Best and worst US airlines

A new ranking by the Wall Street Journal reveals that overall Delta was the best airline, while United was the worst BBC reports.

The US air travel improved for passengers during 2012 according to a new ranking of US airlines.

The ranking was released last Thursday by the Wall Street Journal, using data from FlightStats.com and the Department of Transportation, which oversees air and other transportation in the US.

The report ranked seven major airlines;
Alaska Airlines, American, Delta, jetBlue, Southwest, United and US Airways according to six criteria:
late flights, cancelled flights, extreme delays, bumped passengers, lost bags and complaints.

Delta was the best airline, while United was the worst.

Almost 80% of domestic flights were on time, or within 15 minutes of scheduled time, in 2012.
In 2011 the same figure was 76%.

Only 1.4% of domestic US flights were cancelled last year, compared with 2.1% in 2011.
Fewer flights had excessive delays (defined as 45 minutes or more), and there were fewer lost bags.

The overall rate of traveller complaints increased.
United Airline’s customer complaints accounted for virtually all the industry-wide increase in complaints in 2012. United received 3,617 complaints in the first 10 months of 2012, compared with 958 during the same period in 2011.

Delta Air Lines had 777 complaints.

Among the reasons for United’s low performance is said to be due to the merger with Continental.
Critical data was lost during electronic transfer of United passenger information to Continental computer systems, leading to lost reservations, long phone wait times, late and cancelled flights and angry customers.

American Airlines came in second-to-last with the highest rates of late and cancelled flights.
Disputes with pilots in autumn likely led to their high rates of late and cancelled flights.

The 2012 Airline ranking results:

Delta
Alaska
US Airways
Southwest
jetBlue
American
United

Source: BBC