6 - The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, April 3, 2001 NATION/WORLD Airlines fail to improve service, study shows Passengers bumped, per 10.000 1999 0.88 Mishandled bags, per 1,000 I1I WASHINGTON (AP) - Airline flights arrived behind schedule more often and more passengers complained about service despite industry promis- es to improve, a new study says. An annual review of airline quality conducted by two university professors also found more passen- gers bumped from overcrowded flights and more mishandled checked baggage. "The airlines promised to do better. Things got worse. That's not encouraging," said report co- author Dean Headley, associate professor of mar- keting at Wichita State University. Based on data collected by the Transportation Department, the report found that last year: Flights of 10 major carriers were on time 72.6 percent of the time, down from 76.1 percent in 1999. The Transportation Department received 2.98 complaints for every 100,000 passengers. a 20 per- cent increase over the 2.48 in 1999. For every 1.000 bags checked. airlines mis- handled or lost 5.29. up from 5.08 in 1999. The rate of passengers being bumped against their wishes rose from 0.88 per 10.000 in 1999 to 1.04. Delta won the highest rating for passenger ser- vice among major airlines. followed by Alaska and Southwest. America West received the lowest rank- ing. In 1999, Southwest was the highest-ranked air- line and United was the lowest, with Delta third from the top. United was ranked next to last this year. "We're obviously pleased to be recognized,,, Delta spokesman John Kennedy said. "It acknowl- edges Delta's improvement in customer service. What we're doing ... is to focus our efforts on cus- tomers* needs in these critical service areas." America West spokeswoman Patty Nowack said the airline has dramatically improved service since the end of 2000. "If the study was conducted in the first quarter of 2001, you would see America West's performance going against the trend." Nowack said. "We've improved our on-time performance. have less mis- handled bags and fewer customer cotfplaints." When Congress was considering legislation in 1999, the airlines and the Transportation Depart- ment instead agreed on a package of voluntary standards. The department s inspector general reported in February that customer service had improved but still had a long way to go. The Senate Commerce Committee approved a bill this year to make the airlines' voluntary con- stimer guidelines a legal contract with passengers: require airlines to disclose on-time performance of flights when customers buy tickets or make reser- vations; and require the industry to establish a timetable for reducing the number of flights delayed at least 30 minutes. Legislation also has been introduced in the House. The professors said they believed Congress ulti- mately would pass some iegislation to help airline passengers. "We cannot see many years of continuous airline quality diminishing without some sort of regulato- ry action." said the report s other co-author. Brent Bowen. director of the aviation institute at the Uni- versity of Nebraska at Omaha. Airline industry officials noted that the inspector general in his February report cited substantial improvements in customer service. "To ignore the positive steps that have been taken is simply disingenuous and misleading to the public." said Michael Wascorm. a spokesman for the Air Transport Association. the trade group for the major airlines. "No one can argue that we are not fulfilling otir commitments." In addition, airline industry officials are expected to announce this week that voluntary service com- mitments will become part of the legal contract with passengers beginning May 1; and a new task force of airline, airport and Federal Aviation Administration representatives has been set up to develop ways of providing timely and accurate information about delays and cancellations to pas- sengers. Industry officials have blamed the problem largely on an air traffic system inadequate to handle the sharp growth in airline traffic. The number of passengers on U.S. airlines rose from 600 million in 1995 to 733 million in 2000. the Federal Avia- tion Administration says. 1999 5.08 ent* On-time flights, by perc 1999 76.1 Quality of passenger service, by airline 2000 1999 1998 Rank/airline rank rank 1. Delta 2. Alaska 3. Southwest 4. US Airways 5 Northwest 6 American 7 Continenta 8. TWA 9. United 10. 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