On Wednesday, J.D. Power and Associates released their annual North America Airline Satisfaction Study, a barometer of airlines performance over the previous 12 months. Perhaps the most shocking thing about this year’s results is that American based airline companies came out ahead for a fourth year in a row.
The airlines were judged based on J.D. Power’s rigorous 7-point system which takes into account (in the following order) “costs and fees; in-flight services; boarding, deplaning and baggage; flight crew; aircraft; check-in; and reservations.” Thanks to improvements over the previous years, airlines pulled off a score of 726 on a scale of 1,000.
The highest ranking individual airline was perennial winner JetBlue, who has ranked first on the list for twelve years running. This year, however, Southwest Airlines was nipping at their heels, falling just one point short of JetBlue’s standard.
The news that the airline industry is on the rise may be surprising considering the rampant complaints about the travel industry as a whole. Here’s the thing, though; J.D. Powers survey comes out a mere 24 hours after Mashable posted an article claiming that passengers were more likely to moan and groan about a bad trip rather than actually do anything about it.
