It seems we’ve been hearing a lot about airlines treating passengers badly. We've also hard plenty about customers taking out their frustrations in not so pleasant ways, so it shouldn’t be much of a surprise to find out that overall airline satisfaction is on the decline. The annual American Consumer Satisfaction Index is out with their annual report on the airline industry, and finds that customer satisfaction with airlines is down 2.7% this year to a score of 73 on a scale of 0 to 100.
Overall, customers rated Southwest as the best airline with an ACSI score of 80, taking back the top spot from last year’s number one JetBlue, which actually falls 4% with a score of just 79, tying Alaska Airlines for second, although they saw a a 1% increase to 79. As for Southwest, this survey happened way before a passenger was sucked out of an airplane window earlier this month, so who knows if that number is now different.
Meanwhiile, the highest-ranking legacy airlines are American and Delta, who tie for fourth with a 74, which is a 3% decrease for both airlines.
Airline Customer Satisfaction Rankings
- Southwest (80)
- JetBlue (79)
- Alaska (39)
- American (74)
- Delta (74)
- Allegiant (74)
- All Others (73)
- United (67)
- Frontier (62)
- Spirit (62)
- ONE MORE THING! As for what passengers hate most about flying, not surprising, it’s seat comfort, or lack of it. Seat comfort received the lowest ACSI score at 69, a drop of three points from last year. In fact, with the exception of the check-in process, all aspects of airline travel went down, including making reservations (81), flight crew courtesy (80), and baggage handling (79).
Source: ACSI