T
tomvehoski
As for avoiding individual airlines, every one of them has its good and bad points. The thing to remember is that any individual experience is statistically insignificant in the overall scheme of things. You can't draw the conclusion that airline X is bad because my flight last week was delayed, but airline Y is great because I got bumped up to first class three years ago. With millions of flights a year the 50-60 I take are still too small a sample to evaluate anything on a global basis.
Your airline of choice will often have more to do with where you live, where you fly and how much they charge. I do recommend you look at www.flyertalk.com where the pool of frequent travelers is large so you can start to draw some conclusions, but again what is good for me may be bad for someone else, so you have to form your own opinion.
You also can't rely on articles, statistics and so on. Jet Blue got blasted in the press because of their performace during the snowstorms earlier this year, but still ended up first in customer satisfaction in a recent survey.
Airports are a little easier to predict. I don't have much reason to go through O'hare, but I do hear it is one of the worst for delays. I personally avoid Atlanta - especially during the summer since a 20 minute thunderstorm can cause rolling delays for hours. Note these are two of the busiest airports in the country and are maxed out at capacity, so when something goes wrong it is tough to recover.
As for continuous improvement, the airline industry is mainly drivin by the cost of a ticket. Most travelers will pick whatever flight is $2 cheaper without regards to if, or where, they have to connect, are there pillows on board, what are the on-time numbers, etc. This has pushed airlines to cut amenities, staffing and anything else they can (pretty much anything but safety) to get their price to show as the lowest when you check for a flight online.
Simple advice is to get elite status with whatever airline works best with your routings and stick with them. This lets you line jump security, phone agents and other hassles. Join the club/lounge if their locations fit your travel so you have a calm place to relax in airports. Always expect things will be go wrong and plan accordingly. My rule of thumb is to expect to be two hours late domestic and a day late international. If one of those delays means I miss something of major importance, I pick an earlier flight.
Your airline of choice will often have more to do with where you live, where you fly and how much they charge. I do recommend you look at www.flyertalk.com where the pool of frequent travelers is large so you can start to draw some conclusions, but again what is good for me may be bad for someone else, so you have to form your own opinion.
You also can't rely on articles, statistics and so on. Jet Blue got blasted in the press because of their performace during the snowstorms earlier this year, but still ended up first in customer satisfaction in a recent survey.
Airports are a little easier to predict. I don't have much reason to go through O'hare, but I do hear it is one of the worst for delays. I personally avoid Atlanta - especially during the summer since a 20 minute thunderstorm can cause rolling delays for hours. Note these are two of the busiest airports in the country and are maxed out at capacity, so when something goes wrong it is tough to recover.
As for continuous improvement, the airline industry is mainly drivin by the cost of a ticket. Most travelers will pick whatever flight is $2 cheaper without regards to if, or where, they have to connect, are there pillows on board, what are the on-time numbers, etc. This has pushed airlines to cut amenities, staffing and anything else they can (pretty much anything but safety) to get their price to show as the lowest when you check for a flight online.
Simple advice is to get elite status with whatever airline works best with your routings and stick with them. This lets you line jump security, phone agents and other hassles. Join the club/lounge if their locations fit your travel so you have a calm place to relax in airports. Always expect things will be go wrong and plan accordingly. My rule of thumb is to expect to be two hours late domestic and a day late international. If one of those delays means I miss something of major importance, I pick an earlier flight.
