cruzcap

Just saying all contribute to the success or failure of an organization….I just can’t understand “world class” compensation for an airline that consistently ranks at or near the bottom in customer sat….

RangerNS

Did the lanyard say "world class compensation" or "world class contract"?

So far as I know, I've only been close to personal flight related danger once, and the pilots successfully aborted the takeoff without issue. I mean, a handful of times they've noticed to giant blinkinlight and called in assistance, but I'd expect the pilots of Elbonia Airlines to not push back if the giant "DONT PUSH BACK" light is lit. Even including me not getting to where I'm going, I'm quite satisfied with the pilot side of the AC operation. I can gripe about other things, but the pilots aren't part of any problem I've ever had.

YOWgary

So that�d be a �no� on any form of specifics then. Shame, I was hoping you�d walk us through how to blame those greedy pilots for the busted seat upholstery, or the catering, or the website, or the crowding in the lounges. All legitimate areas for improvement, I think you�d agree.

The flaw in your argument is really the flaw in this whole thing; �I don�t want to explain, I just want to be mad� offers nothing to anyone.

Thank you for that moment of levity.

PLeblond

After reading an Aviation News Site article about this, I was reminded of a podcast from an automotive journalist and car aficionado who explained how JD Power surveys killed all automotive brand identities when it came to design, most especially interior ergonomics.

Those of us here who are older may remember when one could easily distinguish between brands through interior design of a car. Some companies had window switches on the centre console, others had the wiper stalks on the left side. Door handles were of different design and placements, Lighting knobs, HVAC layouts. The sounds of things like door open or seatbelts varied my brand.

What happened is that people who changed car brands they would get a JD Power survey not long after getting the cars and were still adapting to their new car, so they commented negatively about things that were different, even if not bad. So, car companies addressed these points in the hopes of getting better JD Power survey results. This, combined with automotive supplier parts consolidation have created the car interior we all get today. Mostly uniform across all brands and devoid of any character or individuality. This seems to have creeped to the exterior of cars too to a certain point.

When taking a step back, it makes me look at the North American airline industry as a whole. As US carriers have improved their premium cabins in the last decade or so, the delta in hard product is basically extinct (outside of the ultra-pedantic world called FT of course).

So what exactly is JD Power telling us here? From JD Powers Website “based on performance in seven core dimensions on a poor-to-perfect 6-point rating scale. Individual dimensions measured are (in alphabetical order): airline staff; digital tools; ease of travel; level of trust; on-board experience; pre/post-flight experience; and value for price paid. Of those, they continue “The level of trust airline passengers have in their airline is correlated to media coverage about that airline. Overall satisfaction scores for trust are 400 points lower (on a 1,000-point scale) among passengers who saw negative news coverage of an airline’s performance in the past year.”

Let’s ignore the absurdity of comparing limited route, low-cost carriers directly to full service International Airlines it would seem media perceptions seem to be one of the strongest factors and people may have been ranking airlines they never actually flew on basing their opinions on media, including of course, social media. Hmmm.

What does all this tell me? I miss cars that actually had a soul and character rather than todays oversized, overweight, unremarkable, undistinguished blobs of metal and plastic. Damn you JD Power!

taupo

The bolded part will slaughter AC.
Canadian media loves to slam AC at any opportunity they get.
Any FOTSG who bought the cheapest most restricted fare and then whines incessantly about big bad AC gets unlimited airtime without the media asking questions such as which fare, did you read the rules and restrictions.

RangerNS

People want better products for free. Asking people is stupid. You either need to do testing, or data analysis.

tomvancouver

People also want the advertised product, delivered on time

Transpacificflyer

I paid a premium fare for my last TPAC in "Signature Class". I expected all of the services promised for a Signature class purchase. I did not receive several of the Signature services, and of those provided, the quality level was poor. I am not asking for better products for free. I am asking that Air Canada provide the products and services it says it will provide, and at a quality level that reflects its promoted claims of quality.
Asking customers their opinion of a service received is appropriate and is not stupid. Air Canada has never asked me any indepth questions on my passenger experience. I ask my clients and stakeholders for their concerns and for feedback, and have used it to improve my professional performance.
The type of information obtained from the JD Power survey is a measurement of trend and consumer perception. It is not intended to be a defiinitive analysis. Rather, it provides an indication of the customer impression and feeling as to the services or products provided. It is a big picture approach. Air Canada has benefited from the market structure and lack of market regulation and oversight in the Canadian market. Until the Canadian airline industry is subject to some basic consumer protection and regulatory oversight, including reporting of monthly service results as seen in the USA and EU, there is no incentive for Air Canada to improve. IMO, the airline's business model is one of poor OTP, low quality catering, and poor ground handling. Of course flights will be late if there is no personnel available to operate a gate and baggage will be delivered late if the baggage crew is under resourced, and cabins will be dirty if the airline doesn't support cabin grooming as a priority, and catering will be poor if the airline pushes for cost reductions on top of cost reductions etc.

YOWgary

I completely agree that it's reasonable to seek this information. The problem comes when no effort is made to understand whether or not the customer's opinion of service received is based in an accurate understanding of what the product is supposed to be. For example, there are a dozen or so members of this community whose understanding of the Air Canada product is sufficient to do a pretty fair job of training Concierges or long-haul Service Directors. Problem is, a survey like JD Power weights their opinions equally with the FOTSG ranting on Reddit about the criminal fraud perpetrated when Air Canada didn't upgrade them for free from a Basic fare, despite the seat map clearly showing two open seats in Business a month before departure.


I think you're half right; the Canadian airline environment is such that (airports / airlines / government) each have lots of room to throw their hands up and say "not our fault" about an awful lot of things. It leads to much the same result you describe, I only differ insofar as I think those results are reached more by apathy than by design.

RangerNS

It's a Dilbert quote (from before it was obvious buddy was crazy).

Yes, obviously, people want what they pay for. And that should be QA'd with direct check-ins. I mean to say, forward looking, people don't know.

What matters is what customers actually do.

Sopwith

My level of trust correlates to the discrepancy between what they tell me and what they actually do.

kangarooflyer88

I'm sorry but the premise of this article is completely wrong. Air Canada has not hit "rock bottom" on customer satisfaction in Premium Cabins as some might suggest. For one thing the premise of the study is entirely flawed. If you are gonna make a fair comparison of Air Canada, you need to include all competitors, not just ones the firms deem, "relevant" (whatever that means). Where is Frontier, Allegiant, Spirit, SouthWest, WestJet, AmTrak, and most notably Greyhound? I suspect if you include these challengers, you may very well find that whilst Air Canada is scraping the bottom of the barrel, they indeed are not at the bottom of the list.

-RooFlyer88

rankourabu

Amtrak and Greyhound are not airlines, and the study was about airlines.
There is a separate list for economy and includes all the airlines on your list.
Air Canada beat out Spirit and Frontier (what an achievement!) in the economy satisfaction ranking - so yay, way to go AC, not entirely bottom of the barrel in Y, I guess?

Southwest Airlines685
Delta Air Lines651
Allegiant Air633
Alaska Airlines630
JetBlue Airways630
-- Segment Average --613
American Airlines611
WestJet591
United Airlines585
Air Canada542
Spirit Airlines507
Frontier Airlines472

YOWgary

Yeah, anyone running an airline that lost this ranking to an LCC should probably just quit and go home.

On a completely unrelated note, Southwest and Allegiant finished #1 and #3 in that category, which definitely suggests this survey is an accurate measure of overall airline quality and not how effective each airline is at lowering managing customer expectations.

I'm confused, though - you said earlier that this article was clickbait, and you didn't think it was worth discussing?

PLeblond

So... Airlineratings.com just released their 2024 survey and AC beat The US Big 3. From the article, "...combines major safety and government audits with 12 key factors, including fleet age, passenger reviews, profitability, safety rating, product rating, innovation and forward fleet orders."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurabe...h=c87dd242b24a

All these surveys reminds me of a famous quote attributed to Andrew Lang: “Most people use statistics like a drunk man uses a lamppost; more for support than illumination”