Southwest Airlines struggles with being on time - Richmond Times Dispatch

A major airline suddenly can’t seem to get passengers to their destinations on time, posting worst-in-the-industry on-time rates.

But, surprise. It’s not an airline that cynics love to hate, mega-carriers United Airlines or American Airlines. And it’s not an ultra-discounter, such as Spirit Airlines.

It’s perennial consumer favorite Southwest Airlines, the carrier that typically sits atop customer satisfaction ratings, with such consumer-friendly policies as free checked bags and no fees to change a flight.

Recently, Dallas-based Southwest has had the worst on-time rates in America — a shocking turn for an airline that once topped the industry in punctuality year after year and bragged about it.

For the second consecutive month, Southwest has placed at the bottom of the monthly on-time statistics, according to data reported to the Department of Transportation. It marks the first time since at least 1995, when the current Department of Transportation reporting system began, that Southwest ranked last for any month.

For instance, at Midway Airport in Chicago, where Southwest has more departures than any other airport, the airline’s on-time rate last year has been abysmal, with an average of only two of three flights departing on time, according to the most recent DOT statistics.

Seth Kaplan, managing partner at Airline Weekly, said it was surprising to see Southwest at the bottom of the heap of any consumer ranking.

“It’s unusual,” he said. “Although they have transitioned in recent years to more of a revenue-focused airline, they’ve always been an airline that got the operation right.”

The reasons for Southwest’s on-time woes are many.

For one, Southwest has a penchant for scheduling flights close together, giving little wiggle room when flights encounter weather problems, for example, said Henry Harteveldt, a travel industry analyst at Hudson Crossing.

“Southwest schedules its planes so tightly, to maximize efficiency and keep fares low, that even a slight delay early in the morning can snowball into a larger delay through the balance of the day,” he said.

And through the years, Southwest has expanded into congested air markets more prone to delays, such as New York.

“It’s possible that air traffic congestion on key routes … contribute to the local delays,” Harteveldt said.

Because Southwest is not strictly a hub-and-spoke airline, and doesn’t fly as many back-and-forth flights as major network carriers do, its spare aircraft are less often in places where they’re needed, which can lead to delays, Kaplan said.

Meanwhile, airline competitors have slowly improved their on-time rates, raising the bar on performance.

But the reason for the recent terrible on-time rates — in August, September and October — has been “a combination of unexpected summer weather and changes made to our schedule,” Southwest spokesman Brian Parrish said.

“We are aware of the pain points in our network, and we continue to work on schedule adjustments that will improve our future performance,” he said.

In an attempt to improve its on-time rates, Southwest last week changed its schedule, extending for some routes the total time it allots for such tasks as flying, taxiing, loading and unloading passengers, and preparing the aircraft for the next flight.

But delays on Southwest could continue in the near term.

“Adjustments take several months to implement, due to the complexity of our schedule,” Parrish said. “But we do expect to see improvement by early next year.”

At Richmond International Airport, where Southwest began offering one daily round-trip, nonstop flight to Orlando, Fla., in early November, the airline is getting good marks.

“Based on customer feedback and our own observations, Southwest Airlines and its AirTran Airways subsidiary are offering, at a minimum, very satisfactory operating performance at RIC,” airport spokesman Troy Bell said.

Since Southwest began the Orlando service, Bell said Richmond International has observed strong growth on that route.

Brett Snyder, a blogger at CrankyFlier.com and operator of a small travel concierge service, said he has noticed a problem lately with Southwest flights being delayed.

“It’s been worse in the last month from our perspective, though to be fair, we’re a pretty small snapshot of the entire picture,” he said.

Southwest’s performance woes are a far cry from the mid-1990s, when for five years running it was tops in on-time performance, baggage handling and low complaint rates. It bestowed on itself the “Triple Crown” award for excelling on those measures that are important to consumers.

Kaplan said the good news is the delays are not a result of the typical reasons, such as work slowdowns by unhappy union workers or merged airlines combining reservation systems, which often leads to glitches and delays.

“My guess is that this will probably take care of itself, because there’s not the obvious things that have caused operational issues at other airlines,” he said.

And consumers don’t seem to be too angry. During September and October, when Southwest had the worst on-time rates, its rate of complaints filed by consumers was lowest and second-lowest in the industry, respectively.

Source: southwest - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNFXJm8uODAGjwwQSsASbsBiAxSUyg&url=http://www.timesdispatch.com/business/ap/southwest-airlines-struggles-with-being-on-time/article_21e50a3f-aeff-5fdd-a1a2-399c51200df9.html