Defends Industry Practices, Points To Improvements
The Air Transport Association of America (ATA) responded
quickly to the release Wednesday by the DOT of its Passenger
Protections Final Rule.
“ATA appreciates that DOT shares our goal of providing
safe, reliable transportation, treating customers fairly and
providing the best service possible," said ATA President and CEO
Nicholas E. Calio in the statement. "The airline industry supports
increased communication and full transparency, ensuring that our
customers always know exactly what they are getting every step of
the way; and market forces – not additional regulations
– are already providing customer benefits. As the DOT
statistics demonstrate, airlines already have made many service
improvements and many of the regulations formalize procedures
already in place, including prompt delay notification, one-way fare
advertising, and irregular-operation contingency plans. We share
the DOT goal of continuously improving the customer experience and
our member airlines will implement the new rules as efficiently as
possible.”
The industry organization pointed to improvements it says have
been made in several specific areas mentioned in the final
DOT rule. Calio said ATA welcomes the DOT call for the collection
of more data related to cancellations and delays. “Without
comprehensive data and appropriate benchmarks, it is difficult to
accurately evaluate regulatory effectiveness or whether existing
rules should be modified," he said. "Airlines should have more
flexibility in making operational judgment calls to ensure that
they are getting the maximum number of customers to their
destinations reliably and safely. We will work in partnership with
the DOT to collect more statistics, and we also believe DOT must
create a new cancellation tracking code in line with the new
regulations to provide a greater understanding of the rule’s
effectiveness and whether unintended consequences are
occurring.”
Nicholas Calio
In 2010, the industry posted its lowest rate of mishandled
baggage – 3.57 bags per 1,000 customers – since the DOT
began keeping records, and its third consecutive year of
improvement. “Our members compete aggressively on customer
service and are investing in new processes and infrastructure to
assure that passengers’ bags arrive on time,” Calio
said. The industry recently launched a project to create a
centralized database of baggage rules in order to make the rules
more transparent for interline or code-share trips.
On the subject of passenger bumping, ATA says the 2010 rate of
involuntary denied boardings was the lowest since 2006. As reported
by the DOT, there were 1.09 involuntary denied boardings per 10,000
enplaned passengers, down 11 percent from 2009. Many airlines have
long-standing policies and procedures to assist passengers,
including first asking for and compensating volunteers.
Finally, he pointed out that some airlines have opted to offer
customers the option to pay for products and services that they
want and, in doing so, have continued to be fully transparent,
ensuring that customers know exactly what they are buying and
paying for before the purchase transaction. Airlines will continue
to work to present a clear differentiation between the fare charged
by the airlines and the government taxes and fees, which can
account for roughly 20 percent of the ticket price.