Profile: smg
This is smg's Profile page. Use it to view smg's comments, other users' replies to these comments, and comments smg has endorsed.
What's Happening Now
Just a quick point: the DOT got the idea of flight notifications from the airlines themselves, so I wouldn’t be so quick to discount the incentive that customer satisfaction plays to airlines. Here is an excerpt from the proposed rule: “Carriers recognize the importance of timely and accurate flight information, as evidenced by the fact that many of the largest U.S. carriers promise through their customer service plans to provide passengers all known information about delays and cancellations as soon as they become aware of the issue” (48). Any business which intends to survive has to satisfy its customers, otherwise the customers will simply stop buying their product, and the business will go bankrupt. Airlines themselves already thought up flight status notifications because… more »
I find it interesting that you claim neither passengers nor profits to be benefiting from the current state of air transit affairs. Now, air fare is affordable (prices of air fares have decreased 25% since 1991) and more available to citizens than ever before. Airlines like Southwest are benefiting exactly because they are offering low fares, serving their customer needs, which would seem to disprove your statement that both profits and passengers suffer in the status quo. « less
No comments
It has become abundantly clear that commercial airline travel is a “race to the bottom” that satisfies needs of neither passengers nor airline profits. A change of environment, which can only be imposed from outside the industry is needed. Imposition of common sense regulations, such as a requirement that airlines give updated flight information, would level the playing field and remove the impetus for airlines to cost-cut in this area. The results would be better service to customers and a renormalization of the playing field from which the airlines compete without fear of being undercut. This goes for most of the proposed new regulations. I sincerely believe that these regulations are in the best interests of both airlines and passengers.