Airline Passenger Protections: More Data and Analysis Needed to Understand Effects of Flight Delays
GAO-11-733
Published: Sep 07, 2011. Publicly Released: Sep 14, 2011.
Skip to Highlights
Highlights
Flight delays and cancellations are disruptive and costly for passengers, airlines, and the economy. Long tarmac delays have created hardships for some passengers. To enhance passenger protections in the event of flight disruptions, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) recently introduced passenger protection regulations, including a rule that took effect in April 2010 designed to prevent tarmac delays more than 3 hours (the tarmac delay rule), as well as other efforts to improve passenger welfare. As requested, this report addresses (1) whether flight delays and cancellations differ by community size; (2) how DOT's tarmac delay rule has affected passengers and airlines; and (3) how passenger protection requirements in the United States, Canada, and the European Union (EU) affect passengers and airlines. GAO analyzed DOT data, including through the use of regression models, as well as data from FlightStats, a private source of flight performance information. GAO also reviewed documents and interviewed government, airline, and consumer group officials in the United States, Canada, and the EU.
Recommendations
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Department of Transportation | To enhance aviation consumers' decision-making, the Secretary of Transportation should collect and publicize more comprehensive on-time performance data to ensure that information on most flights, to airports of all sizes, is included in the Bureau of Transportation Statistics' database. DOT could accomplish this by, for example, requiring airlines with a smaller percentage of the total domestic scheduled passenger service revenue, or airlines that operate flights for other airlines, to report flight performance information. | The Department of Transportation's (DOT) Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) collects and reports on-time performance for the commercial airline industry in order to monitor the performance of the aviation industry and to help consumers make better informed purchasing decisions. In 2011, we reported that rural airports have higher rates of commercial airline delays, cancellations and diversions than larger airports. For example, using data for 2005 to 2010 representing 98 percent of all airline flights, we found that flights from airports in rural communities (communities with less than 50,000 people) are on average about 3.5 times as likely to be canceled or diverted as flights... from airports in large metropolitan communities. However, the data reported by BTS does not show a difference in performance among different sizes of airports. We showed that this discrepancy is because only flights by the largest airlines representing about 70 percent of all flights are reported to BTS. Smaller airlines that more often serve small and rural airports are not currently required to report their on-time performance. There are many reasons why smaller airlines may have worse on-time performance including operational restrictions for smaller aircraft and economic incentives for larger mainline airlines to impose delays and cancellations on their smaller regional partners. To improve the information available to DOT and ultimately to consumers, we recommended that DOT collect and publicize more comprehensive on-time performance data to ensure that information on most flights, to airports of all sizes, is included in the BTS' database. We recommended that DOT could accomplish this by, for example, requiring airlines with a smaller percentage of the total domestic scheduled passenger service revenue, or airlines that operate flights for other airlines, to report flight performance information. In May 2014, the Department issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for comment and is expected to issue the final rule in April 2016. In the Notice, DOT proposed increasing the number of airlines required to report on-time performance by lowering the minimum percentage of passenger traffic from 1 percent to 0.5 percent for a reporting airline. Doing so would increase coverage to 94 percent of all passenger enplanements according to the Notice. In making this proposal, DOT credited GAO's 2011 recommendation and noted the benefits that would derive from greater public scrutiny of airline performance and DOT's ability to analyze the source of flight disruptions.
View More |
| Department of Transportation | To enhance DOT's understanding of the impact of tarmac delays and flight cancellations, the Secretary of Transportation should fully assess the impact of the tarmac delay rule, including the relationship between the rule and any increase in cancellations and how they effect passengers and, if warranted, refine the rule's requirements and implementation to maximize passenger welfare and system efficiency. | In 2011, GAO reported that long tarmac delays, among other disruptions, are costly for passengers, airlines, and the economy. DOT, in April 2010, implemented a regulation designed to mitigate hardships for airline passengers during long tarmac delays (the tarmac delay rule). Since the rule went into effect, tarmac delays of more than 3 hours have been nearly eliminated, with no delays of more than 4 hours, reducing the hardship for numerous passengers. However, GAO's analysis shows that the rule appears to be associated with an increased number of cancellations for thousands of additional passengers, which is far more than DOT initially predicted, including some who might not have...
|
Full Report
GAO Contacts
Public Inquiries
Topics
Air transportationAirlinesAirportsAviationCommercial aviationComparative analysisCompensationCustomer serviceFederal regulationsPassengersSchedule slippagesTravel