The most punctual airlines according to Wall Street Journal: Delta Airlines tops the rankings
The Wall Street Journal has published the ranking of the main American companies, particularly with regard to the punctuality of flightsDelta Air Lines took first place in the Wall Street Journal’s 14th annual ranking, ahead of Alaska Airlines and Southwest Airlines. The American newspaper’s ranking rates the main American airlines in seven key areas for travelers: on-time arrivals, canceled flights, extreme delays, waiting more than two hours on the tarmac, mishandled baggage, passengers unintentionally changed flights and customer complaints.
American passengers generally praise JetBlue – while they often criticize Spirit Airlines and Frontier Airlines, which incidentally have just merged.
But this year, the low-cost airline based in Long Island City (New York) has dropped to last place in the Wall Street Journal’s annual ranking of American airlines, behind Spirit and Frontier. American Airlines nearly suffered the same fate, now tied with Frontier in 6th place.
Delta won first place in five of the seven criteria analyzed, with the most on-time arrivals, the fewest cancellations and extreme delays, and the fewest complaints. Delta passengers were also the least likely to be bumped from a flight in 2021.
In contrast, JetBlue had the highest rate of extreme delays and incidents where passengers had to wait on the tarmac for at least two hours. It is the second airline with the least on-time arrivals, behind Allegiant Air, and the second in terms of the number of customer complaints behind Spirit.
The WSJ ranking
1- Delta Air Lines
2- Alaska Airlines
3- Southwest Airlines
4- United Airlines
5- Allegiant Air
6- American Airlines
6- Frontier Airlines
7- Spirit Airlines
8- JetBlue Airways
Data comes from masFlight and the Ministry of Transport. In most criteria, they include flights from regional partners of each airline. The first three categories relate to flight performance in the 2021 calendar year, while criteria such as two-hour tarmac delays, involuntary bumps, complaints and mishandled baggage are based on data from the Ministère des Transports covering 12 months and ending in September or October 2021.