With the entire airline industry exceptionally understaffed and struggling to meet record post-pandemic demand, more than one traveler is set to have a bad airport experience.
A recent survey from data analytics firm J.D. Power found that passenger satisfaction with North American airlines dropped by 7 points for flights that took place between March 2022 and 2023.
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While many a dissatisfied customers has vowed to never fly with an airline again only to reconsider when looking at fare prices a few months later, travel website The Vacationer identified Spirit Airlines (SAVE) as the carrier that passengers avoid the most.
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Here's Why So Many Carriers Avoid These Airlines
A budget airline based in Florida's Miramar, Spirit was named as the airline that 21.06% of the 1,021 polled travelers "avoid flying at all costs."
Similarly to the rest of its low-cost competitors, Spirit is notorious for luring in travelers with low base prices and then charging for everything from food and seat selection to even a small carry-on bag. Fellow budget airline Allegiant Air took second place with 16.36% of the votes while Denver-based Frontier (FRON) was not far behind at 14.30%.
"Spirit Airlines is the clear-cut winner of airlines that Americans avoid flying on at all costs," The Vacationer co-founder Eric Jones wrote of the findings.
American Airlines (AAL) took the questionable top spot as the most-avoided full-cost carrier. With 14.4% of the "never again" vows, it was also third when it comes to dissatisfaction overall.
Both bringing in 12.63% of the "never-againers," Delta Airlines (DAL) and JetBlue (JBLU) tied for second place among full-cost carriers and fifth among airlines overall. The survey allowed for people to select multiple airlines they vowed to never fly with again.
Even with some people cursing theses airlines, a far greater 48.38% said they do not avoid flying with any airline — 31.73% because they said they always go for the cheapest fare option when it comes up regardless of airline and 16.65% because they would not avoid an airline if it offers the right date and time for travel."
'Cost Of The Flight Is Most Important'
"With continued inflation, there should be no surprise that nearly one-third of all American adults said the cost of the flight is most important to them regardless of airline," Jones writes.
Both in a nod both to the airline's quality and a testament that few are unhappy when going on vacation to Hawaii, Hawaiian Airlines had the lowest dissatisfaction rate out of all the airlines. Only 5.48% of those polled said they would never fly with the airline again.
Spirit, meanwhile, also took the top spot as the airline with the most dissatisfied customers in the earlier study conducted by J.D. Power even as satisfaction with cost and fees for economy travel was down 19 points overall across the industry.
"If yield management were the only metric airlines needed to be successful in the long term, this would be a banner year for the industry because they are operating at peak economic efficiency," Michael Taylor, J.D. Power's travel intelligence lead, said in a statement on the findings. "From the customer perspective, however, that means planes are crowded, tickets are expensive and flight availability is constrained.
