Southwest Airlines: A Case Study in Great Customer Service

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airline customer service case study

Southwest Airlines serves over 126 million passengers each year, provides service to 121 airports across 11 countries and has maintained its nearly 72,000-employee roster with no involuntary furloughs or layoffs in its history. In addition to its commercial and financial success, Southwest Airlines is known for its excellent customer service. Southwest has built an impeccable reputation by putting customers first and ensuring its employees are content and financially secure.

This model of exceptional customer service can be extrapolated to fit the needs of almost any industry if you employ strategies that work for your business. We’ll explain why Southwest is so successful as a company and a customer service provider to help other businesses understand and implement its tenets. 

Southwest treats its employees well

Great customer service starts with happy employees. Southwest treats its employees well by backing individual employees’ decisions and providing everyone with quality employee benefits . For example, the company offers a 401(k) plan and matches contributions dollar-for-dollar up to 9.3 percent of the employee’s eligible earnings. It also offers a profit-sharing plan, an employee stock purchase plan, health and well-being rewards, as well as quality medical, vision and dental coverage.

In addition to benefits, Southwest also encourages professional development through in-person and online classes, mentorship programs, and even a Career Mobility Center that supports internal career advancement through advisement sessions and interview prep resources. The company also prioritizes community outreach, encouraging and incentivizing employees to give back to causes that matter to them.

Making employees brand advocates is your best defense against bad customer service.

Southwest makes excellent customer service its mission

According to a mission statement on Southwest’s website, “The mission of Southwest Airlines is dedication to the highest quality of Customer Service delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, individual pride and Company Spirit.” 

Southwest outperforms competitors in customer service

In its last survey of the airline industry from 2018, the Temkin Group compared nine U.S. airlines on the quality of their customer experience – the sum of all a customer’s experiences and interactions with a brand. The strategy of focusing on customer experience is built around the needs of the individual customer over the lifetime of the customer-brand relationship.

The Temkin Group’s survey ranked each airline on the criteria of functionality (how well experiences meet customer needs), accessibility (how easy it is for customers to do what they want to do) and emotion (how customers feel about the experience).

Southwest Airlines earned the highest score every year the Temkin Experience Ratings were published from 2011 to 2018, except for 2015. In the most recent rankings, the company received the highest score in the airline industry, 76 percent – 10 percentage points higher than the industry average score of 66 percent. 

Over the years, Southwest Airlines has maintained high ratings among customers, even amid a global pandemic and overall declines in passenger satisfaction. According to the 2023 J.D. Power North American Airline Satisfaction Study , Southwest ranked highest in customer satisfaction for a second consecutive year for the economy and basic economy segment.

How Southwest Airlines emphasizes the customer experience

Southwest Airlines takes the following crucial steps to prioritize the customer experience:

  • Southwest offers multiple avenues for customer support. Customer experience is no longer just an in-person interaction or a phone call. It’s now online, in live chat and more. In addition to multiple phone numbers for different customer service issues, Southwest offers live chat (via mobile app), email and a self-help resource center, allowing multiple touch points and opportunities to delight customers .
  • Southwest adapts to meet customers’ evolving expectations. The airline invested over $2 billion to improve the customer experience. From improved real-time travel communications to bag tracking to bolstered self-service options, Southwest proactively meets passenger needs to make traveling more convenient and comfortable.
  • Southwest empowers employees. Southwest takes care of its employees, which, in turn, helps employees take care of its customers. Providing robust financial and wellness benefits and ongoing career development allows Southwest’s team to perform at its best and effectively support its customers.

Examining Southwest Airlines as a customer service case study can help other companies learn to provide a great customer experience and place customer service at the forefront of their mission and company culture.

How to provide excellent customer service

All businesses should strive to achieve Southwest’s exceptional customer service. However, many of its specific strategies are tailored to the airline industry and may not work for your organization. Here are a few additional methods any business can implement to give its customers the service they deserve.

1. Be responsive to issues.

Nothing is more frustrating than being put on hold for over an hour, especially if you’ve already paid for a product or service. Remember that your customer relationships don’t end after money has been exchanged. These relationships are long-term commitments that must be cultivated over time.

If you don’t have the time to answer calls all day, consider staffing your business with more agents or outsourcing customer service calls. Ensure all customer service reps and outsourced service agents use one of the best CRM software platforms to ensure consistency and informed help. You can also streamline your communication channels and preferences to accommodate as many customer inquiries as possible. For example, it’s easy to set up a chat feature or an FAQ page on your website to avoid being overwhelmed by calls. 

With so many options available to help your customers, there’s no excuse for leaving them in the dark when they have an issue.

2. Communicate beyond complaints.

Responding to problems swiftly is vital to maintaining a high level of customer service, but communicating with your audience shouldn’t stop there. Starting a weekly email newsletter or using X (formerly Twitter) as a customer support channel are great ways to stay in touch with your base.

A simple “thank you for thinking of us” when a customer tags your brand on social media can go a long way. It’s a simple, cost-free measure to set your business apart as one that truly cares about customer service.

Use proven customer service metrics and KPIs like customer satisfaction scores, net promoter scores and customer effort scores to improve your overall customer service.

3. Get to know your customers.

Customers love a personalized experience because it makes them feel heard. However, to ensure the personalized experience stays positive, you should understand the customer’s wants and needs. Maintaining this mindset will help ensure the customer trusts you and your company in the long run.

Almost every customer service representative has some kind of script they must stick to, but there are opportunities to veer off-book and personalize the experience. You could ask customers what they’ve been up to lately or why they chose your company, or just find a way to make them laugh. If you’re willing to go that extra mile, it can be the difference between keeping a customer and losing them.

4. Keep a positive attitude.

When trying to keep a positive attitude toward the customer, it can help to inhabit a service persona. How you speak to your customers can sometimes be more important than what you say. This approach allows you to connect with the customer on an emotional level. You’ll understand their explicit needs and better understand their overall attitude toward you and the company. If you focus on positive thinking and a positive attitude, customers will likely respond in kind.

Danielle Fallon-O’Leary contributed to this article. 

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Hear Your Customers: An Airline Case Study Analysis

Hear Your Customers: An Airline Case Study Analysis

Bill Inmon

In today's business landscape, customer feedback is crucial for organizations looking to improve their services and stay competitive.

Here are the 5 key takeaways from listening to the airline customer :

  • Data-driven decision-making is crucial in the airline industry for understanding customer needs and expectations.
  • Social media can be a valuable source of real-time feedback for airlines to improve customer satisfaction and build better relationships.
  • Collecting customer feedback through surveys and other mechanisms can help airlines identify areas for improvement.
  • Analyzing customer comments using hierarchical sentiment analysis can help airlines better understand what is important to customers and where to allocate resources.
  • By improving the customer experience, airlines can increase customer loyalty and revenue, leading to a better bottom line.

This is a guest post by Bill Inmon, a renowned author, lecturer, and consultant in the field of data warehousing and business intelligence. In this article, Bill Inmon analyzes a case study of an airline and explores the importance of listening to the airline customer. This article aims to provide insights into the benefits of a customer-focused approach and offers practical tips for airlines looking to improve their customer experience.

Table of Contents

  • Data-Driven Decision-Making in the Airline industry

Airline Case Study Analysis

The future of data in air travel, the unified stack for modern data teams, get a personalized platform demo & 30-minute q&a session with a solution engineer, introduction.

The airline industry is complex, with multiple facets to manage and improve upon to satisfy passengers. From baggage handling to flight delays and cancellations, the airline manager has a finite budget and almost infinite demand for attention. So, how does one allocate limited resources to improve the customer satisfaction index of the airline?

A good place to start is by asking customers what they think should be improved. The internet provides a productive starting point for listening to the voice of the customer. There are many sites where people can express their experiences with the airline in the public domain, allowing anyone to see what they have to say.

By understanding what the customer is saying, airline management can deploy their resources where they will do the most good. In this article, we will explore how airlines can empower a better customer experience by using social media, data-driven metrics, real-time feedback

The Importance of Data-Driven Decision-Making in the Airline Industry

Data-driven decision-making has become increasingly essential in the airline industry to help airlines better understand their customers' needs and expectations. The airline industry generates an enormous amount of data from various sources, such as customer data, social media, and customer feedback, which can be used to improve their overall experience.

Through the analysis of customer data, airlines can gain insight into customer behaviors, preferences, and patterns. This information can help airlines understand what customers need and expect, allowing them to tailor their services to better meet these expectations. For instance, airlines can use data to determine which routes are most popular among customers, which amenities are preferred, and which inflight entertainment options are most enjoyed.

Social media platforms have also become valuable sources of customer data for airlines. Airlines can monitor social media platforms to gain an understanding of how customers perceive their brand and services. Social media provides airlines with real-time feedback on customer experiences and opinions, allowing them to respond promptly to issues and improve customer satisfaction. In addition to providing real-time feedback, social media can also help airlines build better customer relationships. By responding promptly to customer inquiries, complaints, or feedback, airlines can show that they value their customers and are committed to improving their experience.

With that, airlines can use customer feedback to understand customer needs and customer expectations. Airlines can collect feedback through surveys, focus groups, and other feedback mechanisms. This data can help airlines identify areas for improvement, such as customer service, onboard amenities, and in-flight experiences.

By using data to better understand customer needs and customer expectations, airlines can create a better customer experience, increase customer loyalty, and build better customer relationships leading to increased revenue and a better bottom line.

Recommended Reading: Where Is Your Customer Data Located?

Late in 2018 Forest Rim Technology (FRT) went to the Internet and plucked about 2,000 comments from the Internet, using several sites. FRT chose two very popular American airlines as the basis for gathering customer comments.

As an example of what a typical comment looked like, the following was taken from the Internet:

  • Location : United States
  • Rating : 10
  • Date : 2018-11-20 00:00:00
  • Description : ✅ Trip Verified | I am so thankful to be coming home this week to work at Corporate, and to spend Thanksgiving with family and friends. A big shout out to XXXXXXXXX as I booked my ticket in reverse from Columbus to Tampa leaving today except I’m in Tampa! They were able to get me home today still on the next direct flight and fixed my ticket for the following Tuesday. They even let me keep my incredible price of $199.96 round trip. This is why I fly XXXXXXXXX regularly. It pays to be a loyal flyer!

The comments were gathered and fed into Forest Rim Technology’s textual ETL. From textual ETL a standard database was created. The database was then fed into a tool for visualization.

As part of the processing, the object of each sentence was identified. The object of the sentence was then classified upward for two levels of abstraction. For example, if the comment mentioned the word – “dollars” – the database contained three entries – “dollars”, “price”, and “cost sensitive”. Or if the customer mentioned “hypertension”, the database was loaded with “hypertension”, “illness”, “medical condition”. By organizing and classifying these words in a hierarchically classified manner, it is possible to do an analysis at different levels of perspective.

In addition, the words that operate on the objects being discussed can be examined with regard to their sentiment. For example, the words “…I hated …” led to the conclusion that there was a negative feeling toward the object being discussed. Or the words “…we really adored …” led to the conclusion that there was a positive sentiment toward whatever was being discussed.

In addition to understanding sentiment, there is the possibility of merely finding out what was on the customer’s mind, regardless of sentiment. This is useful to the airline executive in a thousand ways once you know what is important to the customer (in either a positive or a negative sense), you know where to place your dollars to the greatest effect. Stated differently, without knowing what is important to your customer, as an executive you are flying blind. The executive might well spend a lot of resources optimizing something that is of importance to only a few customers. By hearing the voice of the customer, the airline’s executive knows where the customer's “hot spots” are.

So, two important aspects of the study were – a hierarchical analysis of the objects of sentiment and a disclosure as to what subjects are of importance to the customer.

At a High Level

At a high level, the study found that customers attention and sentiment looked like this:

Picture 1

Some of the high-level categories mentioned by the customer were:

  • Product : An airline flight, baggage handling, frequent flyer club, etc.
  • People : Stewardesses, pilots, gate agents, etc.
  • Process : Boarding, seating, service, etc.
  • Place : Airport, gate, location, etc.
  • Price : Tickets cost, food cost, etc.
  • Financial activity : paying for the ticket, credit card, etc.

Not surprisingly the airline flight itself was the most important thing to the passengers who expressed their thoughts. And surprisingly the price of the ticket was not a great concern.

In addition, the positive comments were a little above the negative comments. In general, this indicates a generally happy customer base.

Looking at data at a high level allows the executive to get a clear overview of everything on the customer’s mind and the prioritization of what’s important.

At a Lower Level

In the analysis of what the customer was saying, given that the object of sentiment is organized hierarchically, it is possible to drill down on what was said about each major topic. In this study, the major concern of the customer was the product of the airline itself.

 The next figure shows that drill down from the product to the components of the product:

Picture 2

The drill down shows that when examining the product, the number one concern of the customer was on the trip itself. This includes seating, arrival time, and other aspects of the journey. In a distant second place were reservations, then the airline rewards program. And consistent with the high-level analysis is the fact that there were more positive comments than negative comments.

Of course, ANY subject can be drilled upon. This article focuses just on the drill down of the product.

But it is possible to continue the drill-down process to see exactly what people were saying about the trip.

At The Detailed Level

The drill down from the product to its detailed objects displays what the customer is saying down to the detailed level. The detailed level shows the actual words that were found in the customer comments. The next figure shows the detailed drill-down of the product:

Picture 3

The detailed drill down shows that the number subject on the mind of the customer was the flight itself. The flight included every aspect of the flight – boarding, baggage, seating, service, and arrival.

When going down to the detailed level, it is often instructive as to what NOT is found there, as well as what is found there. For example, arrival time is not found in the detailed level. This means that the airline is delivering to its customers on time.

The full case study is available for free by contacting Bill Inmon, at [email protected] .

With emerging technologies such as AI and machine learning, the possibilities for improving the airline customer experience are endless.

One way airlines can continue to use data to create a positive experience is by collecting and analyzing more customer data. This can include data on customer preferences, travel habits, and purchasing behavior. By using this data, airlines can better understand their customers' needs and expectations, and tailor their services to meet those needs.

Airlines have the opportunity to use real-time data analysis for a more personalized customer experience. By monitoring data in real time, airlines can respond quickly to any issues that arise during the customer journey, such as flight delays or lost luggage. This can help to minimize the impact on customers and improve their overall experience.

Emerging technologies such as AI and machine learning can also be used to further improve the airline customer experience. For example, AI-powered chatbots can be used to provide customers with personalized assistance, such as booking flights or checking in for a flight. Machine learning algorithms can be used to analyze customer data and provide personalized recommendations for flights, hotels, and other travel services.

AI and machine learning can also be used to optimize airline operations, such as flight scheduling and maintenance. By analyzing data on flight patterns, weather patterns, and maintenance needs, airlines can make more informed decisions that improve efficiency and reduce costs.

In conclusion, data-driven decision-making is crucial for the airline industry to enhance the customer experience, improve operational efficiency, and ultimately increase the bottom line. By leveraging customer data, airlines can gain a better understanding of customer needs and expectations, and use this information to inform their decision-making processes.

Additionally, Metrics and real-time data analysis can help airlines measure the effectiveness of customer experience initiatives and identify areas for improvement. As emerging technologies such as AI and machine learning continue to evolve, airlines can explore new ways to further enhance the customer experience through data-driven insights.

In summary, the airline industry must continue to embrace the power of data-driven decision-making to create a positive experience for customers and drive success. With the help of data integration solutions, airlines can continue to leverage data effectively to meet the evolving needs and expectations of their customers.

Recommended Reading: How Elevate.inc Used Data Integration to Improve Customer Experience

Tags: big data, Customer Data,

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  • Elsevier - PMC COVID-19 Collection

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A study on airlines’ responses and customer satisfaction during the COVID-19 pandemic

The Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic outbreak has significantly impacted the airline industry worldwide. However, limited studies have systematically investigated the airlines' responses and customer satisfaction in the aviation industry during the COVID-19 pandemic. The present study attempts to address this knowledge gap.

The first aim of this study is to determine customers' satisfaction with the aviation industry during the COVID-19 pandemic. A questionnaire survey was conducted in China to investigate the Chinese passengers' satisfaction with 22 constructs in four stages: Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others (Face mask requirement, HEPA filters, etc.). Second, this work explored the measures that will benefit the airlines by investigating the measures taken by 49 major airlines worldwide, especially considering the operational cost and passengers’ safety.

It was found that cabin selection and passengers who travelled after the start of COVID-19 were the groups that affected passengers’ satisfaction levels on responses. The top 3 satisfied measures were “Provide hygiene products for passengers and staff”, “A thermal scanner to monitor body temperature during check-in”, and “Disinfect the cabin after each flight, even for a previous flight of the connecting flight”. In contrast, the bottom 3 measures were “Protective clothing is required to board the plane”, “Adopt a special boarding method such as boarding in the order from back to front”, and “No in-flight meals and drinks (only snacks and water)”. Airlines’ responses primarily focused on reducing the operation cost, ensuring the safety and interests of the passengers and improving the income and cash of the company.

1. Introduction

Coronavirus (COVID-19) is a sheer devastating factor in the aviation and tourism industries. The airline industry has recorded constant and extraordinary growth in the past century. In this way, it has resisted some huge global catastrophes, for example, the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 and the global financial crisis in 2008. Only a half-century after its commencement, the air travel market reached a milestone in 1987: one billion passengers in one year. Afterwards, it was exponentially developed for around two decades; it succeeded in surpassing 2 billion in 2005 and then 3 billion in 2013, and it reached even 4.5 billion passengers in 2019. Two factors have principally altered the international travel status: low airfares and a growing population of prosperous middle-class people. Air travel market share abruptly increased to 58% by 2019, which means 14% more than this number 20 years ago ( UNWTO, 2020 ).

Suddenly in early 2020, the aviation industry encountered a critical point induced by the rapid outbreak and spread of COVID-19. After its primary identification in Wuhan, China, it started to spread to 218 countries in a short period ( Lai et al., 2020 ). It infected over one million people worldwide by April 2020. Then, in November of the same year, 53 million people were identified as confirmed cases, with around 1.38 million deaths ( World Health Organization, 2020a ). Countries set up travel restrictions for their people, and, in addition to that, people were reluctant to travel, fearing COVID-19. This condition seriously and suddenly damaged the aviation and tourism sectors ( Zahraee et al., 2022 ). Tourists were more likely to delay or cancel their travels to prevent them from being infected by COVID-19 ( Reisinger and Mavondo, 2005 ). This stance has been internalized in the attitudes of today's tourists, and they are still trying to avoid high-risk destinations, which has an adverse impact on the tourism sector ( Zhang et al., 2020 ). The existing research studies show that the global airline industry has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the demand for airline business has shrunk significantly. After the declaration of the pandemic by the World Health Organization ( World Health Organization, 2020a ) on 11 March 2020, many countries have closed their borders or issued travel bans in succession. Many international routes have been cancelled due to policy influences, and the aviation market has almost collapsed. Lange (2020) notes that at the worst point in April, two-thirds of the world’s fleet of aircraft was grounded, 90% of aviation business did not keep operation anymore, and even more so for international operations, where it was even more hovering around 98%. Airlines tried to restore routes in the shortest time, but the continuous outbreak of COVID-19 has made the disaster continue. Compared with September 2019, the number of flights of most airlines dropped significantly in September 2020, and the average reduction rate is 50%. The Revenue Passenger Kilometres (RPKs) of domestic routes initially decreased by 80% and then showed a clear upward trend ( IATA, 2020b ). The decline rate increased to 40% in September. The impact on cargo was even smaller, the lowest trough was only a 20% decline rate, and then it continued to rise. Finally, the cargo flight only dropped by about 10%.

Airlines still have to pay for aircraft storage and maintenance costs in a hostile environment and face cash flow interruption. The disparity between income and expenditure has deteriorated the economic situation of airlines. In March and April, international RPKs experienced a cliff-like decline, with a rate of decrease approaching 100%. Even in September, RPK was still at a low level, with a rate of change of around 89% ( IATA, 2020a ).

This work tries to fill the knowledge gap by bridging the operational cost, passengers’ safety, and satisfaction with the airlines by collecting the measures taken by 49 major airlines worldwide and collecting the responses through a questionnaire survey of the airline passengers. This work would determine the measures airlines have taken to deal with COVID-19 and analyze passengers' satisfaction with 22 measures in four stages: Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others (Face mask requirement, HEPA filters, etc.). Based on the previous studies, it can be seen that most of the existing studies usually list which airlines have taken which measures without integrating with the passengers' perceptions. This paper explores the possibility of combining airlines' measures with passengers' satisfaction and thus provides robust evidence to airlines in their future decisions.

The rest of this article is structured as follows. The literature review section discusses the impact of different viruses and COVID-19 on the global aviation industry and the impact of travel restrictions on the tourism/aviation industry. The airline response measure and passengers’ satisfaction criteria are discussed. Then, the methodology section describes the method used and the data collected for the present paper. Afterwards, the empirical findings are presented and analysed in the results and discussion section. Finally, conclusions from the paper are presented.

2. Literature review

2.1. effect of viruses and covid-19 on the global aviation industry.

According to scholarly findings, air transport has a considerable impact on spreading the pandemic worldwide ( Wilder-Smith et al., 2003 ). In addition, several studies have maintained that airline travel has the potential to affect the spread of many viruses, e.g., Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) ( McLean et al., 2005 ), influenza ( Grais et al., 2003 ), and Ebola ( Bogoch et al., 2015 ). SARS infected 37 countries (8000 cases), whereas the Middle East respiratory syndrome infected as many as 27 countries (2494 cases) ( Oztig and Askin, 2020 ). In these cases, the transmission deteriorated partly by those who took flights at the time of the case. Another investigation asserted that the avian flu (H5N1) outbreak spread to about 60 countries, killed nearly 191 people, and reduced around 12 million tourist arrivals within the Asia Pacific ( Wilder-Smith, 2006 ).

SARS negatively influenced people’s inclination to travel ( Wen et al., 2005 ). This finding was confirmed by research conducted by Kuo et al. (2008) , which reported a considerable shrinkage in the number of visitors arriving in SARS-affected countries. With the help of the econometric method, Rosselló et al. (2017) attempted to quantify the influence of various pandemics on visitors’ arrivals. Their findings showed that pandemics meaningfully decrease the number of visitors. For instance, the number of visitor arrivals decreased by 47% after the spread of malaria. Another study reported that foot and mouth diseases had reduced the tourism receipts in the UK ( Blake et al., 2003 ). The above evidence clearly shows that aviation and tourism are two sectors of high vulnerability to infectious disease outbreaks because of their contact-intensive and face-to-face nature and the high mobility rate of both people and goods.

Though COVID-19 exceeded all the former pandemics (it spread to over 200 countries), the scientific reports indicated that the aviation industry significantly contributed to this situation ( Sun et al., 2020 ). This disease led to an extraordinary economic disaster for airline operators on a global scale. In March 2020, the global traffic level fell by 21% compared to the same month in 2019. Then, an unexpected escalation was observed, resulting in more contraction as the global traffic levels dropped by 66% by April 2020 and declined by 69% by May ( UNWTO, 2020 ). This considerable drop occurred when people became aware of the fact that the disease could kill infected people in a short time after infection. Estimations indicated that international tourist arrivals would decrease by 70% in 2020, that is, the loss of 700$ million in the number of visitors and 730$ billion loss in the inbound tourism market ( UNWTO, 2020 ). Statistics indicate that, in 2020, the COVID-19 induced loss was eight times more than the loss during the Global Financial Crisis in 2008–2009 ( UNWTO, 2020 ). The aviation sector suffered from the same loss; in 2020, the airline passenger revenues dropped by about 69% that accounting for around US$421 billion loss in comparison with 2019 ( IATA, 2020b ). The aggregated loss was estimated to be about US$118 billion, which is more than four times higher than the losses in this sector due to the global financial crisis of 2009 ( IATA, 2020b ). Historically, COVID-19 is recognized as the most serious threat to companies working in the aviation sector ( Amankwah-Amoah, 2020 ); this impact could even last until 2024 ( IATA, 2020c ). Recovery may occur optimistically in mid-2022 or delay up to 2026 most pessimistically ( Gudmundsson et al., 2020 ). Several scholars have even stated that the pandemic could cause the collapse of the entire international tourism market ( Thams et al., 2020 ).

Table 1 summarizes several researchers who have paid attention to the impacts of COVID-19 on the air travel industry; however, the literature lacks empirical research on the influence of COVID-19 on operating costs and passengers’ safety and satisfaction.

Summary of COVID-19 investigation in the Aviation industry, including the present study.

2.2. The effect of travel restrictions on the aviation/tourism industry

Both aviation and tourism industries have a high vulnerability to the outbreak of infectious diseases. With the start of COVID-19 spread among people globally, countries restricted travel and closed their borders to minimize the spread of the virus by limiting its import and export via tourists ( Vaidya et al., 2020 ). Recent decades have witnessed increased affordability of air travel for people; consumers have been given a chance to select from numerous airlines. On the other hand, disease transmission could only be confined by limiting people’s travels and mobility in situations such as disease outbreaks. This typically prompts governments to enact the necessary legislation quickly.

As revealed by the reports UNWTO (2020) , as many as 90 destinations partially or completely suspended inbound tourism, and 44 destinations closed their borders to certain countries of origin in case of the COVID-19 outbreak. Many governments have imposed lockdowns, travel bans, shutdowns, and stay-at-home directives to control the virus spread ( Luo et al., 2020 ). However, these measures were taken into action in a highly uncoordinated and almost chaotic manner ( Sun et al., 2020 ). Moreover, the inconsistent travel restrictions caused a significant reduction in the number of visitors intending to travel by air during the COVID-19 outbreak ( Salari et al., 2020 ). According to UNWTO (2020) , it was the first time international travel was limited in such a manner. Numerous people were either discouraged from travelling or informed that they could enter their destination country only if they followed a quarantine procedure lasting for up to 14 days at their own expense. Such conditions had wide-ranging consequences. As reported by Adrienne et al. (2020) , by mid-April 2020, the air travel market dropped by 64%; meanwhile, around 17,000 aircraft were consigned to their shelters.

The travel restrictions mentioned above have obliged airlines to lower their flight operations as much as possible and cut costs. When the vaccination programs were implemented unevenly on a global scale, the accessible tools were confined to measures such as control and containment, including travel restrictions, quarantining, and social distancing ( Petersen et al., 2020 ). The existing literature has empirically confirmed that travel restrictions and control measures can effectively minimize the spread of infectious viruses. The isolation of large cities played a significant role in controlling the SARS epidemic ( Hufnagel et al., 2004 ). Brownstein et al. (2006) investigated the case of influenza spread in the United States and emphasized the prominence of flight restrictions. A significantly-delayed timeframe was reported before influenza peaked in 2001–2002 due to the reduction of flights. On the other hand, the conditions deteriorated in France, where any flight restriction was not imposed. Another study proposed a two-city dispersal model of avian influenza spread via air travel and asserted that control measures such as quarantine and isolation depend on the air travel rate, which refers to the proportion of air passengers in the population of the departure city. As a result, it can be said that restricting people’s travels plays an important role in decreasing the pandemic prevalence ( Tuncer and Le, 2014 ).

On the other hand, some other studies indicate the ineffectiveness of travel restrictions in controlling the spread of infectious diseases. For instance, Cooper et al. (2006) showed that travel restrictions could not significantly delay the worldwide influenza pandemic spread because, initially, many people were infected, and the confirmed cases grew quickly. Likewise, another research argued that travel restrictions could lower the speed of virus spread only for less than 2–3 weeks ( Ferguson et al., 2006 ). A population transmission model was used to investigate the relationships between travel restrictions and the COVID-19 spread ( Chinazzi et al., 2020 ). According to their findings, the lockdown of Wuhan was not as effective as the global travel restrictions, which delayed the spread of the virus to other countries until mid-February 2020. Moreover, according to Borkowski et al. (2021) , the virus can be spread on a domestic scale because of the regular daily mobility of people, such as going to school/work, carrying out social activities, and visiting hospitals. Nevertheless, this in not covered by the scope of the present paper that is mainly focused on the virus transmission via the cross-border flights. As a result, daily mobility of people at the domestic level is not incorporated into the analyses conducted in this research.

2.3. Effect of COVID-19 on passenger load and safety

From the perspective of global aviation, the industry net loss announced by airlines in 2020 was 118.5 billion, and RPKs & APK dropped by 66.3% & 57.6%, respectively. The passenger load factor is around 65.5%. The total number of flights in 2020 was 16.4 million, substantially lower than 38.9 million in 2019 ( IATA, 2020b ). In addition to the airline business affected, airline stock prices have also been hit by COVID-19. When Thailand reported the first case of infection outside China (January 13, 2020), the market did not show a significant decrease in accumulated abnormal returns. But with the outbreak of the Italian epidemic (February 21, 2020) and the WHO statement regarding the global pandemic, and the announcement of the US ban, travelers from 26 European countries/regions (March 11, 2020), global airline stock prices, fell sharply ( Maneenop and Kotcharin, 2020 ). For some time in the future, the stock price will remain depressed. This phenomenon can be attributed to various factors: continuous blockades and traffic restrictions, cash consumption and downgrades of global rating agencies, and poor business prospects ( Dube et al., 2021 ). In October and November of 2020, the aviation safety layer adopted the COVID-19 safety protocol and the arrival test at many destinations, coupled with the news of the successful development of the COVID-19 vaccine, which improved the airline’s performance and revenue. People's renewed trust in the aviation industry also increased stock prices ( Dube et al., 2021 ).

2.4. Effect of COVID-19 on aviation-related industries

The Air Transport Action Group (ATAG) announced that 65.5 million jobs worldwide are supported by the aviation industry, including direct hiring of crew members, airport operators, airlines, etc. ( IATA, 2020b ). Service providers and indirect employment, such as fuel suppliers, construction companies, suppliers of aircraft companies, etc. The article proves that aviation is vital to every country's international trade and economic development ( Serrano and Kazda, 2020 ). The disappearance of flights caused by the outbreak of COVID-19 has also dealt a heavy blow to these aviation-related industries. Air transportation depends on the upstream sector: airports, aircraft manufacturing, aircraft maintenance, etc. Usually, airlines and airports have a mutually beneficial relationship, and some airports rely heavily on one, two, or several companies that use it as a hub ( OECD, 2020a ). Aviation manufacturing and maintenance orders depend on the daily operation and loss of aircraft, and few flights make many aircraft grounded. Therefore, airlines must cancel aircraft purchase plans and reduce maintenance expenditures.

The downstream air transportation sectors rely on the flow of people and goods to stimulate economic activities, such as duty-free shops at airports, tourism, hotels, etc. The promulgation of travel bans and flight restrictions has made the number of visitors low. In transportation, aviation and other modes of transportation are interchangeable. For instance, with a well-developed railway network in China, high-speed rail can allow passengers to maintain a safe social distance while transporting many passengers. Although wide-body jets can still meet the conditions, airlines have to undertake higher costs. Besides, the number of destinations is limited by whether the landing airport is qualified to land large passenger aircraft. The air transport industry also faces increasing market pressure brought about by the increased availability of Internet connections. The connectivity established by video conferencing does not pose health risks associated with passenger transportation ( Peoples et al., 2020 ).

2.5. Airline's response measures

Albers and Rundshagen (2020) made statistics on European airlines' strategic responses to COVID-19 from January to May 2020. The types of responses include retrenchment, persevering, innovating, and exit. The classification of response measures is based on the research of Wenzel et al. (2020) on the response plan of enterprises during the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost all airlines have made layoff decisions ( Albers and Rundshagen, 2020 ), and some airlines have begun to retire their aircraft earlier than scheduled ( Budd et al., 2020 ). Airlines have also made some countermeasures for passengers, such as requesting social distance between passengers and reducing physical contact between people. Some major airlines have introduced more flexible refund and change policies, enhancing their competitiveness in the aviation market ( Chevtaeva and Guillet, 2021 ). Hygiene measures, mask use, and distancing have been proved effective in preventing coronavirus, while temperature screening was unreliable. Besides, in-airport rapid tests with telemedicine and facilities would be the appropriate future strategy at airports ( Bielecki et al., 2020 ). Qatar Airways implements state-of-the-art safety and health measures, including personal protective equipment (PPE) for crew members, free protective kits, and disposable face masks for passengers. In addition, the airline is the first to deploy Honeywell International airlines with ultraviolet (UV) cabin systems that have further promoted sanitary measures on board ( Athena Information Solutions Pvt. Ltd, 2020 ).

There are essential factors for passengers, such as safety and security, customer service, driver friendliness, and the quality of the passenger environment ( Batarce et al., 2022 ). Airlines try new boarding methods to reduce or avoid interactions between passengers. By measuring the performance indicators related to the health of passengers and the boarding time indicators of single-door aircraft, they have evaluated the best use method at present, but due to the cost the time is too long, airlines are also placing greater emphasis on fast boarding times new methods ( Milne et al., 2021 ). Many airlines have also begun to seek help from the government because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The government's assistance to airlines includes supporting loans, helping with capital restructuring, nationalization, and providing flight subsidies. In addition, the government's help may make the competition between airlines unfair, which is what the government needs to consider when assisting airlines ( Abate et al., 2020 ). The main measures taken by the airlines against the business itself are mainly aimed at reducing expenses. As for the passengers, the airlines mainly aim to ensure their flight safety and avoid the spread of the pandemic on their flights. These previous studies are relevant to this report and will be contrasted with the findings of this report in anticipation of more accurate conclusions.

2.6. Passenger satisfaction with airlines

A search of Twitter keywords measured passenger satisfaction with individual airline flight cancellations, refunds, and other measures during the COVID-19 outbreak, with Southwest Airlines, for example, earning high scores ( Monmousseau et al., 2020 ). By mid-October last year, most of the world's 20 major airlines had introduced mask and temperature testing requirements at the Pre-Flight stage, but less than half of them offered hygiene kits. Most airlines continue to require masks and Apply HEPA Filters during the In-Flight stage, and most airlines have set restrictions on the meals they serve ( Bielecki et al., 2020 ). Passengers of different age groups expressed different levels of satisfaction with various aspects of airline service quality, with older passengers being more satisfied with international air travel services than younger passengers. In terms of gender, the results show that at the 10% significance level, male passengers are more satisfied with the safety and security of airlines than female passengers. The ANOVA test was used to determine whether there was a significant difference ( Clemes et al., 2008 ).

3. Methodology

The critical design method of this research is an induction based on mixed data utilization, which includes identifying the research aim, questions, and scope; conducting a literature review and finding gaps; data collection and data analysis; getting results and discussing results. Besides, the theoretical framework is achieved by integrating literature sources. It consists of COVID-19 responses taken by the major airlines worldwide, an analysis of passengers’ differences in perception of measures adopted by airlines, and an evaluation of the responses. The ethics clearance has been acquired from the university. The questionnaires are all voluntarily completed by participants.

Data used in the report are both quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative data refers to passengers’ satisfaction among different responses, which is the primary data collected by the questionnaire. As it is not feasible to send the questionnaire to airlines and obtain their responses against COVID-19, the research collects 22 responses from passengers. The questionnaire used in this study is presented in Appendix . The 22 constructs were developed by considering the guidelines of regulators (e.g., Civil Aviation Safety Authority, Civil Aviation Administration of China, International Air Transport Association), and some other research in the aviation field, such as Bureau, 2020 , Dube et al., 2021 , Bielecki et al., 2020 , Czerny et al., 2021 , and the international air transport rating organisation such as Skytrax (2021) . These 22 responses were widely adopted by Chinese airlines and implemented in four stages: Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others (Face mask requirement, HEPA filters, etc.). The questionnaire was sent to passengers and asked for their satisfaction with each response. The choices of each response are from 1 to 5, representing the most negative attitude to the most positive attitude. The questionnaire survey was conducted online from April 14, 2021, to May 7, 2021, and the survey was mainly distributed through Chinese social media platforms such as WeChat.

The questionnaire collects passengers’ basic information under 12 items to determine whether there are differences between different groups of passengers (Age, Occupation, etc.). Finally, 449 of 500 questionnaires were considered meaningful after excluding repetitive and blank questionnaires. Qualitative data include categories of airline responses, which are the secondary data collected from three sources: airlines' official websites, airlines' annual reports, and credible internet sources. Keywords searching is the main qualitative data collection method (COVID-19, bankruptcy, layoff, etc.). Also, the annual reports of some airlines have a specific COVID-19 section from which the data could also be collected. This resulted in the systematic collection of airlines' responses to the COVID-19 pandemic from 49 airlines.

As for data analysis, IBM SPSS was applied to analyze quantitative data on passengers’ satisfaction. The quantitative analysis focused on two parts: one was to analyze average passengers’ satisfaction with each response by comparing the means of each response, and the other was to figure out whether there are differences between different groups of passengers on the same responses by using the One-Way ANOVA Test. One-Way ANOVA test consists of a series of tests to ensure completeness and preciseness, including Variance Homogeneity Test, ANOVA Test, Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test, and Tamhane T2 Post Hoc Tests in sequential. Homogeneity of variance is assessed using Levene's Test for Equality of Variances. In order to meet the assumption of homogeneity of variance, the p-value for Levene's Test should be above 0.05. If Levene's Test yields a p-value below 0.05, then the assumption of homogeneity of variance has been violated. ANOVA test is a type of statistical test used to determine if there is a statistically significant difference between two or more categorical groups by testing for differences of means using a variance. Another Key part of ANOVA is that it splits the independent variable into 2 or more groups. Welch and Brown-Forsythe ANOVA compares three or more sets of unpaired measurements (data expressed using an interval or ratio scale), assumed to be sampled from a Gaussian distribution but without assuming that the groups have equal variances. The tests of between-subjects effects help in determining the importance of a factor; therefore, the Tamhane T2 Post hoc test is used. It reveals the differences in model-predicted means for each pair at factor levels ( Ross and Willson, 2018 ). When it comes to qualitative analysis of responses taken by airlines, responses are firstly fit into a table to directly show what responses have been taken by each airline in different areas. Then, responses are classified into three groups (reduce the operation cost, ensure the safety and interests of passengers, and improve the company's income) to illustrate the common-adopted responses of airlines in different areas.

4. Results and discussion

4.1. impact of pandemic policies on airlines and passengers.

The whole aviation industry was affected by COVID-19. The change in the behaviour of passengers following the COVID-19 crisis and travel restrictions resulted in a dramatic drop in demand for airline services. The cost of health-related measures and operating costs are likely to increase in the short-run for both airlines and airports because of additional health and safety requirements (e.g. disinfection, PPE, temperature checks or viral tests) before they can be passed on to consumers. Moreover, social distancing measures (if implemented for air transport) could force a reduction in the passenger load factor (i.e. the number of seats that can be occupied during a flight) by up to 50% ( OECD, 2020b ).

Both the airlines and passengers are affected by the pandemic policies, which are obviously different among countries. Mainland China, for example, had almost full control of the pandemic and tried to contain the virus at a relatively early stage. In many other countries, the target is to “flatten the curve”, so that the outbreak is contained at a level that the healthcare system can handle while essential economic activities can be restored early. As a result, the aviation industry should focus on preventing infection at airports and on-board aircraft, with capacity and flight frequency “reactively” adjusted in response to travel demands ( Czerny et al., 2021 ).

Following the COVID-19-induced crisis, British Airways (BA) decided to bring forward its decision to discontinue Boeing 747 fleets as part of its recovery strategy. The airliner was once dubbed the “Queen of the Skies”, the “most recognizable” among the public as well as the preferred choice of global airlines for long-haul routes ( Specia, 2020 ). Likewise, Cathay Pacific reassured their customers of measures being taken by highlighting the “intensifying disinfection of aircraft after landing, making cabin crews don gloves and masks, removing blankets, magazines and pillows, and adding safeguards to the in-flight food and drink service” ( Lee, 2020 ).

As the crisis unfolded, many airlines started moving towards introducing some elements of in-flight social distancing, compulsory temperature checks and demanding that passengers put on masks ( Lee, 2020 ). In line with WHO’s Guide to Hygiene and Sanitation in Aviation , some of the operational responses emphasized enhanced cleaning and disinfection, which covers airports and service providers ( World Health Organization, 2020b ). In addition, it re-emphasized post-event cleaning procedures and disinfecting contaminated surfaces following notification of suspected cases ( World Health Organization, 2020b ).

In an attempt to avert a second outbreak in China, the government limited inter-China flights for both Chinese and foreign airlines by allowing just one flight a week, and each flight was not to exceed 75% capacity ( BBC, 2020 ). The International Air Transport Association, in collaboration with the World Health Organization, have developed guidelines to guide cabin crew and airport workers, e.g. captains are required to inform air traffic control of suspected communicable disease ( IATA, 2020c ). The Chinese government attempt to micro-manage the airlines and airport services to achieve their policy objectives and to deal with the conflicting needs for improving international connectivity for economic/social reasons and tightly controlling the spread of COVID-19 virus cases ( Czerny et al., 2021 ).

4.2. Airlines’ strategic responses to the COVID-19 pandemic

After an investigation of the response of 49 airlines to the outbreak of COVID-19, a conclusion can be reached that airlines’ responses to the outbreak of COVID-19 can be broadly classified into three categories according to their purpose: to reduce the operation cost, to ensure the safety and interests of the passengers and to improve the income and cash of the company. Table 2 summarizes the different responses of airlines to the COVD-19 pandemic by classifying airline responses into 9 categories. In the table, if a response has been taken to a particular category, it is referred to as “Y”, or else it is left blank. According to Table 2 , it is concluded that reducing flights is a measure taken by all airlines to reduce operating costs. This is arguably what airlines have been forced to do because of a sharp drop in passenger travel demand during the outbreak. Most of the airlines in the survey have reduced the salary of their employees or furloughed their workers to reduce labour costs. By contrast, fewer airlines lay off workers. In fact, most airlines reduced their staff numbers by taking many measures, including laying off. As a result, the number of staff of almost all airlines worldwide decreased. Many employees are retrained, which is possible because many airlines believe the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic will have a limited impact on the aviation market after the end of the epidemic and cutting too many jobs is not suitable for their future growth. Among the airlines surveyed, many in Europe and the Americas have opted to retire aircraft early to save operating costs. By contrast, few of the airlines in East Asia took the step of decommissioning their aircraft. Many airlines' annual reports show that many airlines did not stop buying planes during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Airlines' different responses to the COVID-19 pandemic (Source: authors’ compilation of 49 major airlines’ annual reports in 2020).

According to the survey, Asian airlines are more likely than their United States and Europe counterparts to increase their revenue by adding more cargo planes or converting passenger flights to freighters. This is because the industry in the Asia region has recovered quickly, and demand for cargo has increased, giving airlines a chance to make temporary changes. Not many airlines surveyed successfully sought financial assistance from governments and institutions, accounting for about 15 percent of all the airlines surveyed. But more than half of the carriers surveyed in the Americas have successfully sought financial assistance from governments or agencies.

As for the safety of passengers during the epidemic, the vast majority of airlines have taken more or fewer measures. Almost all airlines have put in place comprehensive measures to ensure passenger safety. Due to the different levels of bans issued by various countries during the epidemic, the flight cancellation rate increased significantly. To safeguard the interests of passengers, the vast majority of investigated airlines have introduced more humane ticket cancellation and change services. In particular, airlines in Asia, where nearly 80 percent of the airlines have similar policies to meet passenger travel needs. Only a handful of the airlines in the survey, less than 10 percent, declared bankruptcy or restructured. The vast majority of airlines did not stop operating and continued to do their business.

In the following sub-sections, the details of responses are discussed.

4.2.1. Reduce the operation cost

Due to the impact of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a significant decrease in the number of passengers who travel by air, leading to a dramatic decline in all airlines worldwide. To reduce operating costs to tide over COVID-19 epidemic, airlines have taken different measures to reduce operating costs during the epidemic. The main ways to reduce operating costs include layoffs, wage cuts, early decommissioning of aircraft, postponing aircraft orders, and significantly decreasing flight schedules. Layoffs and wage cuts are the fastest way for airlines to reduce operating costs. The drastic reduction in flight schedules is something the airlines have been forced to do.

4.2.2. Ensure the safety and interests of the passengers

As the COVID-19 epidemic gets more and more serious, airlines have to take strict measures to ensure the safety and interests of passengers to maintain their satisfaction of passengers. To maintain the safety of passengers before check-in, on aircraft, and after landing, many airlines have strengthened the training of their staff and provided passengers with necessary medical supplies. Some airlines also cooperate with medical institutions to provide travellers with epidemic prevention services. As for protecting the interests of passengers, many airlines have introduced more flexible ticket cancellations and rebooking policies to ensure passengers' normal travel.

4.2.3. Increase the revenue and cash flow of the company

Many airlines are looking for more ways to increase revenue and cash flow to keep operating the business during the epidemic and lay the foundation for market recovery. Some airlines tried to turn their passenger flights into cargo flights. The revenue from flying thousands of cargo flights has greatly eased their financial constraints. Some airlines have increased cash flow by raising capital and seeking government assistance. These assistances can help airlines increase their cash flow temporally.

4.3. Average satisfaction score of responses

This section analyses the average satisfaction score of different airline responses, including an analysis of each stage and the overall analysis. The data was collected from 449 participants in the questionnaire. The average score from the participants to each response is shown in Table 3 , Table 4 . Table 3 contains the average score for four stages, while Table 4 illustrates the satisfaction ranking score for all 22 responses.

Satisfaction Ranking (each stage).

Satisfaction Ranking (All).

The satisfaction score of the after-arrival and additional preventive measures, which are rated at 3.99 and 4.00, is higher than the pre-flight and in-flight periods. The lowest score, rated as 3.85, is shown in the in-flight period.

Providing hygiene products for passengers and staff, with an average rating of 4.09, is most acceptable to participants at the pre-flight stage. However, the participants are most unsatisfied with wearing protective clothing and adopting the boarding order, with an average rating of 3.66 and 3.68, respectively. Based on the average satisfaction score of in-flight responses, the participants' satisfaction with temperature monitoring gets the highest rating of 3.99. But for suspending the in-flight services, such as meals and drinks, and the restriction of toilet use, the participants provide the lowest rating of 3.72 and 3.73, respectively.

With regard to the after-arrival response, the participants are most satisfied with the disinfection of the cabin, and the average score is 4.06. The batched disembarkation is rated only 3.88, the lowest average score in the after-arrival response. As for other stages, the standard of COVID-19 travel information is rated 4.04, the highest average score in the table. The latest COVID-19 details on the official website get the lowest score, a rating of 3.99.

Overall, in Table 4 , participants are most satisfied with the supply of hygiene products during the pre-flight period and a rate of 4.09. Wearing protective clothing is the most unsatisfactory measure among 22 responses, which only get a 3.66 score.

4.4. Difference between passengers on satisfaction

This section aims to determine whether there are differences between the satisfaction of different passengers’ groups on responses at four stages (Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others). One-Way ANOVA Test analysis is applied in addressing this question. As the number of participants is 449, larger than 385, the test is regarded as meaningful at a 95% confidence level. The first step of One-Way ANOVA is to test the Homogeneity of Variances. Groups that meet the homogeneity of variance test (Sig. > 0.05) will be able to perform the subsequent ANOVA Test, while groups that violate the homogeneity of variance test (Sig. ≤ 0.05) will perform Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test instead of the ANOVA Test.

Table 5 shows the groups of indicators that meet the homogeneity of variance test (Sig. > 0.05). Gender, Nationality, Travel Frequency, and Education all meet the test of Homogeneity of Variances at all four stages (Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others). In addition, Occupation, Income, and Travel Purpose all meet the Sig. > 0.05 condition only at the After-Arrival stage. The Frequent Flyers Points (FFP) members group meets the condition at all three stages except Pre-Flight. Finally, the Cabin Selection group only had Sig. > 0.05 at the other stage. Hence, the ANOVA test will be used to test these groups to see if there is a significant difference.

Test of Homogeneity of Variances (Sig. > 0.05).

In contrast to Table 5 , Table 6 shows which groups did not meet the test of Homogeneity of Variances (Sig. < 0.05). Groups of Travelled or not after COVID-19 and Travel Frequency (After COVID-19) do not satisfy the test of Homogeneity of Variances at any of the four stages. The data from the other groups are also presented below, all of which will be subjected to the Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test to determine if there are significant differences.

Test of Homogeneity of Variance (Sig. ≤ 0.05).

After the Test of Homogeneity of Variances, all groups are distributed to the corresponding ANOVA Test or Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test. Same as the previous test, groups are regarded as having no significant difference if Sig. > 0.05, and regarded as having a significant difference if Sig. ≤ 0.05. Then, the Tamhane T2 Post Hoc Test is performed on groups having significant differences to figure out the exact group pairs that are different. In the ANOVA test, all significance is greater than 0.05, which means that there is no significant difference between each group in the data taken for the ANOVA test ( Table 7 ).

ANOVA Test.

Table 8 illustrates groups that take Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test. Table 7 and Table 8 illustrate groups with no significant difference (Sig. > 0.05). Travel Purpose is the only indicator that does not have a significant difference in all four stages. Travel Frequency (After COVID-19) has no significant difference in Pre-Flight, In-Flight, and Others. Occupation, Income, and Travelled After COVID-19 are indicators that do not significantly differ in the same three stages (Pre-Flight, In-Flight, and After-Arrival). Besides, Age, FFP members, and Cabin Selection showed a similar trend in that they do not significantly differ in Pre-Flight.

Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test (Sig. > 0.05).

Table 9 illustrates the groups taking Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test with significant differences (Sig. ≤ 0.05), which required Tamhane T2 Post Hoc Tests to analyse further where the significant difference was produced. As the indicator Travelled After COVID-19 consists of only two groups, the post hoc test is unnecessary. The two groups are regarded as having significant differences in the After-Arrival stage.

Welch & Brown-Forsythe Test (Sig. ≤ 0.05).

Table 10 illustrates the result of the Tamhane T2 Post Hoc Test, group pairs whose Sig. is less than or equal to 0.05 are marked grey. Age ≤18 significantly differs from age groups of 18–31, 31–40, 41–50, and 51–60 in the “Others stage”. As for Cabin selection, economy class significantly differs from business class in stages of In-Flight and After-Arrival. Thus, Table 11 concludes all groups with significant differences in specific stages.

Tamhane T2 Post Hoc Tests.

The Summery of Selected Groups.

4.5. Discussion

After investigating the measures taken by 49 airlines, following insights could be obtained. First, airlines worldwide have adopted many measures to reduce expenditures, but few have been implemented to increase revenue. The conditions that can bring profits to airlines basically rely on government policies, such as economic assistance and open borders. Improving cargo services, an essential source of income that could practice by airlines, also requires cooperation with the government or other institutions. Such uncontrollable factors are unforeseeable compared to reducing expenditures, which is regarded as a controllable response.

The second point is that many words frequently appear in all the news released by 49 airlines, which seem ordinary but can subconsciously consolidate the company's image. In past research, it was found that different vocabulary represents what the company wants to express. For example, through keywords such as ‘volunteer’, ‘medical’, ‘food’, and ‘necessities’, the image of medical and charity responsible for society is enhanced, and through the collective pronoun ‘we’, a bond of unity between management, employees, and customers is established. It was found that airlines around the world are using public relations to bring confidence to stakeholders and passengers.

Measures such as travel restrictions, isolation, and social distance planning are detrimental to airline profitability, but airlines have to adopt some measures because of government regulations. These measures include reducing flight plans and arranging strict and complex check-in procedures. Many airlines seek to minimize the loss of market capacity, route networks, customer base, and customer trust built up over the years before the COVID-19 outbreak to prepare them for recovery.

Most airlines only have enough cash to make up for about two months of lost revenue ( IATA, 2020b ). Most governments placed a high priority on maintaining connectivity in air transport. As a result, almost all major airlines received government support. In addition, many airlines in developed countries have received financial assistance ( IATA, 2020a ). Most airlines have tried to seek financial aid, but many failed. However, some people are concerned that some countries may abandon the policies of liberalization and deregulation, which could jeopardize important progress in levelling the playing field. In addition, the financial assistance received by these airlines is limited to a certain extent; these assistances help the airlines survive. Moreover, offering aid to maintain airline operations creates a promising future for the airlines and the aviation market. It is conducive to economic recovery and production recovery after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic is over because these financial assistances prevent millions of employees of airlines around the world from being fired.

The rapid production recovery in Asia and the increase in cargo demand have led airlines to add cargo flights. According to their annual reports, some airlines have added thousands of extra cargo flights over six months. Many of these cargo flights carry medical materials, so these flights are profitable for the airlines and contribute to the fight against the epidemic.

According to the data above, different measures will benefit the airlines differently. Reducing flight plans, reducing the salary of the employees and managers, and retiring aircraft can help airlines reduce their operating costs. Some measures to guarantee passengers’ safety and interests can improve the passengers’ satisfaction. Adding cargo flights and seeking financial assistance can improve the company’s income and cash flow. Most airlines reduced flight plans and reduced the salary of the employees and managers. Some airlines changed passenger flights to cargo flights or retired aircraft. Not many airlines laid off workers or declared bankruptcy.

Findings showed that passengers were generally satisfied with the airlines' response measures, with even the least satisfactory measures scoring an average of over 3. The measure most satisfied by passengers is providing hygiene products for passengers and staff, while passengers are least satisfied with the measure of protective clothing required to board the plane. In addition, for each flight stage, passengers are most satisfied with the “Other stage” and least satisfied with the “In-Flight stage”.

From the questionnaire, it can be seen that for travellers who were surveyed, providing hygiene products for passengers and staff and a thermal scanner to monitor body temperature during check-in were the two measures they were most satisfied with at the Pre-flight stage. However, according to previous research (, only a small number of airlines worldwide provide hygiene products. A 2021 study ( Bielecki et al., 2020 ) shows that of the 20 major airlines surveyed, three airlines from China – China Southern, China Eastern, and Air China – all provide hygiene products. The remaining 17 airlines do not provide hygiene products. Considering that China has the best COVID-19 outbreak control and the fastest recovery in the airline industry, providing hygiene products might be an idea that other airlines worldwide could learn from it. Also, as this measure has received a very high level of satisfaction, applying this measure will enhance the feeling of safety for passengers travelling by air after the outbreak. Sixteen of the 20 airlines test passengers' body temperatures before take-off, while only one airline, Southern Airways, tests passengers' temperatures during the flight. Our survey shows that passengers are very satisfied with this measure, which means that most airlines are doing a good job of checking their temperature.

Passengers were most satisfied with temperature monitoring during the In-Flight stage, but only China Southern offered this service in previous studies. Passengers are most unhappy with the fact that airlines do not provide regular meals, and as can be seen from previous studies, almost all airlines have placed restrictions on eating on board. Airlines could consider adding temperature monitoring services and offering a bit of high-calorie ready-to-eat food. Regarding passenger satisfaction with the airline's response strategies, airlines may need to provide onboard temperature monitoring and hygiene products to enhance passenger satisfaction.

The ANOVA test results illustrate that “Age”, “Cabin Selection”, and “Travelled after COVID-19” are the groups that affect passengers’ satisfaction levels on responses. An analysis of previous research ( Clemes et al., 2008 ) assessed whether passengers with different socio-demographic characteristics have a different perception of airlines' service quality in many aspects. Age was also the group that was significant at a 5% level when assessing passengers’ perception of safety or security. Therefore, it could be concluded that people of different ages are significantly different when facing airline safety issues such as COVID-19 responses. It is evident that people who have not travelled after COVID-19 did not know COVID-19 responses; thus, the different groups of travelled after COVID-19 could be ignored. As there are significant differences in the perception of airline response strategies for different age groups and cabin selections, airlines need to consider passengers' age composition and other cabins for developing COVID-19 measures. This may lead to adopting response strategies that are more likely to satisfy passengers.

4.6. General recommendations and strategies

Airline firms are trying to cope with the COVID-19 crisis that has significantly affected their financial viability. As statistics predict, the aviation sector cannot be recovered in a few years. Airlines require to resume their operations with a low number of customers and under strict regulations. Generally, domestic flights have taken the first place; after that, the border gates have been opened. Then, short-haul international flights and long-haul flights started their operations. A demand shock was induced worldwide by COVID-19 for passenger flights because of the travel confinements and people’s unwillingness to travel in such risky conditions. On the contrary, there was a surge in demand for cargo flights to rapidly transport the required medical equipment, PCR tests, vaccines, etc. Moreover, there were some restrictions on the supply of “belly cargo” carried on passenger flights, which increased the demand for cargo flights. Because of the inadequate financial arrangements taken into action, quarantine measures, the reduction of passenger demand, etc., airline companies have not succeeded yet in reaching their pre-2019 conditions. Some measures taken into action during the COVID-19 crisis will have long-term influences. As the restrictions on international travel should still be obeyed, changes to networks and fleets would not be at the desired level, at least in the near future. Airlines will continue to be suffered from such issues. Nevertheless, these effects could be recovered sooner if countries' relevant authorities allow international travel to be opened to those individuals vaccinated for COVID-19. During the recovery course, airline companies need to avoid quickly increasing the seating capacity because passenger demand may not rapidly return. Many countries have some constraints still taken into action. Airlines must adjust their staff's salaries as the passenger numbers and capacities gradually approach the levels before the COVID-19 crisis. During the post-COVID-19 period, cargo transportation may continue to be a remarkable source of revenue for airlines. The airline operators of adequate size will be able to incorporate cargo units, and as such, post-COVID-19 aviation services may differ from those before the COVID-19 crisis.

5. Conclusion

This research explored airlines’ responses and customer satisfaction in the aviation industry during the COVID-19 pandemic by collecting and analyzing the organization-level responses adopted by airlines and analyzing passengers’ satisfaction with individual-level responses during flights. The study classified organization-level responses into three categories: reduce the operation cost, ensure the safety and interests of the passengers, and increase the revenue and cash flow. It was found that all airlines took “reduce the operation cost” responses, such as cutting flights and reducing employees’ salary, while few airlines adopted responses of increasing the revenue and cash flow of the company. Importantly, airlines in different areas adopted considerably different responses. Airlines in developed countries have usually received financial support, while many airlines failed to be assisted by governments. Besides, in Asia, where production is recovering rapidly, airlines adopt some responses to increase revenue and cash flow, such as adding cargo flights. However, airlines cannot adopt such responses in other areas where COVID-19 is still severe. As for responses to ensure the safety and interests of the passengers, all airlines have taken measures that substantially depend on local government policies. Thus, this research conducted a questionnaire survey to analyze the satisfaction of responses in the Chinese market.

With a sample of 449 questionnaires, which collected passengers’ basic information and their satisfaction with responses in four stages, the airlines’ individual-level responses for passengers were ranked based on passenger satisfaction. It was found that passengers’ satisfaction varied among different COVID-19 measures adopted by airlines. For example, among 22 measures considered in this study, the top 3 measures that passengers were satisfied with were “ Provide hygiene products for passengers and staff”, “A thermal scanner to monitor body temperature during check-in” and “Disinfect the cabin after each flight, even for the previous flight of the connecting flight”. In contrast, the bottom 3 measures were “Protective clothing is required to board the plane”, “Adopt a special boarding method such as boarding in the order from back to front” and “No in-flight meals and drinks (only snacks and water). As China is one of the best countries to overcome COVID-19, the questionnaire is a suitable reference for airlines struggling with COVID-19. Moreover, the “others stage” is the most satisfying of the four stages, while the “In-Flight stage” is the least. The ANOVA and Welch & Brown-Forsythe test found significant differences in travelers' satisfaction between different age groups with the same measure. Therefore, airlines will have to consider this difference in the future.

The results of this study provide airline operators with a better understanding of how customers assessed the quality of airline service during the COVID-19 pandemic and what operators can do in future to improve customer satisfaction post-COVID. Airline operators can develop strategies to focus on key COVID-19 measures that can improve passengers’ satisfaction without compromising passengers’ health and safety. As found in this study, there are opportunities to improve the in-flight stage COVID-19 measures, especially the measures like “each passenger needs to be seated one seat apart”, “It is not allowed to line up to go to the toilet, and the crew will disinfect the toilet after every-one has used the toilet” and “No in-flight meals and drinks (only snacks and water)”. Likewise, airlines should attempt to meet passengers' travel expectations and measures in different cabins (economy, first class and business) as cabin selection groups affected passengers’ satisfaction level in responses.

The data in the questionnaire is limited to Chinese travellers and may not be representative of the views of travellers from other countries around the world. In addition, the number of travellers under 18 and over 60 surveyed in our questionnaire was small, and these smaller samples may not be representative of this age group. Future studies could focus on how the world's mainstream airlines respond to COVID-19 and whether the responses positively impact the airlines themselves. When evaluating whether the strategy adopted by an airline is effective, please consider combining various performance indicators of the airline with building a model that can rate the airline and score the airline's overall performance during the COVID-19 period. This report may help small and medium-sized airlines learn from the responses of large airlines and help airlines around the world adopt more satisfactory responses to passengers. In addition, it may also enable them to consider the differences between different passengers.

Limited studies have systematically investigated passengers’ satisfaction in four stages of air travel: Pre-Flight, In-Flight, After-Arrival, and Others (Face mask requirement, HEPA filters, etc.). As found in this study, through a systematic understanding of passengers’ satisfaction with the COVID-19 measures adopted by airlines in those four stages, there is an opportunity for the airline operator to improve their market share of air travel by improving post-COVID-19 and service measures that can influence passengers' satisfaction. Further, it provides a benchmarking resource for airline operators in case of a similar pandemic in future. Complementing the present study, future research could focus on passengers’ perceptions and satisfaction with new technology that could enhance some of the COVID-19 measures explored in this study, especially for the in-flight stage (e.g., the use of cleaning robots or ultraviolet light and antimicrobial cabin cleaning for toilets and cabins, and the use of application controlled in-flight entertainment systems).

From the investigation of measures adopted by 49 airlines, it can be expected that several significant changes will occur post-COVID-19, for instance, security measures and new operational standards. Airlines may need to re-plan their networks, crew, fleet, and cash flow to adapt well to such changes and for a future pandemic. Another significant aspect of demand recovery is that airline operators need to explore the factors leading to the reduction of passengers’ confidence and ways to restore it.

Author contributions

All authors: Conceptualization, Investigation, Data Collection and Compilation, Methodology, Software, Formal analysis, Seyed Mojib Zahraee: Writing – original draft, Hongwei Jiang: Supervision, Writing – review & editing, Nirajan Shiwakoti: Supervision, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Peer review under responsibility of Tongji University and Tongji University Press.

Customer satisfaction rating on airline response to COVID-19

1. Basic Information

2 Airline safety response questions

Please rate your satisfaction with the different policies implemented by airlines in response to the COVID-19 pandemic based on your actual situation and feelings. 1: very dissatisfied. 2: dissatisfied 3: neutral. 4: satisfied. 5: very satisfied.

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Home › Case Studies › Airline Customer Analytics: Unlocking Insights for Improved Service and Profitability

Airline Customer Analytics: Unlocking Insights for Improved Service and Profitability

Written by: Sudeshna Ghosh

Airline Industry Overview

1. the evolution and impact of air travel.

The invention of the airplane has significantly transformed how people experience the world, making aviation travel a routine part of modern life. With the onset of artificial intelligence, the airline industry has revolutionized the way individuals live and conduct business, shrinking distances and reducing travel time through the use of technology. This industry globally encompasses various segmentation, including international, national, regional, and cargo airlines.

2. Competitive Landscape and Industry Shakedowns

In recent years, the airline industry has faced intense competition and an industry-wide shakedown, impacting trends in both domestic and international services, that highlights the need for airline loyalty programs. This competitive environment necessitates a strong focus on consumer satisfaction and service optimization, making customer analytics a critical tool for airlines in order to increase their market size.

airline customer analytics

Aviation Industry Future Trends and the Role of Customer Analytics

1. adapting to evolving customer expectations.

The future of the airline industry hinges on adapting to rapidly changing consumer expectations and technology. Modern airline customers demand a seamless, frictionless shopping experience that offers both variety and personalization. To meet these rising expectations, airlines must invest in new technologies and capabilities, an effort that inevitably brings new costs but is vital for staying competitive.

2. Harnessing Customer Analytics for Enhanced Service

In an era where customers have constant access to data analytics, predicting customer behavior, segmentation, and preferences becomes essential among other resources. Aviation analytics market, which includes techniques like data visualization, predictive modeling, and information management, serves as a cornerstone for marketing strategies in the airline industry. Effective use of consumer data analytics enables airlines to:

  • Reduce Attrition : By accurately predicting customers most likely to churn, airlines can implement strategies to retain them.
  • Boost Customer Loyalty and Response Rates : Tailoring communications with the right offers to the right customers enhances loyalty and increases the effectiveness of promotional efforts.

Continue reading to know more about the importance of customer analytics for the airline industry or  request a proposal .

Success Story:

Client profile:.

A Major Player in the American Airline Industry

Background and Market Position

Our client, a major American airline, has been a prominent figure in the airline industry since its founding in the 1930s. With a dedicated workforce of over 13,000 employees, the company has established a strong presence, renowned for its diverse range of flight services and commitment to customer satisfaction but failed to adapt to new opportunities and strategy.

Challenges Faced by the Airline

Despite its strong market position, the airline encountered significant challenges in measuring and enhancing customer satisfaction. They lacked a robust framework to generate actionable insights, lack of strategy, and their existing customer analytics system was hindered by inefficiencies, including:

  • Delayed Response in Customer Satisfaction Tracking : The airline struggled with tracking customer satisfaction scores and understanding the drivers behind these scores across various business functions.
  • Inefficient Analytics Framework : The absence of an effective customer analytics framework led to delayed response times and hindered the airline’s ability to adapt to customer feedback promptly and losing opportunities.

Solutions Delivered: Enhancing Customer Satisfaction with Quantzig’s Analytics

Quantzig’s Approach to Revolutionizing Customer Experience and Support

Quantzig’s expertise in customer analytics played a pivotal role apart from social media in transforming the airline’s approach to customer satisfaction. By deploying multiple optimization techniques, our team was able to generate comprehensive insights into various business aspects, crucial for enhancing the airline’s customer engagement and satisfaction levels.

Implementation of Advanced Analytics Solutions

The solutions provided included:

  • Customized Dashboards for Multi-level Satisfaction Tracking : We developed various support dashboards offering a user-friendly view of customer satisfaction using social media customer data at different levels, including airports, regions, sub-regions, and specific drivers. This granular approach enabled the airline to identify areas needing improvement and promptly address them.
  • Optimization of Marketing Costs and Competitor Impact Analysis Report : Through our advanced analytics solutions even at the airports, we helped the airline understand the impact of competitors on their customers. This insight was instrumental in optimizing marketing costs and tailoring strategies to stay ahead in the competitive airline market.
  • Real-time Analytics for Proactive Decision-Making : Our solutions provided real-time analytics, enabling the airline to respond swiftly to customer feedback and market changes, thus significantly enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Impact Analysis and the Broad Perspective of Customer Analytics in Airlines

Transformative Results Delivered by Quantzig

Quantzig’s customer analytics engagement led to transformative outcomes for the airline, significantly enhancing their customer satisfaction levels:

  • Increased Customer Satisfaction : By implementing multiple optimization techniques and real-time analytics, the airline experienced a substantial increase in customer satisfaction levels.
  • Streamlined Marketing Efforts and Cost Optimization : Insights into competitors’ impacts and customer preferences enabled the airline to streamline its marketing efforts, resulting in optimized marketing expenditure and improved return on investment (ROI).
  • Enhanced Operational Efficiency : The adoption of customized dashboards for tracking customer satisfaction facilitated more efficient operational processes, leading to an agile and responsive customer service approach.

airline customer analytics

The Pivotal Role of Customer Analytics in the Airline Industry

The success story of this engagement underscores the pivotal role of customer analytics in the airline industry for more passengers. With the advent of advanced analytics, airlines can now:

  • Predict and Respond to Customer Behaviors : Utilizing predictive modeling and data analysis based on the content, airlines can forecast customer preferences and behaviors, tailoring their services to meet evolving demands, including reporting.
  • Personalize Customer Experiences : Insights gleaned from analytics enable airlines to provide personalized experiences, enhancing passenger loyalty and satisfaction.
  • Optimize Revenue Management : By analyzing customer data, airlines can optimize pricing strategies, route planning, and marketing efforts, thereby maximizing revenue.
  • Improve Operational Decisions : With performance metrics and optimization analytics, airlines can make data-driven decisions to enhance efficiency and reduce operational costs.

In the realm of airline analysis, airlines are increasingly turning to customer analytics to gain valuable insights into the preferences and behaviors of their consumers. By harnessing data from diverse sources such as airport data, travel data, and passenger data, airline companies aim to enhance the overall flying experience for their passengers. The analysis of airline flights, airplane utilization, and customer feedback plays a pivotal role in shaping customer-centric strategies. Airlines leverage customer analytics, including airline customer analytics, to tailor services to the specific needs of their airline customers, offering a more personalized and satisfying journey.

In the context of airline customer analytics, understanding the air passenger is crucial for shaping customer intelligence. Through the examination of customer insights derived from loyalty programs, airline companies can optimize route planning and implement effective revenue management strategies. These customer insights also enable airlines to design targeted marketing campaigns, creating a more engaging and tailored experience for their consumers. With the aid of aviation analytics and customer intelligence, airlines can unlock data insights that lead to improved decision-making across various operational facets.

Quantzig’s article on customer analytics in the airline industry delves into the significance of these data-driven approaches for airlines. The integration of predictive modeling into airline customer analytics is highlighted as a key element for forecasting customer behavior. This predictive modeling facilitates proactive decision-making, empowering airlines to continuously enhance their services and refine marketing strategies based on real-time data insights. The comprehensive analysis provided by customer analytics contributes to operational efficiency by optimizing decisions related to airline services, reducing costs, and streamlining various operational processes.

In conclusion, the synergy between airline customer analytics, aviation analytics, and travel data is instrumental in shaping the future of the airline industry. By harnessing the power of customer analytics, airlines can build a deeper understanding of their consumers, ultimately fostering improved services, increased operational efficiency, and enhanced overall satisfaction for airline passengers. The FAQ section of Quantzig’s article sheds light on the tools and software specifically designed for airline customer analytics, offering a glimpse into the technology-driven landscape that supports the industry’s quest for data-driven excellence.

FAQs for the Article: “Quantzig’s Customer Analytics in the Airline Industry”

  • What is airline customer analytics? Airline customer analytics involves the use of data analysis techniques to understand and improve passengers experiences in the airline industry. It includes analyzing data from various sources like flight bookings, loyalty programs, and customer feedback.
  • How does customer analytics enhance airline services? By analyzing customer data, airlines can tailor their services to meet customer preferences, improve flight and service offerings, and enhance overall passenger satisfaction.
  • Can customer analytics impact airline revenue management? Yes, customer analytics content helps airlines in effective revenue management by providing insights for pricing strategies, optimizing route planning, and improving marketing campaigns.
  • What role does predictive modeling play in airline customer analytics? Predictive modeling in airline customer analytics helps in forecasting customer behavior, enabling airlines to make proactive decision-making for service improvements and marketing strategies along with reporting.
  • How does customer analytics contribute to operational efficiency in airlines? Customer analytics offers data-driven insights that help airlines optimize operational decisions, reduce costs, and improve efficiency in various aspects of their operations.
  • Are there specific tools used in airline customer analytics? Yes, there are specific tools and software designed for airline customer analytics, which include features for data collection, analysis, visualization, and predictive modeling.

Whether you’re looking to develop tailored marketing messages or new products Quantzig’s customer analytics solutions can help you, request a FREE solution demo to get started.

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airline customer service case study

The Strategy Story

A unique take on Southwest Airlines Strategy

Anyone who has studied business management either as a degree or as an elective would have definitely studied Michael Porter’s 5 Forces framework. This framework was first published in  Harvard Business Review  in 1979. The model is very much relevant in 21st-century business as well due to its deep 360-degree view of a business.

One of the 5 forces is called “Barriers to Entry” and more often than not either Oil & Gas or Airline industry would serve as an apt example of an industry with very high barriers to entry due to its high Capex and Opex requirements.

But wait, then with so many barriers to entry, why do airlines still bleed red? There are many reasons for this, but one of them is stiff competition with low-cost carriers, the 5th, and the framework’s central force (competition among the players).

Before we move on, the below is an interesting tweet response from Anand Mahindra, on being asked to buy the ailing “ Jet Airways ”.

Remember the quote: “If you want to be a millionaire, start with a Billion dollars and then start (buy) an airline!” https://t.co/dYRdwup3kK — anand mahindra (@anandmahindra) June 29, 2019

The US Airline Industry

Following the 9/11 attacks, the US airline industry has been through rough weather. 20+ airlines have filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 7. 60+ airlines have filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11.  This list also includes the top 3 out of 4 airlines namely, American Airlines, United & Delta Air Lines, however they were able to exit the bankruptcy within a few years.

The landscape has been constantly changing with a high volume of mergers and acquisitions, resulting in changing market share statistics.

airline customer service case study

The graph above covering the period January to December 2020 showcases that the top 4 airlines constitute approx. 65% of the market share.

In this story, we are focusing on Southwest Airlines that was founded on the notions of the low-cost carrier but with its unique strategy has been profitable for the last 45 years in a row. 

The takeoff strategy of Southwest Airlines

Southwest Airlines Co. , typically referred to as Southwest, is one of the United States’ major airlines and the world’s largest low-cost carrier airline. The airline was established on March 15, 1967, by  Herb Kelleher  as Air Southwest Co. and adopted its current name, Southwest Airlines Co., in 1971, when it began operating as an intrastate airline wholly within the state of Texas first flying between Dallas, Houston and San Antonio. 

Most airlines back in the 1960s followed the most popular “Hub and Spoke” model for their operations.

Hub and Spoke model – As the name suggests, there is a defined hub from where the flights originate, and the destinations are the spokes.

The benefit of a hub and spoke model is that it has fewer routes, but the major drawback of this model is its rigidity, and if there is a slight change in the airline routing due to weather, etc., it can have cascading consequences to the other planned flights.

airline customer service case study

Point to Point model – Southwest, being a low-cost carrier, focused more on the point to point model and bought significant process improvements, in a way mastered it to achieve very high operational efficiency.

In the point-to-point model, each flight is a single journey. The origin and destination are connected via a single non-stop flight. The point-to-point model offers more travel options and flexibility as compared to the hub and spoke model.

For passengers undertaking further journeys, they will have to collect the baggage and recheck them for leg 2 of their journey. This model has considerably led to saved travel hours and done away with the necessity for connecting flights.

airline customer service case study

Key Differentiating Factors in Southwest Airlines Strategy

Southwest airlines is the third largest airline in the United States of America and arguably the biggest in the low-cost carrier segment across the globe.

So, was the operational efficiency gained due to the change in the flight operations model the only reason why Southwest airlines is the #1 low-cost carrier in the world?

NO, let’s understand what differentiated Southwest airlines strategy from its counterparts.

Customer Eccentricity

For Southwest, they keep the customers at the center of their business operations. They offer certain benefits to flyers which are not offered by other airlines, like

  • Southwest allows two checked-in bags, free of cost, unlike many of its competitors.
  • Flight change thirty minutes prior to the departure is allowed by Southwest.
  • Southwest offers free in-flight entertainment like Live TV, Movies, use of whatsapp and imessage. It offers Wi-Fi services at very nominal rates.

All these have resulted in Southwest being the airline with the least number of complaints, according to the Department of Transportation of the United States of America.

Only one type of aircraft

Many airlines have different types of aircraft in their fleet, but not Southwest. Southwest operates by using only Boeing 737 aircraft. It saves a lot of money by:

  • Training cabin crews and support staff on only one type of aircraft.
  • Maintenance of inventory of spare parts for one aircraft type.
  • In case of breakdown, alternate aircraft can be arranged immediately.
  • Its policy of not assigning seats helps tremendously as customers can take any available seat when boarding the aircraft, thereby reducing the boarding time. In the case of alternate aircraft also, this policy hugely benefits the airline reducing the turnaround time.

Right recruitment policies

Southwest stresses a lot on the customer experience and hence it is very imperative for the airline to hire the right kind of people. Southwest focusses on hiring people who have an attitude for serving customers.

Employees undergo various pieces of training which also includes cross-training. Training is heavily centered around team building and collaboration.

The Southwest Airlines case study is a lesson in cultural strategy. An organization built on the fundamentals of customer eccentricity, effective processes, and a dedicated team is meant to achieve success and overcome challenges. This model of exceptional customer service can help a business earn an impeccable reputation in the industry. That’s what makes the Southwest model uniquely priced, yet one profitable in this cruel airline industry.

Southwest’s ability to be different and not follow the herd—not to mention becoming America’s largest airline—can be traced in large part to the Airline Deregulation Act. Thanks to this act, Herb and Rollin realized their Vision and the traveling public benefits on every flight, every day. Gary Kelly, Chairman & CEO, Southwest Airlines

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Lessons in Crisis Management: The United Airlines Case Study

Crisis situations can strike any organization at any time, posing significant challenges to their reputation, brand image, and overall business operations. 

United Airlines, one of the world’s largest airlines, faced a severe crisis that shook its foundations and tested its ability to handle a rapidly escalating situation. 

This blog post will delve into the United Airlines crisis management case study, exploring the events surrounding the crisis, analyzing the company’s initial response, evaluating stakeholder reactions, and examining the strategies employed to manage the situation. 

By examining this high-profile case, we can glean valuable insights into the importance of effective crisis management and the lessons that can be learned from United Airlines’ experience.

Lets learn more through the United Airlines crisis management case study

Overview of United Airlines

United Airlines is a major American airline that operates a vast network of domestic and international flights, serving millions of passengers each year. Founded in 1926, 

United Airlines has grown to become one of the world’s largest carriers, with its headquarters located in Chicago, Illinois. 

The airline is known for its extensive route network, spanning over 350 destinations worldwide, and its membership in the Star Alliance, a global airline alliance that offers seamless travel options to passengers across multiple airlines. 

With a diverse fleet of aircraft and a commitment to providing a comfortable and safe travel experience, United Airlines has established itself as a prominent player in the aviation industry. 

However, like any large corporation, United Airlines has faced its share of challenges and crises that have tested its ability to navigate difficult situations and maintain its reputation. 

The United Airlines crisis management case study provides valuable insights into how the company addressed a high-profile crisis and managed its repercussions in an increasingly interconnected and scrutinizing world.

Background of the Crisis

The crisis that shook United Airlines began on April 09, 2017 when a video capturing a violent altercation between a passenger and United Airlines staff went viral on social media platforms.

The incident occurred on a United Airlines flight where a 69 years old passenger, David Dao, was forcibly removed from the aircraft by security personnel. The video showed a distressing scene, with the passenger being dragged down the aisle, sustaining injuries in the process.

The incident sparked outrage among viewers worldwide, leading to widespread condemnation of United Airlines’ handling of the situation and raising concerns about passenger rights and airline policies.

The incident was captured on video by another passenger named Audra Bridges and shared on Facebook, where it quickly gained widespread attention. In the video, we could see a man with visible injuries and shouting, being dragged down the aisle of the plane. The video went viral, with thousands of shares and millions of views

Initial Response by United Airlines

In the immediate aftermath of the incident, United Airlines issued a series of statements and communications addressing the situation.

The airline expressed regret for the incident and publicly apologized to the passenger involved, as well as to the other passengers who witnessed the event.

United Airlines acknowledged that the incident was a result of a failure to provide the necessary level of customer service and pledged to conduct a thorough review of their policies and procedures.

Strengths and weaknesses of their initial response

United Airlines’ initial response had both strengths and weaknesses. On the positive side, they promptly acknowledged the incident, expressed remorse, and apologized to those affected. Their recognition of a failure in customer service demonstrated accountability and a willingness to take responsibility for the situation. Furthermore, their commitment to conducting a review of policies and procedures indicated a proactive approach to addressing the underlying issues.

However, there were also weaknesses in United Airlines’ initial response. The response was seen by some as lacking in empathy and sincerity, failing to adequately address the distress caused to the passenger and the public. 

Additionally, the communication did not provide detailed explanations or immediate corrective actions, leaving room for doubt and skepticism. This lack of transparency and clarity could have contributed to further eroding public trust and confidence.

Impact of their response on public perception

United Airlines’ initial response had a significant impact on public perception. The perceived insensitivity and inadequate addressing of the incident led to widespread outrage and intensified the negative sentiment towards the airline.

The viral nature of the video and the subsequent media coverage amplified the public scrutiny, further damaging United Airlines’ reputation.

The response was seen by many as insufficient to rectify the harm caused and reinforce trust in the company.

Public perception of United Airlines was heavily influenced by their immediate response, and the lack of a robust and empathetic approach contributed to a significant erosion of public trust.

Escalation of the Crisis

The crisis surrounding United Airlines rapidly escalated through extensive media coverage and the power of social media platforms. As the video of the incident went viral, it gained significant traction on various social media platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

 Users shared and commented on the video, expressing their outrage and disappointment with United Airlines’ actions. The incident became a trending topic, attracting attention from news outlets and further amplifying the public’s response.

Media coverage played a crucial role in fueling the escalation of the crisis. News organizations across the globe picked up the story, leading to widespread coverage and analysis. Journalists and commentators discussed the incident in detail, examining the implications for customer service, passenger rights, and corporate responsibility.

Factors that contributed to the escalation

Several factors contributed to the escalation of the crisis:

  • Viral nature of the video: The video capturing the violent altercation between the passenger and United Airlines staff quickly went viral due to its shocking and disturbing content. The power of visual storytelling on social media platforms played a significant role in rapidly disseminating the video and capturing widespread attention.
  • Public sentiment and outrage: The incident struck a chord with the public, evoking strong emotions and a sense of injustice. The forceful removal of a passenger from an overbooked flight triggered a broader discussion about customer rights, treatment of passengers, and corporate ethics, leading to heightened public scrutiny and outrage.
  • Social media amplification: Social media platforms served as a catalyst for the rapid spread of information and opinions. Users shared the video, expressed their reactions, and engaged in conversations about the incident. The ability of social media to reach a vast audience quickly and facilitate real-time discussions amplified the crisis and its impact.
  • News media coverage: The extensive coverage by news outlets, both traditional and digital, further propelled the crisis. Journalists investigated the incident, interviewed stakeholders, and provided analysis, keeping the story in the public eye and prolonging its impact.
  • Past incidents and public perceptions: The incident occurred in the context of other high-profile incidents involving airlines and passenger mistreatment. Previous incidents had already heightened public sensitivity to issues of customer service and treatment, creating a backdrop that contributed to the intensified reaction to United Airlines’ crisis.

Stakeholder Reactions

Passengers: Many passengers expressed shock, concern, and outrage over the incident. Some shared their own negative experiences with United Airlines or similar incidents, further fueling the negative sentiment. Passengers demanded accountability, transparency, and improved customer service from the airline.

Employees: United Airlines employees had mixed reactions to the incident. While some defended the actions taken by the staff, others expressed embarrassment and frustration. The incident strained employee morale and raised questions about training, protocols, and the overall corporate culture within the organization.

Shareholders: Shareholders of United Airlines reacted to the crisis with concern about the potential financial impact. The negative publicity and public backlash had the potential to affect the company’s stock value and financial performance. Shareholders expressed the need for effective crisis management and measures to restore public trust.

United Airlines’ Crisis Management Strategies

Following are the key crisis management strategies employed by United Airlines to address the situation:

  • Apology and acceptance of responsibility: United Airlines promptly issued apologies and accepted responsibility for the incident. They acknowledged their failure in providing satisfactory customer service and expressed remorse for the distress caused.
  • Internal investigation and policy review: The airline committed to conducting a thorough review of their policies and procedures, aiming to identify areas for improvement and prevent similar incidents in the future. This demonstrated a proactive approach to addressing the underlying issues.
  • Enhanced customer service training: United Airlines announced plans to enhance customer service training for employees, focusing on conflict resolution, passenger communication, and de-escalation techniques. This strategy aimed to improve the overall customer experience and minimize the likelihood of similar incidents.
  • Engaging with stakeholders: United Airlines actively engaged with stakeholders, including passengers, employees, and shareholders, to address concerns, provide updates, and gather feedback. This approach sought to rebuild trust, foster transparency, and demonstrate a commitment to listening and learning from the crisis.

Crisis communication and actions taken by the company

One example of successful crisis communication by United Airlines was the issuance of a public statement that outlined the steps they were taking to address the incident and prevent future occurrences. This statement demonstrated transparency and a commitment to change, providing reassurance to stakeholders.

Another example was the proactive engagement with passengers and employees through various communication channels. United Airlines established a dialogue with affected passengers, offering direct apologies, compensations, and opportunities for feedback. This approach aimed to address individual grievances, rebuild trust, and demonstrate a customer-centric approach.

Furthermore, United Airlines implemented tangible actions to prevent similar incidents. For instance, they revised their policies regarding overbooking and involuntary denial of boarding to ensure fair treatment of passengers and minimize the chances of confrontations. These policy changes were communicated to the public, showcasing a commitment to learning from mistakes and implementing meaningful reforms.

Lessons Learned

The United Airlines crisis management case provides valuable lessons for organizations facing or preparing for crisis situations:

  • Prioritize customer service and passenger experience: The incident highlighted the critical importance of prioritizing customer service and passenger experience. Airlines, as service providers, must ensure that their policies and practices align with customer expectations and rights. Investing in employee training, effective communication, and conflict resolution skills can help mitigate potential crises and improve customer satisfaction.
  • Swift and empathetic crisis response: The importance of a swift and empathetic crisis response cannot be overstated. Organizations should respond promptly, acknowledging the issue, expressing genuine empathy, and accepting responsibility. Failing to address a crisis promptly can lead to a loss of public trust and exacerbate the negative impact on the organization’s reputation.
  • Transparency and clear communication: Transparency and clear communication are crucial during a crisis. Organizations should provide regular updates, accurate information, and honest explanations to stakeholders. Openly sharing actions taken to address the crisis and prevent future occurrences can help rebuild trust and demonstrate a commitment to improvement.
  • Proactive policy evaluation and reform: Conducting a thorough evaluation of existing policies and procedures is essential in crisis management. Identifying potential areas of vulnerability and implementing necessary reforms can help prevent similar incidents in the future. Organizations should regularly review their policies, considering feedback from stakeholders and changing industry norms.
  • Stakeholder engagement and feedback: Actively engaging with stakeholders, including customers, employees, and shareholders, is vital in crisis management. Listening to concerns, gathering feedback, and involving stakeholders in the decision-making process can help rebuild trust, strengthen relationships, and ensure that actions taken address the needs and expectations of those affected by the crisis.
  • Learn from past incidents and industry best practices: Organizations can learn valuable lessons from past incidents and industry best practices. Analyzing similar crises and understanding how other organizations have effectively managed similar situations can inform crisis management strategies. It is essential to continually adapt and improve crisis response plans based on evolving industry standards and emerging trends.

Final Words 

In the United Airlines crisis management case study, we examined the background of the crisis, the initial response by the airline, the escalation of the crisis, stakeholder reactions, United Airlines’ crisis management strategies, and the lessons learned from the incident. The case study serves as a reminder of the critical importance of effective crisis management in today’s interconnected and highly scrutinized world.

United Airlines’ experience teaches us that a crisis can escalate rapidly through media coverage and social media, underscoring the need for organizations to be prepared for the speed and reach of information dissemination in the digital age.

Ultimately, the United Airlines crisis management case study serves as a valuable reminder that a crisis can have far-reaching consequences for an organization’s reputation, customer trust, and bottom line. By implementing the lessons learned and adopting a proactive and customer-centric approach, organizations can navigate crises more effectively, safeguard their reputation, and emerge stronger from challenging situations.

About The Author

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Tahir Abbas

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Stay Resilient and Keep Customers Happy

When a technological problem stranded thousands of passengers on a rival airline, american airlines took the necessary precautions to ensure the same thing couldn’t happen to them..

airline customer service case study

Low code integrations with tools in the incident management toolchain

Automated, repeatable processes replace manual notifications

Share incident information with other tools & teams with ease

Remediate Quickly and Keep Brand Reputation Intact

American Airlines offers an average of nearly 6,700 flights per day to nearly 350 destinations in more than 50 countries. Quick and seamless remediation of IT outages, failures, and breaches is vital when providing top-tier customer service to their passengers, and without this simplicity they risk impacting customer experience, brand reputation, and financial stability. So, when a technological failure stranded thousands of passengers on a rival airline in May 2017, American Airline’s leaders wanted to make sure the same thing couldn’t happen to them.

After American Airlines analyzed the technology stack they were using to identify, resolve and manage IT incidents, they considered the move to multiple incident management tools. A top priority was connecting to Cherwell—the hub of their IT service management infrastructure. They needed an automated solution that offered orchestrated resolution while accounting for different audiences based on incident classification. The airline also wanted to notify stakeholders, directors, VPs, and other leadership due to the implications tied to brand and revenue, not just the team members overseeing the issue. To accomplish this, the new solution had several additional requirements:

  • The ability to integrate with other tools in the incident management toolchain, including Slack and Moogsoft, with low to no code
  • The ability to share incident information with other tools and teams with ease
  • Automated, repeatable processes to replace manual notifications and engage people more quickly, reducing MTTR
  • On-call notifications automatically embedded with information from the Cherwell incident ticket

“As we build our tech stack at American Airlines, the ease of integrations with Cherwell and other solutions in the stack, such as Moogsoft, our correlation tool, is an important decision consideration,” said Tara Burrowes, Senior Manager, ITSM and eGRC Development, American Airlines. “Cherwell is the hub of our IT service desk and with their REST API and low-code workflows, it usually makes integration with other tools easy.”

The solution American Airlines chose for incident management was xMatters. Knowing the integration with Cherwell intimately and the business needs of American Airlines, xMatters worked closely with the American Airlines IT team to design a solution that was a perfect fit.

IT event management by xMatters provides enriched notifications to consolidate information across multiple tools so users can access the latest information with ease. Intelligent targeting connects the right team members based on the incident for quicker resolution. Prioritization with xMatters and Cherwell automates the perfect response by understanding the level of severity and impact.

“Through xMatters’ bi-directional integration with Cherwell, we are able to automate many steps that were previously manual including updating incident tickets within Cherwell Service Management (CSM), aggregating incident details into one central location, and then create Slack channels for each major incident,” said Luis Medina, Manager, Situational Awareness Engineering, American Airlines. American Airlines implemented the integration four years ago and has seen an improvement in the productivity of staff, a reduction in the mean time to acknowledge IT-related situations, and an improvement in overall enterprise situational communication. To learn more about how xMatters and Cherwell can help your business resolve incidents quickly with automated, low-code workflows and even prevent them before they impact the business, visit https://www.xmatters.com/ integration/cherwell.

About the xMatters and Cherwell Integration

Consuming critical metadata from within a Cherwell incident record, xMatters leverages on-call scheduling, escalation rules, and device preferences to find and notify the appropriate responders quickly and efficiently. From there, the notification recipient can choose their response or escalate the incident. xMatters keeps records of all notifications and responses in the CSM platform, allowing users to consolidate reporting to improve incident management processes, proactively communicate to stakeholders, and ultimately prevent the same issues from reoccurring. Integration benefits include:

  • Reduce Mean Time to Restore service by up to 70%
  • Centralize on-call schedules and escalations
  • Improve resource efficiency
  • Align technical and business teams
  • Maintain accountability within the organization
  • Engage teams quickly on critical escalations
  • Attain continuous improvement with measurable KPIs
  • Provide business stakeholders with subscriptions for relevant and required notifications

About Cherwell

Cherwell empowers organizations to transform their business through the rapid adoption and easy management of digital services. Cherwell’s adaptable platform has enabled thousands of organizations to modernize their business operations with customizable service management, automation, and reporting across the enterprise.

About xMatters

xMatters, an Everbridge Company, is a service reliability platform that helps DevOps, SREs, and operations teams automate workflows, ensure infrastructure and applications are always working, and rapidly deliver products at scale. Our code-free workflow builder, adaptive approach to incident management, and real-time performance analytics all support a single goal: the happiness of your customers.

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4 Customer Service Case Studies to Inspire You

Customer service case studies help attract new customers to your business by showing them how your company can help them. Instead of simply telling customers what you can do for them, you demonstrate it with storytelling and draw them in.

November 24, 2022

6 mins read

If you’ve researched any brand it’s more than likely you’ve come across a customer service case study. Real-life customer experiences are a powerful way to advertise a brand and showcase the real interactions customers have when approaching a company’s customer service department.

Instead of simply telling a customer what it’s like to benefit from a company’s customer service, they demonstrate genuine examples of customers who have submitted tickets to their customer service team. 

On the surface of it, one company can appear much like another without powerful customer service case studies to demonstrate its impact. Customers will be required to actually sign up to your service before they can experience your customer support for themselves. 

What is a customer service case study?

A customer service case study is a strategy to show the experiences of customers that have actually signed up to use your product or service and have actually witnessed your customer service for themselves. 

Potential customers who are researching what your company has to offer will benefit from the case studies of customers that have already passed through the buying decision. Instead of a company simply telling prospective customers what they have to offer, they will be able to demonstrate their service in reality. 

See for yourself

Keeping is the fastest, simplest way to manage a shared inbox right inside Gmail.

A customer service case study goes beyond being a simple testimonial, however. It’s factual evidence of customers who have implemented your company’s product or service and a demonstration of its ability to actually deliver results. 

Why are customer service case studies important? 

Without customer service case studies, your business will struggle to show how it is helping its customers. A case study shows your prospective customers how the business has performed in a real-life example of customer service, and helps them imagine what it would be like to do business with your company. 

Customer service case studies show potential customers how your business has helped customers to solve their problems and further their business goals. Although there are other ways to market your business, customer service case studies are a solid way to reach out to new prospects and convert them into customers. 

Successful customer case studies showcase successful examples of customer service that persuade your prospects to actually buy. They show prospects how well your customer service actually works and highlights your product’s value. 

How do you write a customer service case study?

There are a few strategies you need to follow when writing a customer service case study. Having a variety of different case studies will enable you to reach more potential customers which cover a range of situations and needs. 

1. Focus on your personas

You need to consider the type of the customer that you want to attract with your customer service case study. Mapping out your personas is an important part of your marketing strategy because it helps you identify prospects with unique wants and needs. Your customer service may appeal to different types of individuals and it’s crucial to target each one specifically. 

2. Tell a story

At their core, customer service case studies are stories about particular customers. Simply raving about how great your company is wil be boring for your readers, and you need to take them on a journey. Stories need to have obstacles to overcome, and your case study should show how your product or service is the hero of the narrative. 

3. Emphasize benefits

The benefits of your customer service will help to appeal to customers that have a specific pain point to solve. Instead of focusing on products or features it’s important to show how your service will help them. Your customer service case study is likely to be a representative example of a customer that has similar problems to other prospects, and it’s important to help prospective customers visualize using your service. 

4. Highlight the results 

Highlighting the results that your customer service will help your customers achieve means focusing on the before and after of using your service. Genuine improvements to your customer’s business will help to convince them that your product or service is the answer. Showing the results of your customer service helps customers see how they can save or make more money after choosing your business. 

4 interesting customer service case studies

Quick heal and kayako.

Here’s the first interesting customer service case study from Kayako. There was a company called Quick Heal Technologies which was a provider of internet security tools and anti-virus software. They had millions of global users, but they were struggling to deliver outstanding customer service due to a high volume of customer service requests. 

One of their main issues was the absence of a system to track requests from different sources. Agents were checking many different platforms for customer service requests, and lacked a vital overview of the customer experience. They were losing tickets and suffering from incomplete information. There were delays in the customer support experience and the existing system couldn’t manage its workflow. 

Enter Kayako, help desk software. Their Shared Inbox Solution brought together the different customer service platforms such as email, Facebook, Twitter, and live chat. Quick Heal agents were able to support customers seamlessly and minimize the number of tickets that were dropped. They could significantly reduce their ticket response times and accelerate the time to resolution. Agents were able to much more effectively collaborate and reduce duplication of effort. 

Springboard and Help Scout

The next customer service case study is about Springboard, a platform which provides online resources and personalized mentors to help students build their dream careers. Their aim is to make a great education accessible to anyone in the world. 

So far, they have worked with 250 mentors to train more than 5,000 students over 6 continents. Their success has depended on their ability to create an open environment where students feel comfortable requesting feedback and discovering course information on their own. 

Springboard needed a solution that could help them build relationships with their students, even if it’s over email, and they decided that Help Scout was the answer. They chose Help Scout because it means they can have human conversations rather than treating their students like a ticket number. 

They make use of Help Scout’s help desk features to find key insights into students’ conversations, as well as their Docs knowledge base which provides answers to common questions. As a result, students are able to more effectively learn and overcome problems when they arise. 

We’ve got another customer service case study from an airline – in this case, JetBlue. They really know how to make their customers smile with small gestures and ensure they can win customers for life. 

One customer called Paul Brown was flying with JetBlue from the smaller terminal at Boston’s Logan airport. He realized that he couldn’t grab his usual Starbucks coffee because there was no Starbucks at the terminal. On a whim, he sent a tweet to JetBlue asking them to deliver his venti mocha, and to his surprise they obliged! Within minutes JetBlue customer service representatives had delivered the coffee to Paul’s seat on the plane. 

This example of customer service shows that JetBlue is willing to go the extra mile for customers and will ensure that the company can continue to attract more customers.

Gympass and Slack

Gympass is an international platform that gives companies and their employees 50% to 70% off a global network of fitness studios, digital workouts, and mental health and nutrition services. It was founded in 2012 and has experienced steady growth, now worth more than USD $1 billion. Users of Gympass have access to 50,000 gyms and studios in more than 7,000 cities, so they can work out while they are on the move. 

The problem with this growing company was communication across the globe. The company was overly reliant on emails which led to silos and employees missing out on vital information. The solution to this problem was Slack, a communications platform which is made accessible to all new employees so they have everything they need right from the start. 

Now, teams at Gympass work across a range of 2,000 Slack channels which are open to 1,000 employees. They can share documents, messages and information, keeping connected across locations and facilitating new projects like event planning. It’s enabled Gympass to build a strong culture of collaboration and ensure that every employee can find the information they need. 

Wrapping up

Customer service case studies help attract new customers to your business by showing them how your company can help them. Instead of simply telling customers what you can do for them, you demonstrate it with storytelling and draw them in. Showing your customers benefits and outcomes support them to make the decision to purchase. 

Before they actually have a trial of using your product or service, it’s hard for customers to know what it would be like. Case studies can give a valuable preview into what it would be like to work with your company and highlight customers that have already achieved success. 

Catherine is a content writer and community builder for creative and ethical companies. She often writes case studies, help documentation and articles about customer support. Her writing has helped businesses to attract curious audiences and transform them into loyal advocates. You can find more of her work at https://awaywithwords.co.

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February 28, 2012

Even though it seems like yesterday, our popular top 10 initiative has reached its first birthday and we’ve decided to celebrate it with a king-size slide deck featuring the best case studies from our past top 10s. This top 50 has been designed not only to ... Read more

Top 50 case-studies of airlines and airports excelling in social media

Even though it seems like yesterday, our popular top 10 initiative has reached its first birthday and we’ve decided to celebrate it with a king-size slide deck featuring the best case studies from our past top 10s.

This top 50 has been designed not only to celebrate the first birthday of the SimpliFlying’s Top 10s but also to provide our readers with a unique downloadable resource that features what we think are the very best marketing initiatives put forward by airlines and airports over the past few years.

An idea-generating tool

However we do not wish this top 50 to be a sort of “museum” of past initiatives but rather a tool for airline professionals to generate new ideas. We hope that by viewing such a wide variety of outstanding initiatives in a single slide deck, other marketers will be inspired to create other new and innovative campaigns that will form the basis of future SimpliFlying Top 10s.

You will notice that each case study has a category indicator before its title. These indicators refer to the original top 10 that featured that particular case study, and have been included  to facilitate further research into the subject.

A year of top 10s

The list below provides links to all of the past SimpliFling Top 10s

February 2011: Facebook contests

March 2011: Twitter Initiatives

April 2011: Location Based Initiatives

May 2011: Airport Initiatives

June 2011: Social Loyalty

July 2011: Viral Videos

August 2011: Route Launches

September 2011: Travel Distribution Initiatives

October 2011 Mobile apps

November 2011 Customer Service Initiatives

December 2011 Crowdsourcing Initiatives

January 2012 Wow Campaigns / Christmas initiatives

We hope this post will help you come up with fresh new ideas for your marketing campaigns. However, if you are looking for ways to ramp up your own marketing and social media integration, remember that we  also offer consulting services and MasterClasses as part of our Simpliflying University .

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Serve customers ‘vacation cereal’.

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Concept of giving gifts

Early morning flights can be tough, especially when you live two hours from the airport. So, the night before a "crack of dawn" flight, my wife and I elected to stay at the Renaissance Concourse Hotel right beside the Atlanta airport. We requested a room on a high floor on the runway side of the property. I am a Marriott platinum guest, which means I frequent their properties.

"Oh, trust me, you will absolutely love this room," said the friendly desk clerk when my wife reminded her of our special high floor request. She was right. The top floor room was a huge corner suite complete with a full kitchen, expansive living room, and two baths. I called the front desk clerk to thank her for the luxurious upgrade. "Oh, we do this occasionally to surprise our special guests like you." It was vacation cereal!

"Vacation cereal" is the label my daughter-in-law, Lisa, uses to characterize expanded boundaries and irregular exceptions aimed solely at making vacations unique. Sugary cereal at the beach starkly contrasts with the healthy fare that dons their year-round breakfast table. It goes with sleeping late, no homework, and very few chores. It signals unique, exceptional, and out-of-the-ordinary. And it makes children, grandchildren, and customers feel special.

The Dark Side of “Vacation Cereal”

There is an obvious dark side to the customer version of "vacation cereal." Could extravagant service have a return on investment significant enough to warrant it? Should leaders challenge employees to "bring me more lavish bills for unplanned, unbudgeted red-carpet treatment for our customers?" In this era when waste reduction and expense control have become the bread and butter of all organizations, how do you cost-justify encounters that are, by definition, extravagant?

How do you put a governor on the frontline's desire to "make a customer super happy?" We all enjoy playing Santa Claus to the people who fund our revenue. But could this extra generous behavior elevate customer expectations? Where does “vacation cereal” fit on a tightly controlled budget? How do you prevent unique from becoming usual thus disappearing its magic. With all its cautions, “vacation cereal” has its advantages.

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Wwe smackdown results: winners and grades as the rock and roman return, openai reaches $80 billion valuation in venture firm deal, report says.

"Vacation Cereal" Turns Routine Appreciation into Viral Advocacy

Condolance Gift

Andrea Cassell is an award-winning author of children's books featuring her dog, Kibby, a miniature labradoodle that teaches life lessons. When Kibby died of cancer, the family had to cancel their long-planned holiday trip. The Delta Airlines contact center operator spent enough extra time on the phone to learn she was speaking with the author of books that had made a major impact on her young, bullied son. Not only did she accommodate the Cassell's last-minute airline cancellation and extend the deadline for using their no-refund tickets, but Delta also sent a giant care package of goodies, a note of condolence, and a heartwarming sign that read, "Heaven should have visiting hours." Author Andrea penned an article celebrating the compassionate spirit of the call rep and Delta Airlines.

Ritz-Carlton Hotels, Disney theme parks, TD Bank, and Chewy.com are all organizations that have benefited from heartwarming expressions of extravagance that gain them over-the-top social media that goes viral. Again, it does not require a steady diet of indulgence. A once-in-a-while gesture communicates the character of the organization to the marketplace. The key is communicating random acts of kindness to all associates to give them the authority and guidance to demonstrate generosity effectively and appropriately.

"Vacation Cereal" Releases Employee Power

Celebrating service heroics and occasional exceptions encourages employees to "take it to the limit" and "push the edge of the envelope." When boldness is matched by affirmation, they learn to take risks in other areas. The goal is not to set employees up to get hurt but to encourage them to experience the limits. If they go too far, they can learn the leader response will be support and coaching rather than punishment and rebuke. Empowerment begins with error; error begins with risks. Employees take responsible risks when they believe failure will spark growth, not censure.

A patient at St. Luke's Medical Center in Milwaukee had a favorite pair of sneakers

Golden Sneaker Award

mistakenly discarded by housekeeping. The worn condition of the sneakers had led the housekeeper to conclude they were trash. The patient demanded their return. When this proved impossible, the hospital offered to pay for their replacement. But the patient was not mollified. Another housekeeper, getting a description of the sneakers, went to a nearby mall and purchased a replacement pair with his own money. The now elated patient proudly displayed her new sneakers. The employee received the first-ever "Golden Sneaker" award for over-the-top service at St. Luke's Medical.

"Vacation Cereal" Keeps Innovative Service Top of Mind

Every organization's challenge in sustaining an innovation culture is finding ways to keep the "shiny from wearing off." The early elation of "The Year of the Customer" or the "National Customer Service Week" big deal kick-off quickly turns to exertion when the umpteenth irate customer makes some unreasonable demand on an already exhausted front line. How do organizations ensure excitement wins out over despair?

Effective service celebrations begin with "see." The telling of "vacation cereal" service stories provides a graphic picture of what innovative service looks like. Too often those witnessing a celebration...." and, this year's 'CSR of the Year' award goes to"..., learn who but not why. Tell the story in detail, along with the philosophy or attitude demonstrated. People will be reminded of the importance of occasional extraordinary service, not the fact that the way to get the big award next year is to send a customer home in an unbudgeted limousine because "we screwed up her account."

"Vacation cereal" must be framed as unique. Otherwise, the customer will come to view it as standard fare. The Renaissance Hotel front desk clerk did not say, "Come back again, and we'll upgrade you to that same suite." She carefully left the "this is an exception" label on our experience. "We do this occasionally to surprise our special guests like you." Wise organizations help employees remember extravagance is extraordinary. And they work to let them learn the principle behind the peculiar.

Just like too much "vacation cereal" leads to adverse health consequences, the same is true for the health of your bottom line. Give elbowroom for "vacation cereal" along with guidance for its proper place and your employees will be energized to deliver service performances that customers will want to gleefully share with their world.

Chip Bell

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Information Technology Services

Office of Internal Audit relies on ITS Managed Desktop Services

By Louise Flinn

Dean Weber chief audit officer in the office of internal audit

The Office of Internal Audit (OIA) at UNC-Chapel Hill is a service unit that assists University management in providing the highest quality education and services to students and the people of North Carolina. Dean Weber, Chief Audit Officer, said that OIA’s underlying premise is that “the University must function at the highest level possible.” The OIA supports this objective by providing independent and proactive analyses of operations, financial activities and systems of internal control. Weber said these analyses evaluate whether resources are used in keeping with State requirements and the University’s mission, goals and objectives.

The Office of Internal Audit has been an ITS Managed Desktop Support (MDS) customer since June 2019. MDS provides IT support to faculty, staff and administrators at UNC-Chapel Hill. The group supplies “fixers” for technical support as well as consultative services, with a focus on security and reliability. It supports 15 different campus departments.

In this customer case study, Weber answered a few questions about the “terrific” partnership between OIA and MDS.

Tell us a little about the Office of Internal Audit.

The University established an internal audit function in 1961 with an internal auditor position in the Division of Business and Finance. Fast forward to 2024, the Office of Internal Audit (OIA) operates as an independent department with the chief audit officer administratively reporting to the University’s chancellor and functionally to the Board of Trustees, Audit, Compliance and Risk Management Committee.

Why did you enlist ITS Managed Desktop Services?

We turned to MDS to aid in supporting the technology administration of our department. As a smaller unit of eight FTE administratively housed under the Chancellor’s Office, we realized our department lacked the professional expertise necessary to maintain our administrative technology needs. Specifically, we needed to ensure our technology was properly managed, administered, secured and understood by our department’s users. MDS was the solution to meet our needs in providing professional, efficient, knowledgeable and user-friendly staffing to support our desktop computing needs.

What services does MDS provide to your department?

MDS provides support and direction guiding desktop computing needs for our department. This encompasses addressing departmental staff’s immediate technology questions, as well as our technology hardware and software application planning needs. MDS quickly and efficiently responds to our requests to prepare laptops for our team members, comprising wiping and refreshing equipment when changes in staffing occur. They readily respond to user inquiries regarding technology access, software application questions and technology procurement needs.

How does partnering with MDS benefit OIA?

Partnering with MDS as the provider for our department’s administrative desktop hardware and software computing needs has been terrific! As a department focused on cost-effectiveness, the OIA recognizes substantial value in this partnership, both from a financial standpoint and in terms of the knowledge-based expertise offered in technology administration. The utilization of this shared University resource adds significant value to our unit, given that the costs incurred are minimal compared to the alternative of hiring an in-house professional to support our computing needs. This strategic approach allows us to benefit from specialized support while maintaining a prudent fiscal approach.

What about MDS’ support or service has exceeded your expectations?

I am consistently impressed by the professionalism and expertise demonstrated by every member of the Managed Desktop Services Team with whom I interact. Their responsiveness in addressing our inquiries, fulfilling requests and addressing concerns is prompt and delivered in a friendly manner. Our designated representative is readily accessible through various communication channels, including text, email, phone and Teams, making the process of reaching out to MDS remarkably convenient.

The utilization of Teams chat and remote screen sharing between MDS and our staff has proven to be an invaluable resource. This collaborative approach facilitates swift and effective solutions, enabling the resolution of technology concerns or problems in real time. This efficient process allows us to promptly return to our work, supporting our audit activities with minimal disruption.

What would you tell other schools or departments that are considering hiring MDS?

I would tell them that based on my experience, this is certainly a value-added opportunity to successfully meet the desktop computing needs of their team. MDS personnel are extremely professional, knowledgeable, responsive and customer focused. They are a valuable resource possessing the expertise necessary to support and solve your team’s desktop computing issues.

Anything else you would like to say?

In the decentralized University operating environment, leveraging Managed Desktop Services (MDS) offers a steadfast and dependable solution for meeting desktop computing requirements. MDS services stand out as an efficient and cost-effective option, equipped with the expertise to offer guidance and direction in addressing user technology needs. This includes providing swift and effective solutions, along with expert advice on the optimal methods for addressing software and hardware requirements.

MDS and the OIA IT Systems Auditor are collaborating to explore IT audit services that will provide MDS management insight. The audit tool Nessus Professional will be used to assist MDS with evaluating settings in the baseline images for computers they configure. The OIA will provide recommendations from the Center for Internet Security (CIS) benchmarks. This collaboration supports our common goals to strengthen controls and add value to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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COMMENTS

  1. Southwest Airlines: A Case Study in Great Customer Service

    Updated Jan 22, 2024 Table of Contents Sean Peek Contributing Writer at business.com Southwest Airlines serves over 126 million passengers each year, provides service to 121 airports across 11 countries and has maintained its nearly 72,000-employee roster with no involuntary furloughs or layoffs in its history.

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  3. PDF Customer experience in the new reality

    30% over 30% of the world's 26,000 aircrafts were grounded The full-service airlines that have historically led our Customer Experience rankings pride themselves on providing a high touch, personal service. This is, however, the antithesis of COVID-19 world where limiting touchpoints and reducing interaction between passengers and crew is

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    In conjunction with the press release, Delta CEO Ed Bastian sent a letter to Delta frequent flyers, acknowledging customer service issues that have arisen during the Covid pandemic (e.g., long...

  5. A study on airlines' responses and customer satisfaction during the

    1. Introduction Coronavirus (COVID-19) is a sheer devastating factor in the aviation and tourism industries. The airline industry has recorded constant and extraordinary growth in the past century. In this way, it has resisted some huge global catastrophes, for example, the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 and the global financial crisis in 2008.

  6. PDF American Airlines (US Airways) reaches new heights in customer service

    American Airlines case study Customer Service Solutions Contact Center/IVR ebook American Airlines (US Airways) reaches new heights in customer service The U.S. domestic airline industry's first natural language understanding IVR system delivers fast, personalized IVR self-service and a superior caller experience while reducing operations costs.

  7. A Tale of Two Airlines: A Comparative Case Study of High-Road versus

    customer service thereby filling an important gap in current aviation customer service literature. 1 Roberts and Griffith: A Tale of Two Airlines: A Comparative Case Study of High-Road versus Low-Road Strategies in Customer Service and Reputation Management Published by Scholarly Commons, 2019

  8. Airline service quality, customer satisfaction, and repurchase

    1. Introduction and background In the competitive business environment of the airline industry, retaining existing customers and attract new ones is a key to success. Air travel has become more common and customer today have many choices of service providers (Law, 2018 ), which has created significant pressure on the airline companies.

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  10. Customer Service at Singapore Airlines

    Abstract. The case study focuses on customer service in Singapore Airlines (SIA). It discusses the emergence of SIA as the world leader in customer service in the airline industry. The case begins with the launch of SIA and its progress in becoming the most customer-friendly airline in the world. The case discusses how SIA differentiated itself ...

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  18. American Airlines Case Study

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  23. Top 50 case-studies of airlines and airports excelling ...

    Even though it seems like yesterday, our popular top 10 initiative has reached its first birthday and we've decided to celebrate it with a king-size slide deck ...

  24. Serve Customers 'Vacation Cereal'

    The Delta Airlines contact center operator spent enough extra time on the phone to learn she was speaking with the author of books that had made a major impact on her young, bullied son.

  25. Office of Internal Audit relies on ITS Managed Desktop Services

    Dean Weber, Chief Audit Officer in the Office of Internal Audit. The Office of Internal Audit (OIA) at UNC-Chapel Hill is a service unit that assists University management in providing the highest quality education and services to students and the people of North Carolina. Dean Weber, Chief Audit Officer, said that OIA's underlying premise is that "the University must function at the ...