THE Sunday (Dec 1) after Thanksgiving weekend marked a fresh record for US air travel with the Transportation Security Administration screening more than three million passengers in a single day. That does not mean everything went smoothly, of course.
AirHelp, which facilitates compensation for passengers by processing customer service claims for flight disruptions and lost luggage, has released its annual analysis of the best and worst-performing airlines. The 2024 AirHelp Score report, published on Tuesday, comes just in time for the holiday season.
The airline rankings methodology takes into account customer claims processed worldwide, as well as outside data tracking on-time arrival and departure performance for every plane, plus feedback from passengers from over 54 countries on the quality of food, comfort and crew service on their most recent flight. The aim is to give a snapshot of airline performance, said AirHelp chief executive officer Tomasz Pawliszyn, with hope that the analysis “encourages airlines to continuously listen to passenger feedback”. Data analysed for this round spanned from January to October.
The worst-performing airline in the world? That’s Tunisair, coming in last at No 109. Keeping it company in the bottom 10 are a handful of national and low-cost carriers, including Buzz, a Polish airline that is a subsidiary of Ryanair Holdings, Bulgaria Air, Turkish carrier Pegasus Airlines and Air Mauritius. But ranking in the bottom 50, too, are North American carriers JetBlue and Air Canada.
Sort the results based solely on customer opinion and Tunisair keeps the title of the worst performing, followed closely by Ryanair and Aer Lingus, a subsidiary of IAG, which also owns British Airways and Iberia.
As for the best all-around airline globally: It’s Brussels Airlines, part of Deutsche Lufthansa, bumping Qatar Airways to No 2 after holding the top spot since 2018. That’s a marked improvement for the Belgian national airline that was rated No 12 last year.
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Both United Airlines and American Airlines ranked in the top five, in third and fourth place respectively, which might come as a surprise to US travellers given the flight disruptions which plagued domestic airlines this past year. Both have consistently ranked in AirHelp’s top 10 since at least 2022.
“We also had a new North American nominee come to this year, Air Transat, the Canadian airline was ranked in position 36,” notes Pawliszyn. Delta Air Lines dropped to No 17 from No 11 in 2023, which Pawliszyn explains is due to a reduction in its claim processing score, while its on-time performance and customer opinion rankings have not shifted much. The airline’s July tech outage led to more than 3,000 complaints being filed about Delta with the Department of Transportation.
Alaska Airlines, due to merge with Hawaiian Holdings, also dropped more than 30 spots to No 88 this year.
Curious to know the airlines that topped or tanked on AirHelp’s 2024 global rankings? Here’s a quick list.
Worst airlines in the world
100. Sky Express
101. Air Mauritius
102. Tarom
103. IndiGo
104. Pegasus Airlines
105. El Al Israel Airlines
106. Bulgaria Air
107. Nouvelair
108. Buzz
109. Tunisair
Best airlines in the world
10. Air Serbia
9. Wideroe
8. Air Arabia
7. LOT Polish Airlines
6. Austrian Airlines
5. Play (Iceland)
4. American Airlines
3. United Airlines
2. Qatar Airways
1. Brussels Airlines. BLOOMBERG
