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Air apparent: what corp. buyers, flyers want from carriers.

Article Excerpt
Airlines today find themselves in the delicate position of having to cut certain services and amenities in order to lower costs and trying to infuse value into their products as a means of differentiation versus competitors. The latest BTN research, however, suggests the bells and whistles of mainline airline service, and even the perks associated with premium travel, pale in importance to the basics: efficient, comfortable service that gets travelers promptly to their destination and with their bags. According to travelers and their managers, the airlines still have some distance to go in meeting customer expectations.

The industry is making some progress, notably in the areas of airport process improvement--important in offsetting the frustrations of security-related delays--and such self-services as Internet-issued boarding passes. After a lull in spending following the 2001 terrorist attacks, some carriers also are improving their premium products, particularly on international routes.

Travelers and their companies, of course, have differing needs and wants when it comes to airline service. Frequent travelers, for example, place a higher degree of importance than infrequent travelers on newer planes, automatic upgrades and onboard laptop power. Less-frequent travelers are more concerned with efficient baggage delivery at their destination. "We go through a lot of connection markets, so our people are looking for high completion factors," said Tom Barrett, American Standard Cos. global strategic sourcing director.

Travel managers also have specific service needs and are most interested in favorable transient pricing discounts, effective rate loading and responsive airline sales staff. Increasingly, they are exploring opportunities to combine their purview--corporate contracting and preferred supplier relationships--with customer service elements by negotiating service level agreements.

Airline SLAs, in theory, can run the gamut and encompass various metrics and eventualities, ranging from on-time performance commitments and fare availability to the ramifications of labor actions and bankruptcies. In practice, such agreements are difficult to negotiate--despite years of effort by some travel managers and airlines' recent claims that they have developed greatly enhanced tracking systems.

"We need to get hospitality back into this industry," Barrett said, "but with the airlines, there may be too many moving parts for customer service metrics to be applicable. If you don't negotiate creatively, you get bland stuff with lots of wiggle room. What is the penalty if they don't finish in the top three of on-time performance?...

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