Complaints Against Airlines Continue To Soar

The Dept. of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics has released its final report on airline customer complaints for the month of May and it isn’t pretty.

Travelers filed 1,062 complaints about airlines in May, up 20.8% from the month before and a whopping 33% from May 2010.

The biggest category of complaints involved delays, cancellations and missed connections. Given the horrendous storms throughout many parts of the country in May, it’s not surprising that this number jumped up from 226 in May 2010 to more than 380 this past May.

Customer service complaints jumped nearly 40% compared to the same month last year, from 87 to 120.

American Airlines was the target of the most complaints with 147. Delta Air Lines and United Airlines followed with 107 and 101 complaints respectively. If you add Continental’s 72 complaints to new partner United’s 101, that spells trouble for customers of the combined airlines.

The rate of mishandled bags, 3.52 per 1,000 passengers, in May was slightly more than April’s 3.24 or May 2010’s 3.23.

Complaints against airlines jump in May, government reports [USA Today]

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