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Miles With a Smile
The Travel Critic · March 9, 1998

What would make frequent fliers ditch their preferred airline, miles and all? Broken planes? Union trouble? A spotty safety record?

Try shoddy service. In a recent Internet survey conducted by CIC Research in San Diego, Calif., one-third of business travelers claimed they'd abandon their carrier if they got mistreated by a gate agent or flight attendant just once. The poll, which asked more than 500 passengers to evaluate the image of their favorite airline, found that corporate travelers believe good service is paramount.

"The message is clear," says Addison Schonland, director of aviation travel and marketing at CIC Research. "Frequent fliers have an expectation level. If you deviate from that, you irritate them."

Maybe, maybe not. Peter Ivory, a senior economist at Seattle aviation consultants Back Management Services, thinks the figures represent wishful thinking rather than reality. "For business travelers, it hurts to switch airlines. I mean, what are you going to do if you live near Atlanta? Leave Delta? Or near Dallas? Leave American? It's not that easy."

The truth probably lies somewhere between both interpretations. While it's hard to argue that road warriors are prisoners-not only to the dominant carrier in their area, but to a corporate travel policy that usually favors the same dominant carrier-it's also true that passengers are sick of bad service.

In fact, travelers indicate service is more of a distinguishing factor than safety or overall reliability. In the survey, which asked travelers to describe different airlines' images, categories such as global, punctual and safe ranked low, suggesting that most of those qualities don't figure prominently in carriers' reputations.

Another interesting aspect of the survey is how travelers define value. More than 20 percent of US Airways' regulars gave it a high value rating, despite the fact that it has some of the highest fares in the industry. How's that possible?

"The US Airways figure is a real shocker," says Adam Pilarski, senior vice president at Reston, Va.-based aviation consultants Avitas. "Not only are they making the most money off passengers per mile, but they also have the highest costs of any carriers."

So what's happening? To some frequent fliers, value simply means low fares. Continental's passengers, for example, would view it like that. On the other hand, US Airways' business travelers might think of value as convenience. After all, the airline services lots of smaller airports on the East Coast, offering connections to the rest of the world.

At the end of each column I usually include several tips. I wish I could help prevent anyone from being trapped with a troublesome carrier. But I can't. Chances are if you live in Minneapolis or Detroit-or Atlanta or Dallas-you're stuck with the major airline servicing that city.

Consider writing your representative for help in breaking the carrier cartel. Short of everyone suddenly deciding to take the train, that's the only thing that stands a chance of breaking the airlines' monopolistic stranglehold on many American cities.

Christopher Elliott is a travel commentator and author of A Bridge to Nowhere: A Year in the Florida Keys. All e-mailed questions may be edited, condensed or republished at the site's discretion.