The Impact of Delays on Customers' Satisfaction: an Empirical Analysis of the British Airways On-Time Performance at Heathrow Airport

ABSTRACT: Increased congestion at hub airports affects on-time airline performance to the detriment of customer satisfaction and may have substantially negative repercussions for airlines in a hypercompetitive environment. This paper concentrates on the on-time performance of British Airways (BA) at London Heathrow Airport (LHR) to identify BA's delays/disruption management; measure the passengers' expectations in case of a delay; and investigate the passenger satisfaction levels. A survey of 160 BA passengers based on a close-ended questionnaire was conducted, complemented by semi-structured interviews with four members of staff at BA's network operations department. The survey results show that BA has been able to satisfy its customers by matching or exceeding their expectations and that those customers will travel with BA again.Interestingly, the results contradict the widespread belief that BA passengers are annoyed by a service failure/delay at LHR; this is because they expect to experience such a delay anyway.

摘要：枢纽机场拥堵加剧会对航空公司准点表现（on-time performance）造成负面影响，损害旅客满意度，且在高度竞争的市场环境中，可能给航空公司带来极为严重的不利后果。本文聚焦英国航空（British Airways，BA）在伦敦希思罗机场（London Heathrow Airport，LHR）的准点运营表现，旨在厘清英国航空的延误/故障处置机制，测算旅客遭遇航班延误时的心理预期，并调研旅客满意度水平。本研究面向160名英国航空旅客开展封闭式问卷调查，同时辅以对英国航空网络运营部门4名工作人员的半结构化访谈。调研结果显示，英国航空通过匹配甚至超出旅客预期的服务，成功获得了旅客的认可，且受访旅客表示会再次选择该航空公司出行。值得注意的是，本次研究结果与普遍认知相悖：外界普遍认为英国航空旅客会因伦敦希思罗机场的服务故障或航班延误心生不满，但实际情况是旅客本就预料到可能出现此类延误。