Southwest Wants to Shed Its Late-Flight Reputation by Year's End

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Southwest Wants to Shed Its Late-Flight Reputation by Year's End
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People like Southwest*Airlines*for many things: free checked bags, friendly flight attendants and competitive fares. But being on-time when you take a Southwest flight, well, that’s become a questionable proposition.

The airline has ranked near the bottom of the Department of Transportation’s monthly tally of airline on-time performance for much of the past year, with only 72.9% of its flights arriving on schedule for the past 12 months through April 30. Only two regional carriers,*Envoy*(the former American Eagle) and*SkyWest’s*ExpressJet unit, did worse in that period.

In August, Southwest dramatically tightened its aircraft turnaround and scheduled flight times to produce a “better, more marketable schedule,” says Steve Hozdulick, senior director of operational performance. That, in turn, freed up more time for planes to fly during “the meat of the day” from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., when more people want to travel, he says. It was a rational business decision to lure more customers at a time when the airline was looking to increase aircraft productivity and company revenues. Read more... (http://mashable.com/2014/06/20/southwest-airline-late-flights/?utm_campaign=Mash-Prod-RSS-Feedburner-All-Partial&utm_cid=Mash-Prod-RSS-Feedburner-All-Partial&utm_medium=feed&utm_source=rss)

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