About three out of four airline passengers do not bother complaining when they are unhappy as they do not believe they will be heard, a survey published on Tuesday says.
A study published by customer care software company Clarabridge shows that air travellers have little faith in airlines' complaint procedures. Almost three quarters of the 2,500 people surveyed said that they did not bother complaining in the first place.
One third said that their complaints were ignored, and of those who had received a response, 31 per cent believed that the airlines were not actually listening to them.
Clarabridge published the survey as Europe's biggest airline, Ryanair, is still grappling with problems that forced it to cancel an average of 50 flights a-day up to the end of October in a move that will hit more than 300,000 passengers.
The study was carried out before Ryanair became engulfed in the controversy 10 days ago. It ranked the Irish airline as number four for customer satisfaction, behind British Airways, Easyjet and Virgin, but ahead of Air France KLM.
Germanwings topped the list of the five worst, followed by the insolvent Air Berlin, LOT, Alitalia – which is also in severe financial trouble - and Spanish carrier, Iberia, a sister airline of British Airways.
The key factors for people choosing one airline over another were price and flight times.