Delta's 10-thousand pilots have voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike if mediation talks fail to resolve differences between the union and management by the end of the month. That means a strike could begin anytime after April first. And the government today issued a long-awaited review of the airlines' compliance with voluntary measures to improve customer service, begun in 1999. As Marketplace's John Dimsdale reports from Washington, the report card is mixed. Chronically delayed flights nearly quadrupled over the past year.
Customer complaints are way up.
Most notably, the report finds airlines are not giving passengers information about delayed or canceled flights. Critics accuse the airlines of keeping their customers in the dark so as not to lose them to competitors who are flying to the same destinations. Airline companies say the unfriendly skies are simply the result of too much demand overwhelming the ability of airports and air traffic controllers to keep up. But Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden says the airlines share the blame. Today, some of the industry's loudest congressional critics, including Senator Wyden, announced plans to reintroduce a passenger bill of rights to require airlines to notify flyers of delays and cancellations, and to disclose when flights have a history of significant service failures.