There’s good news for modern man: Millions more people will fly this Christmas season--but the airlines say they can handle it.
The US airlines trade group Airlines for America (A4A), just projected that 51 million passengers are expected to fly globally on U.S. airlines over a 21-day winter holiday travel period. The busiest days to pack yourself on a plane are expected to be Dec. 21, Dec. 22 and Dec. 26, when more than 2.7 million people are expected to fly each day. If you want to ‘avoid’ the crowds, the lightest times to travel (still estimated at 2 million passengers per day) are Saturday, Dec. 16, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve.
The A4A trade group, which defines the Christmas season as from Friday, Dec. 15 through Thursday, Jan. 4, says the 51 million passengers represent a 3.5 percent increase over the 49.3 million who flew last year. They attribute the growing demand to an improving economy and what they call “sub-inflation” airfares. “Intense competition within the airline industry is enabling passengers to choose the flights that most closely match their preferences and budgets,” said A4A Vice President and Chief Economist John Heimlich.
To allow the extra 80,000 people a day to fly, the airlines will offer nearly two million additional seats, (91,000 per day), by adding flights and utilizing larger planes. The airlines have been increasing staffing for the past 47 months, the trade group claims and will do so through the holidays to accommodate the crush of travelers.
The Christmas rush is on top of a Thanksgiving season that saw 28.5 million passengers travel on U.S. airlines from Friday, Nov. 17 through Tuesday, Nov. 28. That’s up 3 percent from 2016, according to A4A. The airlines added some 86,000 more seats each day, a 3.2 percent increase over 2016. Delta and American, for example, reported some prodigious numbers for Thanksgiving. American carried 5.5 million customers on 55,463 flights from November 17 to November 26. Delta handled 2.35 million customers on almost 23,000 flights from Nov. 22 to Nov. 26.
Perhaps the Thanksgiving security experience will be a good omen for the Christmas travel air travel period. According to the TSA, 98.1 percent of all passengers waited less than 20 minutes in a checkpoint line and 99.2 percent of passengers in a TSA Pre✓® lane waited less than 10 minutes.
But how has airline consolidation, going from 9 US carriers in 2005 (Delta, Northwest, US Airways, America West, United, Continental, Southwest, AirTran, and American) to four majors (American, United, Southwest, Delta) now carrying 80% of air traffic, affected flyers? Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Ca., said: "It’s an absolute joke that there’s competition in the airline industry.”
Airlines for America would disagree. Vice President and Chief Economist Heimlich notes that 88% of passengers traveling in U.S. domestic markets in 2016 could choose among carriers other than American, Delta, and United, up from 65 percent in 2000.
With all this good news, there are still some clouds on the horizon for airlines and passengers alike.
For the carriers, their problem is shrinking profits. The nine publicly traded U.S. passenger carriers (Alaska, Allegiant, American, Delta, Hawaiian, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit and United) reported a combined pre-tax profit of $14.7 billion so far in 2017, for a margin of 12 percent. But that’s down from $18.4 billion and 15.5 percent, respectively, in the first nine months of 2016. Although revenues for the airlines rose 3.8 percent, expenses rose 8.1 percent, led by labor (up 8.1 percent) and fuel (up 17%).
And the concern for passengers? Through August 2017, U.S. airlines achieved an on-time arrival rate of 78.2 percent, down from 81.4 percent in 2016. So considering the coming crush, leave plenty of time to get to your holiday destination.
