Heathrow has this week belatedly published the results from its Fly Quiet & Green programme for
Q1 2019.
For Q1, as with previous quarters, league table scores have again been inflated, this time by a record 46% compared to the results that are produced when Heathrow's own published methodology and performance rankings are used. Once again that increase has not been applied uniformly across all of the 50 airlines considered (some of the poorer performing carriers have been awarded more than double the number of points that they merit), with the result that the relative league table positions are significantly distorted.
A more detailed look at the Q1 table shows:
a) Individual airline scores are inflated by between 9% and 135%, with the poorest performing carriers receiving the biggest unjustified increase in their score. For example, the 797 points score awarded by Heathrow to Jet Airways is 434 points more than the airline actually merits under Heathrow's own rules, based on its published performance metric rankings.
b) 48 out of the 50 airlines in Heathrow's table are awarded more than the correctly calculated average (based on Heathrow's data and methodology) of 528 points (from a maximum possible 1,000 points).
c) Jet Airways and Air India are given an unexplained hike up the table, by 17 and 15 places respectively, compared to the positions that their performance merits.
d) Among the airlines entitled to feel aggrieved with this quarter's published results include China Southern, relegated 23 places from its rightful position, together with Icelandair shorthaul and Japan Airlines, each unjustifiably demoted by 16 places. El Al, despite meriting 368 points by Heathrow's own methodology, putting it just above Jet Airways, bizarrely ends up ranked 22 places and 281 points below the Indian carrier.
e) "RAG" (red/amber/green) classifications are again applied inconsistently; for example Cathay Pacific and BA longhaul, ranked 40th and 41st, respectively, by Heathrow for early/late movements, get an "Amber" for that category while American, ranked 35th for that metric by Heathrow, gets a "Red".
f) Finnair's wide-body types (Airbus A330 and A350) which account for more than 20% of its flights at LHR and should therefore, under Heathrow's rules, be considered separately, have been lumped in with the narrow-body fleet, thereby invalidating the results for metrics such as Quota Count per seat and CAIP.
However one positive outcome in this quarter's results is that, for the first time, Heathrow has successfully managed the tricky task of counting how many times each airline lands on its runways in order to to determine the 50 busiest airlines. Either that, or it simply used the list that I sent, back in April.
