Airlines Are Bumping Fewer Passengers

Back in April, United Airlines experienced a massive backlash after viral video showed one of their passengers being dragged off an overbooked flight and injured in the process. The uproar seems to have had an effect with a new Department of Transportation report revealing that passenger bumping rates have fallen to their lowest level since 1995.

In the wake of the scandal, politicians called airline executives to a hearing, warning that a lack of improvement could result in regulatory action. United and other airlines scrambled to introduce new initiatives to reduce overbookings and offer customers generous financial incentives to switch flights. That seems to have resulted in the bumping rate falling for 12 major U.S. airlines. In the second quarter of 2017, it stood at 0.44 per 10,000 passengers compared to 0.62 during the same period last year.

The following infographic shows how the number of involuntary denied boardings per 10,000 passengers among major domestic carriers. Expressjet had 1.54 bumpings per 10,000 passengers in Q2 2016 and that fell noticeably to 0.63 in the second qarter of this year. The most impressive decline in bumping was recorded by JetBlue who saw its rate plummet to 0.04 this year compared to 0.91 last year.