Quality of service audit for Heathrow and Gatwick

Heathrow and Gatwick Airports are each subject to a service quality regime (SQR) by which they pay rebates in airport charges to airlines where certain standards are not reached in respect of security queuing, passenger perceptions of service quality, asset availability and the aerodrome congestion term (ACT).

Steer Davies Gleave carried out a service quality audit for the CAA in April, 2009 “to provide a transparent, independent assessment of the extent to which BAA’s measurement of service standards…provides objective, unbiased, reliable and robust information on which to base regulatory financial incentives”. We consulted with AOCs and airlines to understand any concerns they might have, or particular issues they had observed, with respect to the operation of the SQR.

A detailed review of the four service quality areas were carried out, generally incorporating: reviewing the process, observing the process in action, sampling the measurement data produced and cross-checking between data sources where this was possible.