Ethiopian Airlines beats SAA at Skytrax awards

ETHIOPIAN Airlines, Africa’s largest
airline group and fastest-growing
airline, has won the Skytrax World
Airline Awards for the ‘Best Airline in
Africa’ in 2017 at the Paris Air Show,
knocking SAA out of first place for the
first time in 14 years. The two airlines
were followed by Air Mauritius, Air
Seychelles, Kenya Airways, Royal Air
Maroc, TAAG Angola Airlines, fastjet,
kulula.com and Mango. Air Austral was
not placed this year, while fastjet made
the list for 2017 after not being listed
in 2016.
The awards are based on a consumer
satisfaction survey that is conducted
annually by Skytrax, an independent
aviation research organisation, which
received entries from business and
leisure travellers around the world.
The online survey was open from
August 2016 to May 2017, giving
travellers an opportunity to rate their
experience both in the air and on the
ground, and included more than 320
airlines, from the largest international
carriers to smaller regional and
domestic carriers. It measures
customer satisfaction across 41
key performance indicators of airline
frontline products and service, including
check-in, boarding, on-board seat
comfort, cabin cleanliness, food and
beverages, inflight entertainment and
staff service.
“We are thrilled that Skytrax, the
most reputable global airline rating
organisation, has honoured Ethiopian
Airlines with The Best Airline in
Africa award. I am very happy that
Ethiopian has won the award based
on a customer survey,” Tewolde
GebreMariam, group ceo of Ethiopian
Airlines, said while receiving the reward.
Tewolde concluded that the award
would motivate Ethiopian Airlines to
continue to invest time, energy and
money in customer service, human
resource development, modern fleet,
infrastructure and technology.