Customer relationship and efficiency analysis of the listed air companies in China

Abstract

With the rapid development of globalization and the improvement of residents’ income levels, the scale of air transport business has grown steadily, resulting in a substantial increase in customer traffic. The degree of marketization of airlines has been continuously improved, and operational efficiency has been significantly improved. Chinese air passenger transport market has gradually reached the level of development in North America and Europe. However, major domestic airlines face fierce competition from domestic and international counterparts. Building good customer relationship efficiently matters. This study uses a two-stage dynamic DEA method to evaluate the impact of customer complaints on airline operational efficiency by comparing the financial data of seven listed airlines in China from 2014 to 2017. The network data dynamic analysis method was used to analyze and evaluate the operating efficiency and productivity index of the seven companies. The results of the study indicate that customer complaints have a positive and significant impact on the airline’s operational efficiency. In addition, The smaller Shandong Airlines, Hainan Airlines and Jixiang Airlines have higher total efficiency scores than the three largest airlines in ChinaAir China, Southern Airlines and Eastern Airlines. The operating efficiency of the latter three companies is less than 0.4, which is a lot of room for improvement. The airline with high operating efficiency considering customer satisfaction is Spring Airlines, and the company has a trend of continuous improvement in efficiency.