I suspect that when travelers are asked what they consider to be the most important elements when it comes to choosing an airline high on that list would be reliability and punctuality.  Airlines are easy targets when it comes to these issues and coverage by media and travelers tends to only focus on these elements when an airline struggles with on time arrivals and fleet reliability.  Thats not the case this time!

For 2012, Austrian (OS)  had no such issue.

Austrian has been awarded the AEA’s (Association of European Airlines) award for being Europe’s most reliable and punctual airline.   Of the thousands of flights that Austrian had scheduled, a nearly perfect 99.3% of them took place.  Don’t let the fact escape you that Austrian operates in very challenging environment in Europe where winter weather wreaks havoc with airlines.

In addition to that fantastic metric, Austrian also ranked at the top of the class when it came to punctuality.    In 2012, 88.3% of Austrian’s flights were on time.   This handily exceeds the  82.3% that the rest of  the European airlines averaged.

For Austrian, both of these measures were improvements over 2011.   In 2011, ‘OS’ operated 98.9% of their scheduled flights and on time arrivals occurred 86.7% of the time.  This is also testament to the efficiency that you’ll find at Vienna’s Airport thanks in large part to the new terminal that opened last year specifically geared towards Star Alliance member airlines.

With a refreshed long haul fleet being rolled out this year and  the launch of a new route from the US when service starts from Chicago in mid-May, Austrian is making a very compelling argument for passengers to discover what Austrian has to offer.

Just make sure you are at the gate on time! 🙂