Which? names Southend Airport the best in Britain
The Essex terminal topped the poll with a customer score of 84% and a maximum five star rating in five of the 10 categories assessed. This left other London airports such as City (78%), Heathrow (Terminal 5, 66%), Gatwick (North, 56%) Stansted (50%) and Luton (43%) further down the table.
In June 2013, 11,537 Which? members were asked to complete an online survey about their experiences of flying from a UK airport in the past year. The customer scores are based on a combination of overall satisfaction and how likely people are to recommend the airport to a friend.
Categories surveyed included speed of check-in, airport security, passport control, information and navigation, airport design (all of which London Southend scored the maximum five stars in), plus airport environment, food outlets, shops, toilets, facilities.
London Southend Airport operations director David Lister said: “This is wonderful news and testament to all the hard work that the team here at London Southend has put in. We think our unique promises to passengers – that they should wait no more than four minutes to go through security and that, on arrival with hand baggage, they are on the rail station platform within 15 minutes of leaving the aircraft with a fast and frequent service to the heart of London - is what has been a big part of our success over the last year and the factor which is driving more and more passengers to choose London's newest airport.
That is why we are currently extending the terminal to ensure that we continue to deliver these high standards of customer service as the airport grows, and we are also working closely with all our partners to offer more variety of destinations for business and leisure travellers.”
Which?
executive director, Richard Lloyd, said: “Our research shows a jumbo jet-sized gap in the performance of UK airports with smaller terminals generally performing better. It is clear some of our major airports have some work to do if they are to keep more of their passengers satisfied."
