Almost on time

Citation

(1999), "Almost on time", Work Study, Vol. 48 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/ws.1999.07948eaa.005

Almost on time

Almost on time

I recently undertook a very long journey by air. This involved three flights on both the outward and return legs of the journey. Of these six flights, five were more or less on time (departing within half an hour of scheduled departure time) and the other was delayed by two hours. Two things struck me about this. First, that such performance is pretty good when one thinks of the complexity and volume of air travel: the skies are pretty full! Second, that if this was rail travel, there would be an outcry about such diabolically poor performance. Expectations of air travel are different - and this is reflected in perceptions of performance.