The Air New Zealand has been crowned the world’s best airline for 2020. This is sccording to AirlineRatings.com, the world’s only safety and product rating website.
Singapore Airlines (SIA), the title holder for 2019 slipped to second place, but Singapore carrier took top spot with its more premium offerings, winning the Best First Class Airline award for its suites product.
The Air New Zealand, the flag carrier airline of New Zealand is based in Auckland. The airline’s wikipedia states that it operates on scheduled passenger flights to 20 domestic and 32 international destinations in 20 countries, primarily around and within the Pacific Rim. The airline has been a member of the Star Alliance since 1999.
This year’s win, is the sixth time that Air New Zealand has been given the top award, with airlines assessed based on a range of factors including safety, environmental leadership and motivation of its staff.
The site stated that Air New Zealand won for its record-breaking performance, multi-award-winning in-flight innovations, operational safety, environmental leadership and motivation of its staff. These factors have stamped the airline as a clear industry leader.
Airline Ratings Editor-in-Chief Geoffrey Thomas said, “In our analysis, Air New Zealand came out number one in most of our audit criteria, which is an outstanding performance when it’s up against carriers with more resources and scale on this same list of best airlines for 2020.”
It also emphasized that the “Air New Zealand’s win was impressive, given its relative size when compared with other international brands such as SIA, Qantas and Cathay Pacific”.
The AirlineRatings.com Airline Excellence Awards, judged by seven editors with over 200 years’ industry experience, combines major safety and government audits, with 12 key criteria that include: fleet age, passenger reviews, profitability, investment rating, product offerings, and staff relations, it stated.
The site also identified the top 20 airline (in order of merit): All Nippon Airways, Qantas, Cathay Pacific Airways, Emirates, Virgin Atlantic, EVA Air, Qatar Airways, Virgin Australia, Lufthansa, Finnair, Japan Airlines, KLM, Korean Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, British Airways, Alaska Airlines, Delta Air Lines and Etihad Airways.
AirlineRatings, an Australia-based website that started in 2013, said that to be named in its top 10 list, airlines must achieve a seven-star safety rating and demonstrate leadership in innovation for passenger comfort.-ezc
