Indonesian national carrier Garuda Airlines is now considered amongst the best airlines in the world, consistently winning industry awards such as “Best Airline Cabin Crew” and “Most Loved Airline” for its high customer satisfaction rating. Now it can add “Most Improved Airline” Award from Airlineratings.com to its list of accolades.
It’s hard to remember now, but the perception of Garuda used to be quite different. In the late 1990s and early-to-mid 2000s, the company was hit by financial and operational difficulties that caused its service standards suffer severely. It was even banned (along with all other Indonesian airlines) from entering Europe due to the country’s poor safety ratings.
But after that low point, the company initiated a series of programs, dubbed the Quantum Leap expansion plan, to turn the struggling airline around. Since then, its performance has consistently improved by leaps and bounds each year, earning it the aforementioned praise and awards. Buoyed by Garuda’s performance, the whole Indonesian airline industry has also seen great increases in standards, leading to the United States upgrading the country’s safety rating this year, allowing Indonesian carriers to operate routes to US cities for the first time in over a decade.
That is why Airlineratings.com, which tags itself as the world’s foremost airline safety and product rating website, decided to recognize Garuda Indonesia with its “Most Improved Airline” award this year. As explained in a press release announcing the award:
[Most Improved Airline] has been won by Garuda Indonesia in recognition of the dramatic turnaround by the country’s national carrier. Over the past five years the airline has made enormous strides to improve its in-flight product, operational and fiscal performance. It has renewed its entire fleet, been approved for European and US operations and is now considered a world class operation. AirlineRatings.com editors were unanimous in their praise of the professionalism of Garuda Indonesia’s operation and the speed of the airline’s turnaround.
Congrats to Garuda Indonesia for this latest achievement – its great to have an Indonesian airline that we can truly be proud of (maybe you guys can give Lion Air a few pointers…?)
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