SAS® Keeps Staffing Levels Aloft

Reserve forecast aids in saving millions at America West Airlines

Like most major airlines, America West Airlines schedules and assigns full flight crews for hundreds of daily departures and uses a straightforward staffing forecast to predict employment levels and training needs for the upcoming year. Until recently, however, most major airlines have been challenged to develop a truly accurate method of forecasting for reserve crews – the pool of on-call pilots and flight attendants scheduled to cover for any sick call or scheduling snag that may arise on any given day. Today, America West is confronting that challenge with SAS.

Customer Success Video

Check out this video to learn more about America West Airlines and its successes with SAS.

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You have questions; our customers have answers. Check out this video Q& A.

Kat Weaver
Senior Analyst, America West Airlines

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Kat Weaver, a senior analyst in America West's Manpower Planning and Analysis Department, has turned to SAS to develop an innovative reserve crew forecast that helps avoid expensive flight cancellations and reduces overstaffing costs. According to Weaver, the goal is to schedule the minimum number of reserves required to protect the operation against canceled flights.

"At what point do we stop staffing and take the risk of cancellations versus overstaffing just to be sure that those flights are covered?" asks Weaver. "It's very cost-effective to know, within a few heads, at what point you can expect either to pay premium rates or to cancel flights based on your crew levels."

Reserve crews are paid in full, regardless of whether they are called to take a flight. Therefore, the goal is to determine exactly how many will be needed for each one-hour block of time throughout the day. But how can you predict when a plane and its crew will be stuck in Columbus during a snowstorm? How can you foretell when a flu bug will hit Phoenix and keep dozens of pilots in their beds for the day?

Weaver does it with seven forecasting models built with SAS and a large assortment of data collected from throughout the enterprise. "I used anything I could get my hands on," she says, including flight cancellation histories, weather patterns, training schedules, available vacation time, previous reserve crew levels and detailed flight schedules. Incorporating such a large number of variables helped Weaver increase the usefulness of her models.

Improved performance ratings
Before using SAS, the airline scheduled reserve crews based on a simple percentage of the regular flight crew schedule. According to Weaver, this method was inaccurate and often led to overstaffing. Her method, in contrast, predicts reserve crew levels with amazing accuracy. For the past year, her monthly forecasts have never been off by more than one head for the entire month.

As a result, says Weaver, America West seldom cancels flights because of crew-related issues. "If we plan accurately and we're staffed at the right levels, we typically have zero cancellations attributed to crew issues. Thanks to SAS, we won't be delayed due to scheduling difficulties."

In fact, America West has consistently led the industry with a high on-time performance rating – a valuable measure that increases the company's revenue with every percentage point gained.

Significant cost savings
When Weaver first started the project in 2002, the obstacles to accurate forecasting included a lack of historical data and a technical infrastructure that made current data difficult to retrieve. But SAS helped overcome those challenges in just a few weeks.

"SAS is the best overall analytic package available. With SAS, data set size doesn't matter, and it doesn't matter how many variables you have, either. It allows for merging of multiple data sources quickly and easily," she says. "The computations done in SAS are precise and the goodness-of-fit parameters are all readily available."

Weaver says the solution surpassed her expectations and offered a fast return on investment. "When we started testing the future, I was just quite shocked at how quickly it validated. It's impressive enough that we're able to produce a solution at all for this problem, let alone come up with such accurate results even at the beginning of the project."

In fact, SAS immediately targeted two aircraft fleets for staffing reductions and a third where staffing was increased to avoid expensive cancellations. "Within the first year of implementation, we made several changes in our pilot staffing model, which helped bring our cost structure down considerably," she says.

America West leads the industry
America West is the only new airline to survive – and thrive – since the U.S. airline industry was deregulated. The carrier initiated service in 1983 with three aircraft and 280 employees and grew to achieve major-airline status, with annual revenues of more than $1 billion, by 1990. Today, America West is a low-fare, full-service airline with a history of overcoming challenges with smart, innovative solutions.

"Currently, America West is the only airline using this method of forecasting to enhance reserve crew planning," says Weaver.

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