Low-cost airlines fare poorly in website usability

The 2009 Flights Online Report from user experience consultancy, Webcredible, revealed that Ryanair finished bottom of the study of 20 leading carrier and travel agent websites with a score of just 41 per cent, an improvement of just 1 per cent on last year. 

Despite improving by 9 per cent and rising from 20^th place last year, Monarch was joint 18^th with Thomas Cook with a usability score of 47 per cent.  In addition, both easyJet and Jet2 also scored 50 per cent or lower in the study.

The report also revealed that British Airways, Expedia and Virgin Atlantic offer their customers the best levels of usability in the online travel sector. 

The British Airways website topped the study of with a score of 71 per cent, moving from 2^nd to 1^st with a rise of 6 per cent from last year.  Expedia and Virgin Atlantic were the biggest movers improving their scores by 17 per cent and 15 per cent respectively from last year, to leave them in joint 2^nd place with a usability score of 70 per cent. 

After only achieving a worrying average usability score of 51.5 per cent last year, the 2009 report reveals that the vast majority of carriers and travel agents have improved their website usability since last year giving an average score of 56.7 per cent. 

However, there is still significant scope to improve across the board as usability can be a key driver of sales in the highly competitive online travel market.  Key guidelines that still need improvement include displaying clear progress bars, clear identification of errors and providing information on airports. 

Unlike last year the difference between the usability of travel agents and carriers is less clear with travel agents averaging 58.7 per cent and carriers averaging a score of 54.7 per cent, a difference of 4 per cent as opposed to 7 per cent last year.  This difference can be largely attributed to low cost airlines scoring poorly in the usability stakes. 

Trenton Moss, Director at Webcredible, said: “Despite improving since last year, many travel companies are still not doing enough to ensure that their websites are easy to use for their customers.  The online travel market is highly competitive with many companies offering the same flights and packages at similar prices, and if customers find one site difficult to use, they will often seek out a competitor.”   

The 20 travel websites received the following scores in total, out of 100:

Methodology

Webcredible analysed the websites of 20 UK online travel agents and airline carriers in March 2009.  An identical study had previously been completed in February 2008 of the same sample of websites (with the exception of Netflights and Jet2).

Each website was evaluated against 20 best practice guidelines and assigned a score of 0 to 5 for each guideline, with 5 being the maximum. With 20 guidelines in total, websites were assigned a total Web Usability Index rating out of 100.  A full copy of the report can be downloaded from www.webcredible.co.uk/travel2009.   

*********************************

Get your voice heard in mobile marketing! June is mobile marketing month at Netimperative, and we are seeking sponsors for our annual sector seminar (June 17^th) and Netimperative Nights networking evening (June 24^th).

For details of the complete sponsorship package, email davina@netimperative.com.

**************************************

Follow Netimperative on Twitter