CHOOSING which flight to book is generally a compromise between two things. The first is convenience: is the flight to or from a handy airport, at an agreeable time of day, and as direct as possible? The second is price. Airline search websites usually display results in an order that combines these elements in some way. Getting to the top of such lists is becoming more important for carriers. In 2012, 53% of airline ticket revenue in America was booked online, including airlines’ own sites, according to PhocusWright, a travel-research firm. That is expected to rise to 56% by 2016. In Europe the share was 31% in 2012 and is projected to hit 36% next year. As online travel agencies (OTAs) and meta-search engines (MSEs) allow easy and direct comparisons between airlines, customers have become price-led. According to David Fleischman of Expedia, an OTA that is a big recipient of meta-search referrals, around half of people who compare flights on MSEs click on the cheapest option.

Airlines, therefore, have an incentive to be that little bit cheaper than their rivals so as to appear at the top of search lists, even if that means skimping on service. That is a recipe for a race to the bottom, at least for those in economy cabins. In some markets, that does indeed seem to be the case. A recent study by Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and Wichita State University, found that of 12 big airlines in America, only three improved their performance last year on matters such as punctuality, losing baggage and the number of passengers they bumped. This was despite many recording healthy profits.

Yet even as their shopping habits encourage airlines to prioritise price over service, many passengers whine as life in the cheap seats gets less comfy. One common lament is that customers are not given enough information to judge carriers on anything other than fares and convenience. This is a little unfair. Look hard enough and there are scores of sites that measure many aspects of airlines’ service, important or otherwise, from legroom to the attractiveness of the stewardesses. Still, the effort of collating such things for each potential flight is too arduous for most people. As yet the OTAs and MSEs have done a bad job of doing it for them.

That, though, is changing. Several firms are now looking at ways to incorporate quality ratings into their search results. Some are testing early versions. Expedia, for example, now gives a somewhat opaque flight rating alongside its prices. This brings together hard data on things such as Wi-Fi, seat pitch and entertainment equipment, although the components are not broken down. However, it currently lacks two important elements. The first is the ability to rank results by the rating (it is working on this). The second is adding the experience of other fliers into the mix.

Such user-generated ratings will be important for those airlines that want to distinguish themselves by experience as well as price. Consumers are now well used to using such ratings to make trade-offs between price and quality when buying other products online, from hard-drives to hoovers. Hence, Expedia is working hard to garner these reviews for flights, and hopes to include them in its search results in the near future.

TripAdvisor is working on a similar project. The firm is already well known for its hugely influential customer reviews of hotels. Fear of being panned on its website, which has around 200m reviews, has led many establishments to focus exhaustively on their levels of service because its rating can be make-or-break. The firm is looking to pull a similar trick with its airline meta-search site, TripAdvisor Flights. It has not proved easy. “We have really struggled on the flight side because the way consumers shop for hotels and the way they do for flights is very different,” says Jami Counter of TripAdvisor Flights. “Users see [planes] as a means to get where they are going, they are looking for the cheapest way possible. If we don’t show the lowest fare they question what is going on.”

Nonetheless, the firm is confident that passengers will eventually get it. While fliers are unlikely to pay significantly more for better service, thinks Mr Counter, they will get used to making a trade off. Among the site's nascent ratings, he says, “Jetblue has 80% thumbs-up while Spirit, which flies the exact same aircraft, gets 18%. That is a very stark example of letting customers know what the difference in paying $30 is.”

Encouragingly, both Expedia and TripAdvisor say that they have seen a lot of interest from the airlines themselves in their projects, which have encouraged them to push ahead. Many, it appears, would like to find a way to pull out of their nosedives as they race to the bottom. First, they must change their behaviour of their customers.