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The purpose of this paper is to examine the uncertainty of acquiring the lowest possible airfare when contemplating the purchase of a ticket. A real option model is applied to value insurance contracts that could be offered to passengers to cope with price risk. Furthermore, the premiums charged for such airfare price insurance contracts can augment airline carrier revenues.

Prices on 14 airfares were collected for 79 consecutive days on an assortment of US domestic and international flights from four airline carriers. Volatility in airfares was shown using the price range and SD. The Black‐Scholes‐Merton model was employed to value the call and put options representing different airfare price insurance contracts.

Airfare price insurance contracts affordability was demonstrated ranging from 1.55 to 11.28 percent of the average dollar ticket price.

The valuations in the paper were based on ex post data that would not be available to the customer purchaser. Nonetheless, the airline carriers that sell the insurance would have better estimates of the price volatility and therefore could price the contracts to make a profit.

Airline passengers would have an opportunity to reduce the ticket price risk they face when buying their tickets. Airline carrier could increase revenues by offering such products.

The opportunity to manage price risk contributes to the completeness of markets.

The paper shows that airfare price insurance contracts are a viable tool in the management of price risk.

This study aimed to examine young, middle-aged and mature air-travelers’ perceptions of the quality levels of in-flight physical surroundings and service encounters, and investigated the drivers of their repurchase intentions in the low-cost airline industry.

A sample of 402 passengers on international flights was used. An ANOVA and a series of multiple-regression analyses based on Baron and Kenny’s (1986) suggestion were used.

In general, significant differences in quality attributes were identified across age groups. Additionally, the role of these quality components, perceived level of the airfare and trust in the airline were found to be decisive in low-cost airline passengers’ decision formation. Further, the mediating impact of perceived level of the airfare and trust was identified.

Research about air-travelers’ decision formation by considering their age is rare in a low-cost airline context. Results of the present study provided meaningful insights for researchers and practitioners in the airline industry.

The purpose of this article is to review the alternatives and to demonstrate the easily measurable benefits of savvy searching for airfares.

A desk‐based approach to data collection is used.

It is found that by exploring the best deals through savvy searching can yield instantly measurable benefits. Depending on travel patterns, being a savvy travel searcher can easily save enough money to yield a very good return on investment.

The article highlights some points and reinforces others on some of the best practices for savvy searching.

The purpose of this paper is to help airlines gain a better understanding of passengers’ service concerns, identify opportunities for continuous service improvement, and then develop service benchmarking standards that can be a yardstick for the airline’s competitiveness.

This paper develops a set of target performance standards that helps airlines monitor their service delivery process, identify relative weaknesses, and take corrective actions for continuous service improvements using exploratory data analysis and competitive gap analysis.

This study reveals that a service attribute considered most important to the airline customers’ impressions of service quality are air safety. This result reflects a growing concern over potential terrorism against airlines in the wake of the September 11 incident. The authors also found that proper baggage handling, competitive airfare, and on-time arrival/departure were next most important service attributes, whereas frequent flier and code-sharing programs were least important. Furthermore, the authors discovered that airline passengers’ perceived service quality influenced their choice of airlines. That is to say, airline service quality can be an important gauge of airline market share and revenue.

The current study is limited to the evaluation of comparative service quality of airlines in the USA. Thus, this study cannot be generalized to the airline passengers’ perceived service quality in other countries or different cultural settings. Also, this paper focuses on the performance aspect of benchmarking rather than the strategic aspect of benchmarking.

With rising costs of fuel, labor, maintenance, and security, many airlines are at a crossroads where they have to decide between succumbing to restructuring pressures in a form of mergers/acquisitions and reinventing their service offerings. One viable means of reinventing airline service offerings is to learn more about what airline passengers truly value and appreciate in terms of service offerings and then figure out what it takes to win the hearts of customers and then how the airline can differentiate its service offering from those of its competitors. With this in mind, this paper develops viable service improvement strategies for the airline that can enhance its competitiveness in the struggling airline industry.

This paper is one of a few attempts to identify a list of service attributes most important to airline service quality based on the actual survey of airline passengers, and then develop a benchmark standard of airlines in the USA from a customer (passenger) perspective.

This study aims to investigate the effects of flight delays, distance, number of passengers and seasonality on revenue in the Turkish air transport industry.

The domestic return routes of a Turkish airline company were examined to address this issue. Among five cities and six airports, 14 major domestic return routes were selected. The augmented mean group (AMG) estimator and common correlated effects mean group (CCEMG) estimator were conducted with a two-way fixed effects (FE) robustness test in this study.

The results show that arrival flight delay and departure flight delay had negative effects on revenue, whereas the distance between airports, the number of air passengers and seasonality had positive effects on revenue.

The data used in this study were retrieved from a Turkish airline company; for future research, other airline companies operating in Turkey may be included.

These findings could be evaluated by air transportation leaders to provide a guide to make strategic decisions to achieve greater performance in this competitive environment.

The originality of the paper comes from the facts that besides distance and number of passengers, the authors control for the seasonality when assessing the effects of flight delay on revenue; they use panel data techniques, which permit them to control for individual heterogeneity, and create more variability, more efficiency and less collinearity among the variables; they use two recent panel data techniques, CCEMG and AMG, allowing for cross-section dependence.

Online flight booking websites compare airfares, convenience and other consumer relevant attributes. Environmental concerns are typically not addressed, even though aviation is the most emission-intensive mode of transportation. This article demonstrates the potential for digital nudges to facilitate more environmentally friendly decision-making on online flight booking websites.

The authors used the digital nudging design process to implement two nudging interventions in an experimental setting on a fictitious flight booking website. The two nudging interventions are (1) an informational nudge, presented as an emission label, and (2) an understanding mapping nudge, presented as an emission converter.

This article finds that both digital nudges are useful interventions in online choice environments; however, emission labels more effectively encourage sustainable booking behavior.

The contributions of this article are twofold. In contribution to research, this article builds on existing research in sustainability contexts and successfully evaluates the effectiveness of anchoring and understanding mapping heuristics to influence sustainable decision-making in virtual environments. Furthermore, in contribution to practice, this article contributes knowledge to nudge design and provides hands on examples for designers or website operators on how to put nudge designs to practice in virtual choice environments. Additionally, this article contributes relevant considerations in a high-impact research field with growing importance given the global climate crisis.

The purpose of this study is to examine and extend Noer's theoretical model of the new employment relationship.

Case study methodology is used to scrutinise the model. The results of a literature‐based survey on the elements underpinning the five values in the model are analysed from dual perspectives of individual and organization using a multi‐source assessment instrument. A schema is developed to guide and inform a series of focus group discussions from an analysis of the survey data. Using content analysis, the transcripts from the focus group discussions are evaluated using the model's values and their elements. The transcripts are also reviewed for implicit themes. The case studied is Flight Centre Limited, an Australian‐based international retail travel company.

Using this approach, some elements of the five values in Noer's model are identified as characteristic of the company's psychological contract. Specifically, to some extent, the model's values of flexible deployment, customer focus, performance focus, project‐based work, and human spirit and work can be applied in this case. A further analysis of the transcripts validates three additional values in the psychological contract literature: commitment; learning and development; and open information. As a result of the findings, Noer's model is extended to eight values.

The study offers a research‐based model of the new employment relationship. Since generalisations from the case study findings cannot be applied directly to other settings, the opportunity to test this model in a variety of contexts is open to other researchers.

In practice, the methodology used is a unique process for benchmarking the psychological contract. The process may be applied in other business settings. By doing so, organization development professionals have a consulting framework for comparing an organization's dominant psychological contract with the extended model presented here.

The traditional means of procuring airline tickets and associate travel arrangements are rapidly changing. The advent and proliferation of computers, coupled with the increasingly acceptable leveraging of the Internet has caused some major changes in the travel industry. These changes are primarily being facilitated by Internet travel marketplaces (such as Expedia, Orbitz, and Travelvelocity) that claim to provide an easier, less expensive alternative to traditional methods of ticket procurement without sacrificing service quality. If travel marketplaces are to be successful then they need to understand their customers and what the motivations behind their actions when it comes to shopping for discount travel. However, there are required information exchanges on the part of both the service provider and the consumer that are not without perceived risks and required a sense of mutual trust. This paper looked at online consumer behavior as it pertains to e‐travel through the theoretical perspectives of expectancy theory and the technical acceptance model by inspecting selected motives and experiences of the consumer and specifically what these Web sites offer.

This study aims to investigate the attributes that create brand trust in internet retailing extending the work by Ha, and expanding the purchase categories.

Using a two‐phase qualitative and quantitative methodology, 15 in‐depth interviews were conducted followed by written surveys from 199 respondents. Linear regressions were undertaken to test the hypotheses. Further to the empirical research, a new model is proposed.

Regression analysis using Ha's six scales of security, privacy, brand name, word of mouth, information, and (past) experience yielded an R² of only 0.105 for the dependent variable of web brand trust. Similar results were obtained when adding in extra scales (i.e. website design and navigation, returns policy and country of origin), and when completing regression analysis using only the attributes that had a statistically significant correlation with brand trust. The results for all three types of regressions increased to R²≤ 0.165 when the attributes length of time using the internet, length of time purchasing from the internet and frequency of internet purchase on the internet were included.

A limitation of the study was that the sample included only part‐time graduate students from one Australian university. Therefore future research should include respondents from a wider range of ages, income and educational levels.

The study extends the work of Ha to additional cultural and internet retailing contexts. It also introduces a wider range of factors affecting brand trust.

The availability and price of oil are intimately linked to the global economy and as a result to tourism. This paper aims to present the results from research on tourism and oil, undertaken with a particular focus on New Zealand as a long‐haul destination in the light of dwindling global oil resources.

The findings of four distinct research phases will be reported in an integrative analysis.

The results highlight that economic prosperity in countries of origin, and in particular tourists' income, is of critical importance for outbound tourism, especially to long‐haul destinations. The econometric analysis of in‐country behaviour, such as consumption and regional dispersion, reveal that variables such as country of origin, travel purpose or length of stay are currently more important determinants of travel behaviour than fuel prices.

Coupled with differentiated oil vulnerabilities by different countries and different levels of price elasticity, the importance of market mix becomes evident. Tourism businesses can reduce their oil vulnerability by addressing a range of risk factors. Government policy and industry initiatives can support these micro‐economic adaptation processes.

Little research is available on the importance of oil shocks for tourism, and this paper is an attempt to address this gap. The findings are specific to New Zealand but will be of interest to other long‐haul destinations. The analysis integrates across a range of research methods.