easyJet rated highly for business travel
March 15, 2006easyJet is the nation's second favourite airline for business travel, according to the Barclaycard Business Travel Survey 2005/06.
The poll by Barclaycard rated airlines in three categories: best for business travel overall, best for low-cost business travel and best for business class travel. Although British Airways topped the poll as best for business travel, the result is significant for easyJet as it is the first time a budget airline has finished in the top two.
BA netted an impressive 47 per cent of the vote as it finished top for a fifth year running.
easyJet was nominated by 8 per cent of respondents, finishing above Virgin Atlantic (7 per cent), bmibaby (4 per cent) and KLM (4 per cent).
On top of being the only no-frills airline to place highly in the overall rankings, easyJet also headed the specialised low-cost airline category.
It finished way ahead of the pack with 37 per cent of the vote, compared to 13 per cent for Ryanair, nine per cent for bmibaby, five per cent for British Airways and three per cent for Flybe.
In response to its strong showing, easyJet argued that it has a number of attributes that mark it out from the typical low-service stereotype of low-cost airlines.
"The airline has recently introduced online check-in, becoming the first low cost airline to offer this popular service to business and leisure travellers alike," it explained.
"Indeed, unlike most low cost airlines, easyJet has high levels of customer service, a good punctuality record and flies to main city destination airports."
As you'd expect from a business travel survey it was BA, however, which stole most of the plaudits, also finishing top in the business class category ahead of Virgin Atlantic, Emirates, Singapore and KLM.
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