"What we found was that more e-mails were being answered than previously -- 95 percent of all e-mails are answered from the travel industry, which is very high compared with other industries, where we typically see 75 percent answered. And last time, only about 91 percent were answered, so they're getting there," said Terry Golesworthy, the group's president. "But the overall quality of e-mail responses has gone down a bit. We deemed about 68 percent of the e-mail responses were very helpful and relevant and addressed the question specifically, but that's gone down to just over 50 percent. Some companies have systems in place so they can answer questions well and they can answer them quickly, but what we've [generally] found is the quicker the response, the better the response."

Only seven companies out of 42 airline and travel companies studied received an "excellent" rating, while five received a poor rating, according to "The First Quarter 2006 Online Customer Respect Study of Airline and Travel Industry." Scores for the study range from a low of 1 to a high of 10.

Overall, airlines and travel companies scored a customer respect index (CRI) rating of 5.9. A CRI rating of 7.0 is considered excellent, and under 5.0 is considered poor.

The top-scoring companies overall were Expedia Inc. and Marriott International, both of which earned scores of 7.4; Travelocity.com LP, 7.2; Cheaptickets.com, 7.1; Enterprise Rent-A-Car Co., 7.0; Northwest Airlines Corp., 7.0; and Orbitz LLC, with a score of 7.0.

Golesworthy said end users are more concerned about privacy and security than they were last year.