Coming up with a quicker route to landing a good airfare deal

Call them aggregators. Or travel-specific search engines. Or the Googles of travel websites.

Whatever you call them, they are websites striving to become one-stop shopping for Internet airfares, though none can yet claim that status. Sites such as Qixo, FareChase, Cheapflights and the newest kid on the block, Mobissimo, scour online travel sites and report back the best deals they can find, but they don’t book. Some, such as OmniTravel Search and ITA Software, are primarily licensed to other sites but can be used by consumers.

“I think [travel search engine] SideStep is at an all-time high in popularity so it’s not surprising that there are other sites trying to do what they are doing, or do it better,” said Lorraine Sileo, an analyst with Connecticut travel research firm PhoCusWright.

These sites appeal to consumers who are frustrated that they can’t find fares for Southwest or JetBlue on such major sites as Expedia. Even knowing which routes airlines fly is not always obvious.

Here’s how the aggregator sites work: They don’t book the flight but instead send the customer directly to the supplier’s site. (Supplier sites pay a “click-through” fee for every customer sent to them.) Some aggregators tack on a fee to the consumer (besides what might be charged by a supplier site), such as the $20 per ticket that Qixo adds.

Others, like Cheapflights and FareChase, sell paid placement, a type of advertising that gives some supplier sites better placement in the search results.

But do the aggregator sites help in winnowing the number of sites needed to get the most complete picture of airfares on the Net, or do they simply add more sites to the mix?

The answer is, to some degree, both. Consumers on average visit 3.6 sites when shopping for airfares, according to a PhoCusWright survey on online travel released this month. Sileo said most consumers start at one of the big three: Expedia, Orbitz or Travelocity.

Even aggregators acknowledge that shopping around for the best fares is likely to continue. “What we want is for your travel plans to begin with Mobissimo,” said Beatrice Tarka, co-founder and chief executive of Mobissimo.

I tested itineraries from LAX to London and LAX to New York on Mobissimo, launched in March and still being tested.

Unlike many aggregators, Mobissimo includes foreign- and U.S.-based sites among the 50 it searches.

“We set the goal of being truly global,” said Svetlozar Nestorov, a co-founder of Mobissimo in charge of technology for the site. “Just figuring out who flies where is a challenge.”

In my LAX-to-London search, Mobissimo produced results in about 90 seconds. Four of the top seven results were foreign-based websites, though the prices displayed on Mobissimo were in U.S. dollars.

The lowest-priced fare was $902 on Air Canada through Canadian website Destina. When I clicked through to that site, I was startled to see the fare was $1,194, but that was in Canadian dollars. (If you book with a site that charges in foreign currency, make sure you factor in any exchange costs, which can be as much as 3%, depending on your credit card issuer.)

My search results for LAX to New York did not include any JetBlue results because JetBlue flies out of Long Beach. On Mobissimo you can search only from a specific Los Angeles airport (though you can search New York “area” airports).

Even though it’s incomplete and imperfect, Mobissimo is fast and easy to navigate, and the results are well displayed.

Contact James Gilden at www.theinternettraveler.com.