I am Maryam, an energetic yet focus
UX Designer
Scaling Flight Options
Upselling Fare Families in Flight Booking
Senior Product Designer on an ongoing project with continuous experimentation. Collaborated within team including product, tech and business stakeholders.
The Trigger
Early 2022, we discovered a significant opportunity through discovery interviews ..
Customers preferred booking directly from airline websites because of the wide range of fare options available.
Refundable and flexible fares
“Covid changed my travel habit , now I’ll book for semi or fully refundable flight options or changeable ones”
Clearer fare comparison and rich information
“I book on the airline website because I can get more baggage allowance (35kg) for a good price”
Loyalty benefits like miles upgrades
“I book higher fare because I get more miles that I can use to upgrade to business class”
Hypothesis
By surfacing all available fare families, including upgradable options—within the OTA platform, we believed we could
Flexibility
Provide the flexibility users crave
Competitor Gap
Close the experience gap with airline websites
+Booking Value
Increase booking value
through upselling
.png)
3 Phase Rollout for Complexity & Scalability
Given the reliance on backend infrastructure and the complexity of the feature, we rolled out the design in three key phases, each building on user insights and business metrics.
Tools used for A/B testing
1
2
3
Phase 1
Visibility & Trust
🔹 Goal:
Introduce all fare families clearly and simply during the booking process.
-
Used conventional fare display aligned with user expectations
-
Simplified comparison through consistent structure and content
🎯 Impact:
+10% increase in conversion rate
+4% increase in booking value
Phase 2
Familiarity & Confidence
🔹 Goal:
Align our fare family display to mirror airline site layouts more closely
-
Improved terminology and layout for clarity
-
Increased transparency in fare inclusions
-
Displayed all options with one click (no more swiping)
🎯 Impact:
+27% increase in conversion rate
+15% increase in booking value
Phase 3
Scalability & Usability
🔹 Goal:
Design a scalable fare family layout that can handle complexity while remaining intuitive
-
Refined the comparison UI
-
Consolidated upgrade and refundability features visually
-
Built for scale across multiple airline providers
🎯 Impact:
+36.6% increase in conversion rate
+17% increase in booking value
Research & testing strategy
We collaborated closely with the research team to validate direction at each step
Touchpoint
Flights Search Results was the most prominent touch point for this feature
Familiarity
Display All Options with a Single Click, No More Swiping
One Click
Conventional display , the winning approach.
Apart Research
We reviewed best practices and insights from eight leading airlines centered on themes of scalability and usability.
Key focus areas included design layout, content categorization, UI enhancements, upgrading, and more.
Winning Variant
Conventional display layout with structured content, comparison grid, and quick-access fare options
UX Rationale:
-
Highlighting current selection upfront reduced confusion.
-
Showing relative pricing helps users assess upgrade value.
-
Modular cards reduce visual noise and boost decision clarity.
-
Stronger focus on upsell visibility and decision framing (e.g., default vs. upgrade).
-
Clean hierarchy; user can quickly assess value of upgrades.
-
Sticky CTA reinforces action and reduces hesitation.“+ SAR 66” format simplifies cost comparison.
🗝️ Key Takeaways
The Importance of Technical Discovery
We aligned tightly with backend teams early to understand API constraints, saving time during ideation and reducing rework.
Continuous Discovery as a Habit
Consistent user interviews allowed us to:
-
Identify upsell opportunities based on real needs
-
Avoid feature bloat by killing assumptions
-
Maintain alignment with evolving customer behavior
🪞 Final Reflections
