(FORTUNE Magazine) – At last, a measure of agreement in an otherwise often quarrelsome industry. In a survey conducted by Towers Perrin, a management consulting firm, 231 executives working for 97 airlines around the world put themselves in the passenger's seat and rated the carriers on promptness, employee courtesy, reservation systems, and good baggage handling (see table for the results). With the exception of Delta, the same names showed up among the airlines most favored by 350 business travelers surveyed on similar points by Euromoney, a British magazine. The travelers, primarily Europeans, ranked Cathay Pacific as a top-six favorite instead. Delta's absence might be explained by an apparent disdain for U.S. airlines on that side of the Atlantic: Euromoney's list of the ten worst included Continental, Pan Am, TWA, Northwest, and United.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE CREDIT: FORTUNE TABLE/SOURCE: TOWERS PERRIN CAPTION: FAVORITE CARRIERS