Welcome to United's Sometimes Friendly Skies.....
"Welcome to the friendly skies automated phone system. What should take 10 seconds has now been inconveniently programmed to take over 30 minutes and ruin your day...."
I am a member of the Mileage Plus program from United Airlines. For those who are not aware of this program, it allows me to be given credit for every flight I take on United Airlines. In addition, the program allows me to earn credits by purchasing goods and services from their business partners.
For more information on what others say about their program, click here.
This program is thelinchpinn to United's overall loyalty program. In general, the program is a good concept and mostly works as it should. According to their website, they have won several awards over the past few years.
However, one of the major issues that I have with United is that their IVR (integrated voice response) system is completely inefficient to the consumer. United seems unwilling to pay the few thousand dollars it requires to set-up different phone lines and routing based on particular consumer experiences.
I recently took advantage of the credits racked up from my flights on United and booked some award travel using the United.com website. However, post-booking of the flight, my plans began to change around the timing of the flight.
Thankfully, United does allow credit redeemers to change the timing of their award travel.
However, when I navigated to the My Itinerary section, things began to take a turn for the worse. When I clicked on Make Changes, I received the following error message with a phone number to call.
My first question to United is why not allow me to change this online? By forcing me to call them, they are likely going to incur expenses.
Secondly, from a consumer standpoint, the number presented on the screen should take you straight to the appropriate place to make change to your award travel itinerary.
Not so.
Instead it dumps you off at the very top of the voice response system. "Umpteen" touch tone responses later, and I was finally able to get a customer service representative.
Of course, if you are on the run and communicate via cell phone, you may lose contact with the customer service agent. Being painfully aware of this possibility, I requested a number that could allow me to get directly back to the group responsible for making changes to my award travel itinerary.
"No such number exists" was the reply from the customer service agent.
Apparently no one at United realizes that calls are occasionally dropped.
My recommendation to United: Allow people to change their itineraries online. The award travelers are likely to include some of your most loyal customers.
If you insist upon a phone number, then present the customer with an 800-number that allows them to go directly to the branch of your call center that handles for award changes to award travel itineraries.
I am a member of the Mileage Plus program from United Airlines. For those who are not aware of this program, it allows me to be given credit for every flight I take on United Airlines. In addition, the program allows me to earn credits by purchasing goods and services from their business partners.
For more information on what others say about their program, click here.
This program is thelinchpinn to United's overall loyalty program. In general, the program is a good concept and mostly works as it should. According to their website, they have won several awards over the past few years.
However, one of the major issues that I have with United is that their IVR (integrated voice response) system is completely inefficient to the consumer. United seems unwilling to pay the few thousand dollars it requires to set-up different phone lines and routing based on particular consumer experiences.
I recently took advantage of the credits racked up from my flights on United and booked some award travel using the United.com website. However, post-booking of the flight, my plans began to change around the timing of the flight.
Thankfully, United does allow credit redeemers to change the timing of their award travel.
However, when I navigated to the My Itinerary section, things began to take a turn for the worse. When I clicked on Make Changes, I received the following error message with a phone number to call.
My first question to United is why not allow me to change this online? By forcing me to call them, they are likely going to incur expenses.
Secondly, from a consumer standpoint, the number presented on the screen should take you straight to the appropriate place to make change to your award travel itinerary.
Not so.
Instead it dumps you off at the very top of the voice response system. "Umpteen" touch tone responses later, and I was finally able to get a customer service representative.
Of course, if you are on the run and communicate via cell phone, you may lose contact with the customer service agent. Being painfully aware of this possibility, I requested a number that could allow me to get directly back to the group responsible for making changes to my award travel itinerary.
"No such number exists" was the reply from the customer service agent.
Apparently no one at United realizes that calls are occasionally dropped.
My recommendation to United: Allow people to change their itineraries online. The award travelers are likely to include some of your most loyal customers.
If you insist upon a phone number, then present the customer with an 800-number that allows them to go directly to the branch of your call center that handles for award changes to award travel itineraries.
posted by CyberRead.com at 11:16 AM
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