Other Asian, Australian and South Pacific Frequent Flyer Programs - Malaysia Airlines e-Ticketing faulty.....

To: Putriati & Tengku Zuraya....Please reply my mail or call me asap....stop ignoring your customer

On Saturday 14th November 2009, I managed to logon to Malaysia Airlines online booking system. i.e. https://book.malaysiaairlines.com. During the form filling session, I'm able to key in all the necessary information including Full name and others travel details for 3 travelers. Upon clicking submit, the MAS booking system automatically populates my default login account and overwrite whatever I have key-in previously in the form filling session for all 3 travelers. I’m not able to change anything since I’ve clicked submit and confirm the payment. So I did write an official email to the respective party to get approval for name changes which were due to the System auto populates error. The administrator allows me to have the names changed by paying RM65 penalty for each traveler. I was stunt as the error was caused by the system and they are charging me for the request. I did address my concern to the respective party and acknowledge them that I would like to get my travelers name change with paying any additional cost. In reply they mentioned “Our online booking system is designed in such a way….”. It is unfair to have the customer paying for penalty for the system error services provided by the online booking.

After getting few excuses email reply saying "Our system is designed in such a way....."

Now they avoiding my calls and not replying my mails....I wonder what kind of "Customer Relationship" they are building? Should have call it "Customer Disaster-ship" instead

My flight date is on Feb 14th 2010...i think this how MAS strategy to pretend nothing ...until the flight date is over....MAS is "smart" in handling customer .....:td:

Hello, for your information, this is not my 1st time buying air tickets from internet....I do not have such problem with other airlines company please dont treat your customer like a noob.:mad:

I am sorry David.Chai for your experience. I concur that their staff seems incapable to understand problems. And when they can't understand problems, regrettably they are unable to solve anything.

Sadly that is the prevailing culture of how Malaysian companies that I dealt with deal with their customers. Putting people on hold, preventing people from speaking to their managers when things do not go well. Maybe they love to dwell in their security of 'hiding behind phones' and there is no need to face a disgruntled customer.

My current experience is that I wanted to do a one-way flight with stopover in KUL. As the flight was fully flexible and changes are FOC, I was advised by their staff to just book it online (as it will be cheaper), and then phone up to make the changes, and all I need in the end is to pay for the additional KUL tax.

Called their number on +60378433000, passed from department to department. Terrible thing is you can explain what you want to an agent, and when they say "hold on sir", you expect they are doing some computing work to get my request done. NO. They put you on hold, and then someone new picks up the phone, with no idea about my prior request, hence I had to re-explain.

It was not until my 6th 'transfer' that I got fed up and raised my voice slightly with the agent, informing her that I am not happy and I demand her that I am NOT to be put on hold and NOT to be passed around without my consent. This lady finally managed to get everything done (I hope), asked for my credit card details for the further KUL airport tax payment, and then said everything will be done in 48hours. Well maybe it's a bit too early yet, but more than 24hours have passed and my credit card balance has not dropped - means no pre-authorization has occured. I suspect I will have to call up again later. That is how low my confidence is of their service attitude that I am already pre-empting the outcome.

Buck up Malaysia Airlines! Everytime when I hear the 'Malaysia Airlines is voted the Best Cabin Crew for 4 consecutive years' on the 'on-hold' music, my reaction is "are you aware that your ground staff is your liability?"

My booking reference is L4F8Y if any helpful MAS souls will contact my number (which is recorded in the PNR) to solve my problem.

Thanks for sharing your experience on this. Hope that MAS people can seriuosly look in to this matter. A disgrace to the country.....:(

This case has been opened more than a month....Why are MAS people keeps rejecting their customer calls, ignoring emails and totally no follow-up ...on the status....???


All experts out there please do advice me how should I proceed from here...? Thanks in advance

You'd definitely get faster action here than through MH's website or through their customer service department.. (does anyone really work there?)

Paging our resident FT member(s) : Malaysia Airlines to answer above queries!

You may send a PM Malaysia Airlines who is actually a collective of several individuals in various departments monitoring FlyerTalk for issues such as yours above and really getting problems solved asap!

Edited to add: Note to david.chai - Next time just book with a travel agent!

Thanks, already sent them a private message and email. Hope to hear from them soon. Thanks again ;)

David.Chai,

I do hope that your issue will be solved soon. Have you visited a MAS office in person and demanding to see their manager?

Since your flight dates are relatively near, if your problem is still not resolved until say one week before it, I'd say change your names with them, paying the 3x MYR65 first. Then launch a court action. In Malaysia I know you can use the "Tribunal Tuntutan Pengguna". Whilst I do hope it doesn't go that far, it is something you can think of.

David.Chai,

I do hope that your issue will be solved soon. Have you visited a MAS office in person and demanding to see their manager?

Since your flight dates are relatively near, if your problem is still not resolved until say one week before it, I'd say change your names with them, paying the 3x MYR65 first. Then launch a court action. In Malaysia I know you can use the "Tribunal Tuntutan Pengguna". Whilst I do hope it doesn't go that far, it is something you can think of.

Thanks for responding to my help. Finally I've managed to call them (Miss.Putriati - person who handling my case) minutes ago and she kept saying is not a system glitch and not responsible for that.....I've ask her to escalate the case and she said she did in DEC ( not sure how true is her statement) but until this morning she gives me the same old excuse "Our system is designed in such a way...." my goodness.....

Excuses given by her:
1. Our system is design in such a way
2. You are the only case happened that day
3. Is your responsible to book anything online
4. Confirmation page is there for you to check

I did request a report on the findings or perhaps put me in the email loop but she said is meant for internal communication only and keep rejecting in provides any report or data on the case.

I'm thinking how can an internation Airline company like MAS not having a exception handling mechanism when duplicated data is store. Do they really think the consumer have nothing better to do than key-in the same data again 3 times?

And again do they really take the effort to look into their online system glitch instead of pointing fingers on the consumer?? What are the preventive measurement taken for other customer to improve the system??

My online booking error screen below:

http://www.mypicx.com/01272010/Flight_Details/

Note: This is not my first time booking MAS via online (I do not have such problem previously) and "David Chai" is not even my fullname, just a login name.

chowinlondon, definitely i'll take your advice into consideration (pay them to have the names changed and bring it to the court) if they continues to do nothing about it. I do not want my Chinese New Year ruin by this idiotic system.

Thanks again chowinlondon.

Dear Guy,

Thanks for your continued faith in us! Rest assured that we're looking into this.

David, chowinlondon,

We are truly sorry for this level of inconvenience. While it may be a systems error, it's essential that we rectify this to avoid similar incidences for other customers - for this, we are grateful for your feedback. Please allow me some time to bring this matter up to the Heads of Department and I will personally see to it that we address your cases soonest.

Please let us win back your confidence. Thank you.

Regards,
Tan Wai Fong,
Head, Media Relations
Malaysia Airlines

Dear Guy,

Thanks for your continued faith in us! Rest assured that we're looking into this.

David, chowinlondon,

We are truly sorry for this level of inconvenience. While it may be a systems error, it's essential that we rectify this to avoid similar incidences for other customers - for this, we are grateful for your feedback. Please allow me some time to bring this matter up to the Heads of Department and I will personally see to it that we address your cases soonest.

Please let us win back your confidence. Thank you.

Regards,
Tan Wai Fong,
Head, Media Relations
Malaysia Airlines

Please do expedite the work as my travel date is drwaing near. Thanks again

It is true! The response in f.talk is faster than official channel, although I hope it is not just lip service to 'win back confidence' of a very upset customer! I don' t know why it has to degenerate to this level of customer service....

Dear Guy,

Thanks for your continued faith in us! Rest assured that we're looking into this.

David, chowinlondon,

We are truly sorry for this level of inconvenience. While it may be a systems error, it's essential that we rectify this to avoid similar incidences for other customers - for this, we are grateful for your feedback. Please allow me some time to bring this matter up to the Heads of Department and I will personally see to it that we address your cases soonest.

Please let us win back your confidence. Thank you.

Regards,
Tan Wai Fong,
Head, Media Relations
Malaysia Airlines

Thanks for this. Please be aware that it is now already pass the promised time (>48h) that the call centre staff mentioned to have my new itinerary reissued. You may think why worry now as flights are still some time away - remember that people need to make plans for their holidays, and some excursion trips for example have payment deadlines. For your information, it is not the first time dealing with Malaysia Airlines KL Office - this, with further information from my colleagues does not augur well with me, which is why I escalated this matter really early on.

Surely in a good corporate environment things should move quickly on its own, without the need of intervention from head of departments?

I look forward to hearing from you quickly.

As an occasional MH passenger, I'm indeed astounded at some of the complaint emails posted in FT over the last few months. Try googling "Malaysia Airlines customer service" and you'll see more on other sites.

While it's quite commendable that Malaysia Airlines has been lurking and helping with resolution of customer issues, it's truly a sorry state of affairs for MH's customer service. That it's failed in its job so badly and treated its customers so poorly is quite shocking. If customer service isn't living up to its namesake and basic standards (through its poorly trained and obstinate staff who often lack intelligence, empowerment and initiative) then something needs to be done at the highest of management levels.

Sorrier still that MH customers have to go to a public forum like this one (and, in doing so, air more of MH's dirty laundry for all to see) in order to have any faint hope of proper attention and resolution.

Sigh.

I just received a new e-ticket from Malaysia Airlines, with no changes being made. This is extremely shocking and distressing.

So it seems all my instructions to them has not been done.

Malaysia Airlines should be embarassed with what they are doing.

I just received a new e-ticket from Malaysia Airlines, with no changes being made. This is extremely shocking and distressing.

So it seems all my instructions to them has not been done.

Malaysia Airlines should be embarassed with what they are doing.

Wow, well....that is still better than mine.... I'm yet to receive any official report ticket for my case.

Malaysia Airlines should be embarassed with what they are doing.

Unfortunately, embarassment is not part of MH's culture.

They can close down their Golden Lounge in Langkawi with just 24hrs notice with no alternative provided for those who have purchased C/F tickets or their Golden Lounge programme.

They can just terminate the online booking bonus for Enrich branded credit card with no notice given.

They can offer you an upgrade, and then downgrade you later when they discover the fare you have paid is too low.

The list goes on and on ......

Basically they feel they have the right to vary anything at their whim and fancy, without any consideration to those whom they have promised a service.

As a matter of personal policy, I only fly MH if they offer extremely low fares. I rather give the revenue to any other airline when it comes to premium travel.

MAS management also haveto get off their high horse and come to realise that no one is going to 'invite' them to join an airline alliance if they think they can have conditions. Oneworld alliance asked MH to join a while back.. only to have MAS give a condition that both BA & QF move their hub from Singapore to KL. Really now.

MAS management is in denial and believes that with Malaysian Hospitality, people will fly them over anyone else. Take the case if having to choose between KUL and say PEK. MH thinks that people will choose MH over Air China. But with Air China in Star Alliance, people will go with them over so called Malaysian Hospitality. Then there's SkyTeam. MH's reluctance to join them now has given Garuda a chance to join. Lets see the skyteam passengers fly with Garuda over MH soon.

But with JL leaving Oneworld now, it may very well give MH a chance to join a world class alliance and start receiving the number of passengers again. It really cannot survive on its own... without a major alliance.

Thanks Guy Betsy and mario33

MAS management also haveto get off their high horse and come to realise that no one is going to 'invite' them to join an airline alliance if they think they can have conditions. Oneworld alliance asked MH to join a while back.. only to have MAS give a condition that both BA & QF move their hub from Singapore to KL. Really now.

MAS management is in denial and believes that with Malaysian Hospitality, people will fly them over anyone else. Take the case if having to choose between KUL and say PEK. MH thinks that people will choose MH over Air China. But with Air China in Star Alliance, people will go with them over so called Malaysian Hospitality. Then there's SkyTeam. MH's reluctance to join them now has given Garuda a chance to join. Lets see the skyteam passengers fly with Garuda over MH soon.

But with JL leaving Oneworld now, it may very well give MH a chance to join a world class alliance and start receiving the number of passengers again. It really cannot survive on its own... without a major alliance.

Absolutely spot on. I spent lots of time earlier on to search for fares on Star Alliance careers. If some Star Alliance airlines are able to offer similar fares or up to about 25% more, I would have gone for them over MH.

As a matter of personal policy, I only fly MH if they offer extremely low fares. I rather give the revenue to any other airline when it comes to premium travel.

Me too. Many years ago I've discared MH and chosen SQ.

To be honest, I am nostalgic about MH, as it was the airline I used to travel with during my childhood years. Due to an incident which was again due to poor customer service by MH, and the fares between LHR-Australasia is so competitive anyway, I have always stuck to SQ since then.

However, as the fares this time are much cheaper on MH anyway (not LHR-Australasia route), plus I still often remininsce my childhood memories of flying MH, I thought why not give it a go again. But I regretted. It was a disaster. In fact if the refunds are penalty free I would have cancelled the flight to save me all this aggravation.

To Malaysia Airlines, to let you know:
a. Last year when SQ had to cancel one of the flights resulting in an involuntary schedule change, their Indian call centre contacted me and I requested an alternative date. The staff told me that that flight is full on my booking class, but since it is an involuntary change, they will waitlist me and contact the controllers of that flight to allow me on. They said should be within 48h. The next morning (less than 24h later), I received a text telling my waitlist has now been confirmed, and a new itinerary is in my e-mail. Now this is punctuality. Contrast this to MH's Call Centre staff, not one but two had told me "you are only flying in September aren't you" - I had a real sense that they think I am being way too urgent and I should just relax-lah. They never thought people need to finalize holiday plans, plus they weren't aware their inability to adhere to their promised time is precisely the reason why I cannot trust them and had to keep on pushing.

b. Last year as well when Krisflyer was doing their 25% off redemption bookings, somehow the online system is giving only a 15% off redemption. I contacted their Krisflyer number which was 24hours, and reached their Singapore centre. The agent tried doing it for me, and was surprised that it is also only 15% off. She said she'll ask a manager to call me back in the next hour. It was about 1am Singapore Time then, I asked her "are you sure, it's past midnight already?" She said yes. And truly, in the next hour, the manager called, apologised for the inconvenience, asked me and waited for me to book the redemption online, and then recredited my Krisflyer account, not to the 25% discount level but to the 35% discounted level. He even thanked me for pointing this IT problem up. His service was exemplary. Never was I demanding anything, but his apologies, his solving of the problem right there and then and his thanking me for pointing the problem up made me absolutely pleased with his service. Are MH managers able to do this? MH managers, to my knowledge, are treated as gods, held in high 'esteem' such that they are completely incontactable.


Then finally,
As an update to my situation. I received another e-mail itinerary today at 6.30pm UK time. Surprise surprise. My credit card has been charged, but the itinerary now only showed leg 1 of my flight. The leg 2 of the flight, after the stopover, disappeared. Maybe they cancelled my flight? Obviously, an angry e-mail followed.

Thanks Guy Betsy and mario33



Absolutely spot on. I spent lots of time earlier on to search for fares on Star Alliance careers. If some Star Alliance airlines are able to offer similar fares or up to about 25% more, I would have gone for them over MH.



Me too. Many years ago I've discared MH and chosen SQ.

To be honest, I am nostalgic about MH, as it was the airline I used to travel with during my childhood years. Due to an incident which was again due to poor customer service by MH, and the fares between LHR-Australasia is so competitive anyway, I have always stuck to SQ since then.

However, as the fares this time are much cheaper on MH anyway (not LHR-Australasia route), plus I still often remininsce my childhood memories of flying MH, I thought why not give it a go again. But I regretted. It was a disaster. In fact if the refunds are penalty free I would have cancelled the flight to save me all this aggravation.

To Malaysia Airlines, to let you know:
a. Last year when SQ had to cancel one of the flights resulting in an involuntary schedule change, their Indian call centre contacted me and I requested an alternative date. The staff told me that that flight is full on my booking class, but since it is an involuntary change, they will waitlist me and contact the controllers of that flight to allow me on. They said should be within 48h. The next morning (less than 24h later), I received a text telling my waitlist has now been confirmed, and a new itinerary is in my e-mail. Now this is punctuality. Contrast this to MH's Call Centre staff, not one but two had told me "you are only flying in September aren't you" - I had a real sense that they think I am being way too urgent and I should just relax-lah. They never thought people need to finalize holiday plans, plus they weren't aware their inability to adhere to their promised time is precisely the reason why I cannot trust them and had to keep on pushing.

b. Last year as well when Krisflyer was doing their 25% off redemption bookings, somehow the online system is giving only a 15% off redemption. I contacted their Krisflyer number which was 24hours, and reached their Singapore centre. The agent tried doing it for me, and was surprised that it is also only 15% off. She said she'll ask a manager to call me back in the next hour. It was about 1am Singapore Time then, I asked her "are you sure, it's past midnight already?" She said yes. And truly, in the next hour, the manager called, apologised for the inconvenience, asked me and waited for me to book the redemption online, and then recredited my Krisflyer account, not to the 25% discount level but to the 35% discounted level. He even thanked me for pointing this IT problem up. His service was exemplary. Never was I demanding anything, but his apologies, his solving of the problem right there and then and his thanking me for pointing the problem up made me absolutely pleased with his service. Are MH managers able to do this? MH managers, to my knowledge, are treated as gods, held in high 'esteem' such that they are completely incontactable.


Then finally,
As an update to my situation. I received another e-mail itinerary today at 6.30pm UK time. Surprise surprise. My credit card has been charged, but the itinerary now only showed leg 1 of my flight. The leg 2 of the flight, after the stopover, disappeared. Maybe they cancelled my flight? Obviously, an angry e-mail followed.

Sounds like MAS having the same mindset as Proton....."Always think they are the best in the market...but infact......everyone knows about the ugly truth"...

There is nothing to be proud of the abused term Malaysian Hospitality! Took KUL - YOG flight on redemption in Y yesterday. No IFE, no in flight magazine, no duty free sale, limited copies of newspaper, limited pillows and blankets That left many passegers loads of time to do nothing. One half filled cup of juice and a miserable carbo laden snack box is all one gets .... Malaysian Hospitality my $&@$ ! .... such mediocre offering even AK beats it hands down. I am now truly ashamed of MH. Do keep us posted on the long haul product offering.

I am now truly ashamed of MH.

Eeerrr... why should passengers be ashamed of airlines they fly with ;)

And to be fair to MH; KUL-JOG is only a 2hr flight, not sure what form of IFE you expect & you cant expect them to carry enough blankets for every passenger in Y (I am even surprised they do for these short haul flights), and honestly inflight duty free sale is a waste of time & effort.

Eeerrr... why should passengers be ashamed of airlines they fly with ;)

Lol. Maybe he meant he cringes at "MH is more than an airline code. MH means Malaysian hospitality." I for one felt that the slogan was extremely cheesy. ;)

Lol. Maybe he meant he cringes at "MH is more than an airline code. MH means Malaysian hospitality." I for one felt that the slogan was extremely cheesy. ;)

In all fairness, their cabin crew are usually fairly good, even in Y ( at least when compared to European and American airlines)

Its the management and ground staff who should be "ashamed" of themselves ;)

Eeerrr... why should passengers be ashamed of airlines they fly with ;)

And to be fair to MH; KUL-JOG is only a 2hr flight, not sure what form of IFE you expect & you cant expect them to carry enough blankets for every passenger in Y (I am even surprised they do for these short haul flights), and honestly inflight duty free sale is a waste of time & effort.

Naive me used to be proud of MH circa 1990s....that was when my travel was limited to MH and their product was truly great. Now I would hesitate to recommend non Malaysian friends to MH if there is a reasonably good alternative airline to KUL. The current experience from online booking to even baggage collection in KLIA can only be summed up in one word. Disappointing. Even the saving grace ie multiple award winning crew's performance is nothing to talk about on intra ASEAN routes, since on board product offering is practically minimal

In all fairness, their cabin crew are usually fairly good, even in Y ( at least when compared to European and American airlines)

Its the management and ground staff who should be "ashamed" of themselves ;)

That I agree totally. Their cabin crew whilst, not necessarily the best I have encountered (Singapore Airlines is way better in my opinion), has been certainly positive to me.

Their management and ground staff, on the other hand, are definitely a liability to them. Long delays (or even no reply) to e-mails, being passed from person to person on a call centre, promised time not adhered to, luggage being tampered/vandalised at KUL... I shall stop here.

Let's hope the OP, david.chai's matter is being progressed swiftly.

That I agree totally. Their cabin crew whilst, not necessarily the best I have encountered (Singapore Airlines is way better in my opinion), has been certainly positive to me.

Their management and ground staff, on the other hand, are definitely a liability to them. Long delays (or even no reply) to e-mails, being passed from person to person on a call centre, promised time not adhered to, luggage being tampered/vandalised at KUL... I shall stop here.

Let's hope the OP, david.chai's matter is being progressed swiftly.

Wish you all the best on your case as well....

really sorry to hear this story but I just can confirm that MH ground staff is not really capable. Check-in, call center, baggage etc. wherever you go..they are still feel working for a government owned airline...so relax...no work pressure..sorry and sad to say as I believe the crew in the airline does a good job but they can't repair the peoples experience before they get to the aircraft.

The MH slogan was Idris Jala's idea and he is a good marketer. Perhaps he thought he can use it internally to muster his troops into moving up to the next service level. Now that he has left, and having hyped up the MH label, the people at MAS are clueless what to do. The crew are generally nice people - their smile and emotions tend to be more real than some other airlines - with plastic smiles or the 'don't try that with me honey!" attitude of some US airlines. But that's only the start - competencies are very, very, patchy, especially on local and short haul flights. The crew generally does not know how to respond to issues - either through customer service or on-board; all they do, if at all they do, is apologise sweetly. If all that was not enough, they tried to also attack the low cost sector - with their 5 star value campaign. Now they are not only to be the best but the cheapest. Talk about tall orders.

I feel sad for MAS, having been subject to a build up of hype they never believed they could deliver in the first place. Imagine a Toyota Camry (a nice car) being hyped as Porshe beater at Volkswagen prices! What would you do if you were in their place?

Dear Guy,

Thanks for your continued faith in us! Rest assured that we're looking into this.

David, chowinlondon,

We are truly sorry for this level of inconvenience. While it may be a systems error, it's essential that we rectify this to avoid similar incidences for other customers - for this, we are grateful for your feedback. Please allow me some time to bring this matter up to the Heads of Department and I will personally see to it that we address your cases soonest.

Please let us win back your confidence. Thank you.

Regards,
Tan Wai Fong,
Head, Media Relations
Malaysia Airlines

Any updates on my case? Hope to hear from you soon. Please call my mobile directly should you require further explanation on the case. Thanks

The MH slogan was Idris Jala's idea and he is a good marketer.

You are joking, right ?

Good afternoon everyone,

Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Amin Khan, the Head of the Network and Revenue Management Division in Malaysia Airlines. I am also responsible for online booking channel.

We have investigated Mr. Chai's plight and I would like to provide some clarifications on the issue at hand.

To ascertain if there was a technical glitch as experienced by Mr. Chai, we simulated a similar booking in our Internet booking member’s profile page. We confirm that only primary user details are auto defaulted in the first traveler details column. Any subsequent traveler’s details will not have the primary user details but have to be manually keyed in or selected from the drop down menu. This drop down menu includes the primary/member user detail and other stored passengers detail from previous bookings on our web site. This will not be auto populated, but has to be selected by user.

Thus the primary user’s name would not to reappear by default on the second and third traveller’s columns, and until now, we have not received any complaints of this nature.

As a added control feature, Mr. Chai would be given a review page to verify and confirm the information before submitting his booking he submitted prior to e-ticket issuance.

We do not allow change of names as the customer would have had the opportunity to review the finalized names. This is a standard policy to mitigate potential fraud.

Mr. Chai has appealed and we have allowed the change of name but with a minimal RM65 fee for each name change.

We are in contact with Mr. Chai to resolve this matter soonest.

We hope this provides greater clarity and perspective to the situation at hand. Thank you very much.

Dr. Amin Khan
Senior General Manager
Network and Revenue Management Division
Malaysia Airlines
Amin Khan
Malaysia Airlines
+603 7840 4865

Good afternoon everyone,

Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Amin Khan, the Head of the Network and Revenue Management Division in Malaysia Airlines. I am also responsible for online booking channel.

We have investigated Mr. Chai's plight and I would like to provide some clarifications on the issue at hand.

To ascertain if there was a technical glitch as experienced by Mr. Chai, we simulated a similar booking in our Internet booking member’s profile page. We confirm that only primary user details are auto defaulted in the first traveler details column. Any subsequent traveler’s details will not have the primary user details but have to be manually keyed in or selected from the drop down menu. This drop down menu includes the primary/member user detail and other stored passengers detail from previous bookings on our web site. This will not be auto populated, but has to be selected by user.

Thus the primary user’s name would not to reappear by default on the second and third traveller’s columns, and until now, we have not received any complaints of this nature.

As a added control feature, Mr. Chai would be given a review page to verify and confirm the information before submitting his booking he submitted prior to e-ticket issuance.

We do not allow change of names as the customer would have had the opportunity to review the finalized names. This is a standard policy to mitigate potential fraud.

Mr. Chai has appealed and we have allowed the change of name but with a minimal RM65 fee for each name change.

We are in contact with Mr. Chai to resolve this matter soonest.

We hope this provides greater clarity and perspective to the situation at hand. Thank you very much.

Dr. Amin Khan
Senior General Manager
Network and Revenue Management Division
Malaysia Airlines
Amin Khan
Malaysia Airlines
+603 7840 4865

Oh dear! MH did not believe Mr Chai, coming from the head honcho of revenue dept! However, having been through another painful MH computer glitch experience, I can assure you that MH online booking system can behave erratic one day and be alright the next, so that by dummy booking with another computer, another time does not really prove that the system was ok during your booking process. Believe you me, the amount of bugs in the booking system....

Mr Chai, if you have reasonable grounds for your complaint, would you consider pursuing this matter in another avenue, eg court of law, if MH is unwilling to resolve this matter?

Deleted

Dr. Amin Khan,

Please may I respectfully point out some of the flaws from the conclusion that you reached by the experiment you performed.

1) Your Online Booking system, to my knowledge, is subject to frequent minor upgrades/changes. I was not aware of when David.chai made his bookings, but I also know a few weeks ago I received an e-mail from MAS notifying me of "Reservations Systems Upgrade", which I suspect is a major upgrade. The scientific notion that you change only one variable when you perform an experiment, in my opinion, is not adhered to in your experiment.

2a) It is unsafe to extrapolate one result from your experiment and expect it to be applied to 'all cases'. In my post previously in this thread, I mentioned about your competitor Singapore Airlines' Online Redemption Booking fault, where despite a promised 25% discount, only 15% was applied. Their staff in Singapore Airlines never heard of such complaints before (neither do I see any such complaints posted in Flyertalk or SQTalk), but when they went through the same steps with me, they found the same problem themselves.

2b) You mentioned "we have not received any complaints of this nature." Further to point 2a) above, I wonder could it be also a result of the culture in your organization. Due to my numerous unhappy dealings with your airline in the past, I do wonder, could there again be cases where your junior staff refuses to escalate complaints further up - or complaints were made but not replied to (both from 'complaints' made here in Flyertalk and also personal chat with friends who flew with MH)?


And furthermore, I wonder have you considered David.Chai's motives behind booking 3 names for himself? Is it for a profit motive? Or something else? Honestly I cannot think of a plausible explanation, if Mr. Chai did indeed purposefully made the whole story up.


To be honest, may I respectfully suggest to Dr. Amin Khan here that whether it is Malaysia Airlines' fault or David.chai's fault, it is hard to come to a conclusion. I doubt you will possibly 'reinstall' your old system, at the time/date when David.Chai made his booking, to come to a firm conclusion.

Why not offer a goodwill gesture to him and waive the MYR65 change fee without admitting any liability, to foster some goodwill between Mr. Chai and your airline?

Whilst there are Small Claims Tribunals in Malaysia that Mr. Chai can go through, I do feel sorry if he has to go through that, as MYR195 is, in a way, not a huge amount to spend that much time to pursue about, especially if Mr. Chai is a working professional. But I also fear that as a result of the small sum involved and because of the bureaucracies that are involved, he will be deprive himself of the justice that he , I believe, deserves.

I'm not wishing to hijack this thread, but it doesn't seem a worthy enough point to have it's own thread - but---

Has anyone ever managed to make MH online check-in work?

I'm no dunce, have no problems with the myriad of other airlines online check-in, but have never managed to get past the initial page. Either with Enrich Card, Ticket Number or VL.

I'd like someone to say it's just me, as I still have plenty of faith in MH! (Mind you at 6ft5, and normally found down back i'm very loyal to anyone who gives me 34 inches!).

Last week, tried MH online check-in and failed. Phoned call centre who for once, was prompt in picking up phone and did not redirect me to numerous other depts...

I was told that the check-in system is much more responsive to ticket number than other methods such as Enrich card or booking reference....:confused: Managed to check in after advice from agent, but could not print out boarding pass (not first experience...)

I too had checked in online with other airlines previously without any problem. The MH IT dept, as I have said before, really need to have a major revamp before it can 'win back customer confidence'.

I concur with chowinlondon that Mr Khan's comment that " we have not received any complaints of such nature" could be due purely to skewed representation of the problem - ie complaints not even filed due to various local reasons and culture, and even if filed was not brought to top management's attention until it had brewed up to a storm in f.talk, since the official customer satisfaction channel is either too tardy or just offer sweet nothing promises. Recognizing one's failure, in this case, the lousy MH IT system, would be the first step in improving customer satisfaction. MH's simple-minded experiment and response sent chills down my spine that maybe MH is really beyond redemption/expectation.

On a lighter note, maybe Mr Chai made 3 bookings to his name just to pull MH's leg and to test the system :p :p

Oh how familiar all this sounds to me. Yesterday I spent a total of 5 hours trying to buy tickets through Malaysia Airlines online booking system. And, you guessed it, I still don't have the tickets. 2 hours and 40 minutes of this time I spent on the phone with their customer support (no exaggeration here - I looked at my call logs). I live in Thailand so I learned what patience means but I must say that MA customer support is hands down the worst I ever experienced anywhere in the world.

The problem I had was, again, with a website glitch. Not the same as OP had - my problem was that my card kept being declined. There is nothing wrong with my card whatsoever and I called my bank two times to make sure that there is no issue on their side and both times they confirmed that no declined transactions can be seen in the system. And I trust them. Kasikorn bank has a very helpful and professional CS and they've never let me down before.

On the other side, there is MA's support where they:
- put me on hold for 30 minutes straight,
- they keep telling me that everything is fine on their end,
- then they tell me that I should have some security code (issued by my bank) because I am buying from outside of Malaysia (never heard of this before, and no it's not CCV code),
- then they transfer me to another operator and I have to explain everything from the very beginning,
- then they put me on hold again,
- then they say OK, we have a solution for you: you can book by phone but the price they offer me is $4,300 instead of $2500 - almost double!!!,
- then I start raising my voice,
- then they put me on hold again for 20 minutes or so,
- and finally they come back to tell me that the problem might be my popup blocker
- so I deactivate my popup blocker and try again but there still was no popup during the booking process
- then I just didn't have energy to call them again so I gave up and decided to fly with some other company

To spend 5 HOURS and still not have the tickets, can you imagine that?

Oh how familiar all this sounds to me. Yesterday I spent a total of 5 hours trying to buy tickets through Malaysia Airlines online booking system. And, you guessed it, I still don't have the tickets. 2 hours and 40 minutes of this time I spent on the phone with their customer support (no exaggeration here - I looked at my call logs). I live in Thailand so I learned what patience means but I must say that MA customer support is hands down the worst I ever experienced anywhere in the world.

The problem I had was, again, with a website glitch. Not the same as OP had - my problem was that my card kept being declined. There is nothing wrong with my card whatsoever and I called my bank two times to make sure that there is no issue on their side and both times they confirmed that no declined transactions can be seen in the system. And I trust them. Kasikorn bank has a very helpful and professional CS and they've never let me down before.

On the other side, there is MA's support where they:
- put me on hold for 30 minutes straight,
- they keep telling me that everything is fine on their end,
- then they tell me that I should have some security code (issued by my bank) because I am buying from outside of Malaysia (never heard of this before, and no it's not CCV code),
- then they transfer me to another operator and I have to explain everything from the very beginning,
- then they put me on hold again,
- then they say OK, we have a solution for you: you can book by phone but the price they offer me is $4,300 instead of $2500 - almost double!!!,
- then I start raising my voice,
- then they put me on hold again for 20 minutes or so,
- and finally they come back to tell me that the problem might be my popup blocker
- so I deactivate my popup blocker and try again but there still was no popup during the booking process
- then I just didn't have energy to call them again so I gave up and decided to fly with some other company

To spend 5 HOURS and still not have the tickets, can you imagine that?


Please beware! I had almost similar problem previously. When MH realised the computer glitch a day later, its online booking team traced back the declined bookings and manually issue tickets for all the declined attempts, resulting quadruple bookings and quadruple charges to my credit card!!! And lots of hassle in claiming back money..... please check your email for e-ticket confirmation and with your bank the next few days in case its team decided to do this again.

Your experience just reaffirmed my belief on this issue which I had mentioned previously in this forum : its IT dept needs to be revamped. However, if there is autocratic protection from the top for such mistakes and glitches, would you expect the system be significantly improved (beyond expectation)?

I never had any problem with either online booking or check-in with MH. Maybe I am just lucky? :)

For international flights, I book through a travel agent (myself). But for low internal malaysia fares, I then book thru the MH website. No problems before. But mind you the last time I did that was in Aug 09.

The time when Goldmundo makes his booking coincides with MH's promotional period. I had to book some flights for my family members in Malaysia. Initially when I made flight searches, it will return as "The page cannot be displayed" but after trying an hour or so later everything went fine (though the system was quite slow then).

I think what Goldmundo highlighted is precisely what my previous experience with MH was. In a good organization, you should expect to be transferred once - to the right department, and that should be it.

And then in terms of problem solving, I cited my case with Krisflyer website not applying the correct 25% discount to my booking, and how they solved the problem perfectly within an hour. I know his case is different in that it is a revenue booking, but if he genuinely had problem with web booking, surely they should be able to offer something more acceptable, e.g. phone booking at internet prices, or maybe just a slight surcharge.

What I wonder about the MH call centre staff is that, other than maybe making simple bookings, how much are they trained to deal with more complex customer requests? I have contacted one or two who were excellent, but for most others, their standards are really low.

Hmm...is Malaysia Airlines ground staff that bad? The last time when my flight was cancelled, I contact Changi Airport ground staff, they respond to me in the morning by their office staff (I called them at 1am) and put me on the next avaliable flight. I feel they have hande it quite professionally. And the service onboard quite good too. But that was last year and I departed from my home airport, Changi. I was going to book my trip to Bali via KL until I saw this thread. Is the service in KLIA that bad? If so, even though KLM service not the best, but a direct flight to Bali with them doesn't seem bad too if they save me the trouble.

It has been a while since my last reply and thanks Dr.Amin for paying a visit on this thread. It was a pleasant flight as expected from MAS always with friendly "cabin crew". Sorry for not updating this soonest possible as my case was resolved in a win-win situation. Send me a private message should you require knowing more. => Cheers and Happy Chinese New Year for those who celebrating. Lastly, to all MAS ground-staff it is important to response your customer ASAP in whatever situation before it reaches here as it will bring much disgrace to your services & fame, worst to the country.



Dr Amin,

My advice to you by conducting a simple survey should you thinking of facing the true responses of your online booking system from the users else if you still insist your system is perfect and friendly. I have nothing much to share as you already harden your heart.

For international flights, I book through a travel agent (myself). But for low internal malaysia fares, I then book thru the MH website. No problems before. But mind you the last time I did that was in Aug 09.

I've never had success booking on the MH website even with all the security protocols like Secure Code, etc. I have learned, however, that MH website doesn't always offer the cheapest rates. Often Orbitz has a cheaper fare, even ex-KUL. Most recently I bought a KUL-BKK for about $140+tax roundtrip, MH website was quoting over $400+tax for the same dates. The Orbitz ticket even included a TG codeshare. In the past I've also used Orbitz to grab AI codeshares on SQ for a lot cheaper than an SQ ticket.

I used MH online booking engine once last year... I had to fax my canadian credit card details to their office in LAX as their online system was not setup to handle/accept my card. :td:

I also had major trouble in receiving MH enrich miles for a AF flight. Eventually (like after 4 months from my initial complaint) after multiple correspondences I received 'partial' miles. They were acting as if they are doing a major favor for me. :td::td:

They were acting as if they are doing a major favor for me. :td::td:

Yes, MH does not regard miles as your entitlement but rather a reward out of their goodwill.

Just look at their marketing terms; they use terms like free flights, free upgrades etc which is very deceptive since you have to use miles to upgrade or redeem a ticket unlike some airlines when its really "free".

And it seems so strange to me that senior management are responding to individual complaints over domestic bookings worth a couple of hundred dollars; but fail to answer general questions like why the Langkawi lounge was closed with no notice given which affects many passengers who were promised the use of a lounge at time of booking. What credibility is there left for the airline when they feel that they have the right to vary or omit any service with no notice and without any need to justify their action.

General arrogance on MH over the last few years seems to be having an effect to passengers and they seem to not understand how bad the name of MH is becoming

I faced the same problem with all of you and I was not given a chance to key in 2nd passenger's name, end up I have 2 tickets with my own name.

I have emailed MAS BSC 5 times, called customer service 4 times,
and no one cares about my problem. Customer service (Mohd Azrul Hidayat) ignored my complaint on system, requested me to pay RM150 for one ticket name change.

MAS doesn't care about Malaysian's customers ?

tien
KJXBT 01 March 2010

while waiting for MAS customer service to feedback on my online booking problem, I was called up by bank, telling me that my credit card has been fraud under MAS, making a purchase of RM2.5k!!

wonder how many more issues will arise after these...

p/s: MAS has replied regarding credit card fraud case, will cancel the booking and make a refund to me, but no reasons or explanation given.

After so many emails and phone calls, they refused to listen to my explanation on system problem and insist me paying for the ticket's name change. They simply can not understand a possibility in system error....

When one is bored and has nothing better to do, try to dummy book on MH's website and you'll discover a whole load of quirky bugs. I still don't understand why MH does not realize this (or chose to ignore it).

On a serious note, tien, you are letting them off the hook? Credit card fraud is a criminal act. I am not cognizant with the law, but does this deserve a notice of demand from a lawyer or a police report of fraud?

kenyalang, most likely I will make a police report.
is currently waiting for more details from citibank.

Current MH website does not allow one to put in destination. No matter what is put on it, the scroll down screen to allow you to choose the destination keeps rolling down and then up again, making it impossible to choose.

I am using firefox web browser.

MH must realise that IE is no longer the preferred browser that people use. So it must comply or upgrade or else lose sales.

kenyalang, most likely I will make a police report.
is currently waiting for more details from citibank.

You can find out from MH who made the booking. But it looks like it has nothing to do with MH themselves but as they are the ticketing agents, that the charge will show up with them.

These new revelations about the instability of MAS' online booking are indeed shocking.

Calling Malaysia Airlines - particularly Amin Khan (who needs to really get off his high horse and start taking responsibility to address these system issues) and Tan Wai Fong (who needs to exert pressure within the organization before these well publicized system and customer service issues explode into a media disaster) - what exactly are you doing to sort these out? One would hope that a popular forum like FT would spur immediate action, but so far these issues are popping out and all we get is only unhelpful defensive attitude from Amin Khan but not much of anything else!

Having read this thread, I will never book online on MAS' website again. Confidence lost, but potential frustrations prevented.

If your flight originates from Malaysia, the booking site will not accept payment if you use Amex, its the only airline I have come across with such policy.

I felt I had to come back here and report on the further development of situation with my online booking and subsequent events.

While I was able to finalize my booking (with a different card on a different day) I still have to say that overall unreliability of the online booking system is unacceptable. Both from usability and flawed functionality point of view.

HOWEVER, I have to say that the ground staff of Malaysia Airlines at KLIA (both at the KLIA ticket office and at check in counters) turned out to be extremely polite and helpful and I have only words of praise for them. It seems that only call center issues (which were truly an unpleasant experience for me) are giving a bad name to MA staff.

wow, unbelievable! I just was looking to buy a flight on MAS from BKK to LAX. I guess I better pay extra $25 to Asiana and fly them?

These new revelations about the instability of MAS' online booking are indeed shocking.

Calling Malaysia Airlines - particularly Amin Khan (who needs to really get off his high horse and start taking responsibility to address these system issues) and Tan Wai Fong (who needs to exert pressure within the organization before these well publicized system and customer service issues explode into a media disaster) - what exactly are you doing to sort these out? One would hope that a popular forum like FT would spur immediate action, but so far these issues are popping out and all we get is only unhelpful defensive attitude from Amin Khan but not much of anything else!

Having read this thread, I will never book online on MAS' website again. Confidence lost, but potential frustrations prevented.

I was trying to book return flights to HK and the web page kept throwing out some stupid error MSG and asking me to try later. I tried for hours and called MAS twice before being informed that for return flights, they can't be both coach sharing!! Wasted 3 hours of my time!
What kind of crap system did their system analysts designed? Just inform users of the requirements instead of "application error...please retry later". Any layman can tell a system/application error from a incorrect data validation !!!
No wonder MAS is in the red if they employ novices in senior positions.

Sorry to resurrect an old thread but the problems continue......... so a challenge to Dr Khan.

I have just booked a flight to Auckland from London with stopovers each way in Kuala Lumpur. There is no choice of flights between KUL and AKL as there is just the one flight per day. However between LHR and KUL there are 2 flights per day morning and evening and I booked the evening flights both ways - or rather was SURE I had.
This was until the confirmation email arrived showing the evening flight out to KUL but the morning flight back meaning an early check-in at KUL - something I DID NOT want.
Immediately I noticed this I contacted the airline on the 24hr "Help"line. It was no "help" at all - it was all my fault for not checking the final "review" page (I am CERTAIN I did) before confirming and if I wanted to change the flight it would be £100 PER PERSON! that is almost 10% of the total fare for all four flight sectors to make one simple change to get me back to where I was.
It seems that the website has a default option already selected of the earliest flight on days/routes where there is more than one flight instead of leaving both options open for the customer to choose from and if the page refreshes for any reason the default seems to kick in again instead of leaving the customer's choice selected.
I have read elsewhere about problems like this with Malaysian where cookies go wrong and wrong selections get booked. So Dr Khan how about removing the pre-selected default choices from multi flight time days OR if you insist on making customer's choices for them have a period within which website induced errors can be corrected free of penalty.

Armed with this information I will be taking the matter up with the London office once again and escalating the matter beyond the first level of contact by insisting on speaking to a supervisor.
In the meantime I would be grateful for Dr Khan's explanation of why my booking went wrong inspite of me checking everything was as I wanted it before clicking to proceed. Together with some justification for the extortionate penalty charge for a simple change.

Who's Dr. khan? Does he even read FT?

Why not post your woes on Facebook's MAS group instead?

Who's Dr. khan?

Dr Khan isn't longer with MH

Malaysia Airlines has always been one of those companies I only book with in-person at an MH physical office, or through a travel agent where all the particulars can be confirmed in writing before the funds get handed over. Have never trusted their online tools.

Malaysia Airlines has always been one of those companies I only book with in-person at an MH physical office, or through a travel agent where all the particulars can be confirmed in writing before the funds get handed over. Have never trusted their online tools.

Having made a number of bookings online recently I can completely understand why one wouldn't trust their online tools :(

One booking,on which I was unable to get to the payment stage on the website, still shows as a current booking when I log in, only when I drill down does it say ticket not issued!

One booking,on which I was unable to get to the payment stage on the website, still shows as a current booking when I log in, only when I drill down does it say ticket not issued!

Any booking you attempt to make under you account will show up, irrespective of whether the ticket was issued or not.

While I would rather that only successful purchases show up in my account, the information shown is not incorrect ; eventhough the purchase was not finalised, there was a booking reference but ticket not issued due to failure to process payment.

Ahhhhhh....the great MH website strikes again !!! I've got 4 bookings this month that have just vanished under my itineraries. Anyone else having issues ?

Ahhhhhh....the great MH website strikes again !!! I've got 4 bookings this month that have just vanished under my itineraries. Anyone else having issues ?

After reading your post I checked mine and 3 flights booked for May have dissapeared:confused:

Edit: when I search by Pnr they do show up though!