Cheetah_SA
Mar 3, 09, 10:28 am
This morning around 10am I called SAA to change the date on an upcoming flight. It's a business class flexible fare with a fixed fee for changes so that should be simple, right?
Took 20 minutes to get through and when I explained what I wanted to do the agent tells me this must go through to fares dept. for pricing. I ask why she doesn't just charge what the fare rules say (which she agrees is ZAR750) but she says the taxes must be recalculated and only fares dept. can do that.
Apart from the fact that the fare rules say nothing about taxes I soon concede that I won't be able to fight it. But we then got into an interesting discussion when I asked if I will be refunded if taxes have gone down. The agent is adamant that I will not because the rules don't say that; but she can't explain why I will have to divvy in if taxes have gone up even though the rules are silent on that too. (I have since checked on a dummy booking - they have gone down.)
But this is the clincher: I have to call back later and if fares dept. have done their magic, reservations will take my cc details and do the change. There is no way they will call me - "we don't make outbound calls" - and although she sympathises with my long hold time "we have a high volume of calls".
I duly call back after 4pm as instructed. This time it takes 39 minutes to get through. And guess what? Fares has not done the pricing! The agent says I will have to call back again but she has no idea when would be a good time. (One piece of info I gleaned was that fares dept. only works from 8 to 4 so nothing will happen before tomorrow.) She regrets the long hold time but "we are experiencing a high volume of calls". :mad: She cannot call me back because the systems will not notify her when the pricing has been done. (Evidently she is not empowered to write down my PNR and phone number on a little slip of paper and check a couple of times a day. :rolleyes:)
I can't believe the pathetic inefficiency of this! :mad: Other airlines manage to allow me to make the change online within minutes. Or, if you do have to call, one agent does it in a matter of minutes. SAA sees fit to train staff so narrowly that a simple booking change gets bounced to 2 departments that communicate with each other by the electronic equivalent of a cleft stick. And the customer gets to spend hours queueing on the phone in the vain hopes that one of said departments will have done their job. When your hopes are frustrated you are told apologetically that there is nothing they can do.
OH, I sooooo wanted to scream at someone! But to make matters worse (perversely) the agents were unfailingly polite and obviously totally hamstrung by their work processes so I couldn't vent on anyone.
But do try to understand this, SAA: you are a financial basket case; you cannot afford to alienate paying customers. Oh, and SAA: you aren't experiencing a "high volume of calls" - you are experiencing a "low number of agents" who are stuck with the most abysmally designed customer interface processes ever inflicted on a paying public. :td:
Took 20 minutes to get through and when I explained what I wanted to do the agent tells me this must go through to fares dept. for pricing. I ask why she doesn't just charge what the fare rules say (which she agrees is ZAR750) but she says the taxes must be recalculated and only fares dept. can do that.
Apart from the fact that the fare rules say nothing about taxes I soon concede that I won't be able to fight it. But we then got into an interesting discussion when I asked if I will be refunded if taxes have gone down. The agent is adamant that I will not because the rules don't say that; but she can't explain why I will have to divvy in if taxes have gone up even though the rules are silent on that too. (I have since checked on a dummy booking - they have gone down.)
But this is the clincher: I have to call back later and if fares dept. have done their magic, reservations will take my cc details and do the change. There is no way they will call me - "we don't make outbound calls" - and although she sympathises with my long hold time "we have a high volume of calls".
I duly call back after 4pm as instructed. This time it takes 39 minutes to get through. And guess what? Fares has not done the pricing! The agent says I will have to call back again but she has no idea when would be a good time. (One piece of info I gleaned was that fares dept. only works from 8 to 4 so nothing will happen before tomorrow.) She regrets the long hold time but "we are experiencing a high volume of calls". :mad: She cannot call me back because the systems will not notify her when the pricing has been done. (Evidently she is not empowered to write down my PNR and phone number on a little slip of paper and check a couple of times a day. :rolleyes:)
I can't believe the pathetic inefficiency of this! :mad: Other airlines manage to allow me to make the change online within minutes. Or, if you do have to call, one agent does it in a matter of minutes. SAA sees fit to train staff so narrowly that a simple booking change gets bounced to 2 departments that communicate with each other by the electronic equivalent of a cleft stick. And the customer gets to spend hours queueing on the phone in the vain hopes that one of said departments will have done their job. When your hopes are frustrated you are told apologetically that there is nothing they can do.
OH, I sooooo wanted to scream at someone! But to make matters worse (perversely) the agents were unfailingly polite and obviously totally hamstrung by their work processes so I couldn't vent on anyone.
But do try to understand this, SAA: you are a financial basket case; you cannot afford to alienate paying customers. Oh, and SAA: you aren't experiencing a "high volume of calls" - you are experiencing a "low number of agents" who are stuck with the most abysmally designed customer interface processes ever inflicted on a paying public. :td: