svs-dhm

Wanted to share something I've experienced over the past 3-4 months when calling the customer service center in the UAE. I have had to call them for fairly routine items, such as:

- Three or four calls to either request or confirm a limo
- Two calls for an attempt to book rewards on partner airlines
- One call for an upgrade using miles
- One call to change a date on an award ticket
- One call to edit the name (spelling) in a ticket
- One call to cancel/refund an award ticket

At least half or more of these calls were in the daytime, while the rest were in the evening. Whenever I called in the daytime, the service level was not as good as in the past. This included at least two or three occasions when the call (after being on hold and listening to music) was routed to an operator, who "seemed" to pick up, but then there was no response, but each time I could hear background noise/talk. I then had to hang up and call back, very frustrating. For the times I was able to get through, the level of service was mediocre, and took longer than usual (including being on hold while the agent took care of the request).

On the other hand, whenever I called in the evenings, typically after dinner, the response has always been faster and more competent.

Is this just me, or has anyone else experienced anything similar?

MAZ199

UAE time zone ?

svs-dhm

Yes, I live in the UAE, calling the local number here.

sumayya

I dread calling up the call center - both EY and EK. The attitude is dismal most of the time and quite often they have bungled up things for me. Unfortunately EY boasts that bookings can be changed online etc but their website is another disaster and full of issues. It used to be much better before indeed.

minmaguire

That happens to me a lot, I thought something to do with people answering their quota of calls but not actually doing any work!
I also find that the gold call line often takes far longer than calling the regular number and unfortunately I generally find the Arab staff aren't really sure of what they are talking about and I have to hang up and start again.

I would be interested to hear about your experience with partner award bookings, I tried last year to book flights with AA and after talking to 7 different people,none of whom had a clue, I just gave up!

svs-dhm

Hah! You may be right about your first point. I can only add that it made me mad after being on hold for a while to have to hang up and call again!! Just not the way to do things while making all those claims about the worlds best airline.

As for the partner awards, I had no luck. In this case the agent was actually very polite and helpful (called at night), but took a while to look up the procedure, and then wasn't able to find seats for the full route, only half the segments - I was trying for Air Berlin. Sorry to hear about your case, I'd figure that they'd be better with AA considering they have had this partnership for quite a long while?!?

minmaguire

The agents didn't have a clue and I didn't either to be honest! I might start a thread on this topic, I know there is a thread for AA customers booking EY rewards tickets but havent seen anything for the other way round!

EtihadHelp

Dear svs-dhm,

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We are sorry to hearing about the experience you have encountered and we would certainly like to look into this for you. We value all our guest feedback to maintain a high quality service throughout.

We would ask you to kindly send us a direct message with your email address, contact and booking details as we are unable to provide our email address over forums.

Thank you again and we look forward to hearing from you

*GW

EtihadHelp

Dear minmaguire,

Sorry to hear about your experience, we understand your frustrations. We have a Social Media team who is available 24/7 should you need any assistance. These are on our Facebook and Twitter pages and we will be able to liaise with our team to assist you.

We apologise for the experience you have encountered and thank you for highlight this to us.

*GW

svs-dhm

Dear EtihadHelp - thanks for your offer, appreciate it.

Since my observations were over a period of time, there is no specific item on which I need help, but maybe you can pass on the message to the call center management regarding the quality of service.

Thanks!