I know this is a broad question with many differences across companies/airlines. I think intuitively that it's not among the best paid jobs and can be very stressful... but recently I've had quite a few bad experiences which triggered me to open this discussion with additional questions:
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- Aren't they supposed to be the first point of contact when people have issues and need to talk to a human?
- Aren't they supposed to know how to solve the problems that the automated systems (websites, booking systems etc) cannot?
- Shouldn't companies/airlines invest more into ensuring they are better trained, respectful and can deal with real problems rather than just tell customers to wait on the line another 20 minutes and then to send an email to someone else who will reply weeks later?!
In terms of airline travel, booking premium fares or premium airlines (like CX) have been the only cases when I had a somewhat positive experience with customer service teams. Almost all other times I tried contacting customer service resulted in completely useless conversations. Is good customer service only for premium fare and premium airline passengers?
What has been your experience with customer service representatives?
Which airlines or companies have the best ones, which ones the worst?