Originally Posted by
Thunderroad
A couple of times last year calling the UA reservations line, I was given a text option, which worked out pretty well in terms of quickness and service (though not sure why that made sense from UA's point of view, since it would seem to occupy the agent's time at least as much as a call would).
With text, Twitter DM, in-app chat, etc., each agent can handle multiple simultaneous customers. On the phone, each agent can handle only one person at a time. During any interaction, there is usually some amount of time when the agent is idle, waiting for a response from a customer (or, in AA's case, waiting for a response from internal departments such as Tariff).