Here is another interesting and positive interaction with Cathay: I called 27473333 this afternoon around 2:30pm HK time, selected Cantonese language, and the wait for Diamond was less than 5 min.

Reason for my call was wanting to book one-way CDG-HKG-TPE. While I could book this on the Cathay website as a transit, I could not book it as a stopover (the "loading fare" icon kept showing on the screen, and I could not proceed). I could see the actual fares in the screen "background", but the "loading" error prevented me from proceeding further. I could peek the "Business Light" fare as EUR 2,220.29, but with a CDG-FRA-HKG indirect flight. The "Business Essential" fare was EUR 2,343.89. I was pleasantly surprised when the Agent quoted me a fare of EUR 2,082.89 for the CDG-HKG non-stop flight and then a three-week stopover in HKG before the HKG-TPE flight. That fare difference is quite a significant savings from the Agent's quote vs. what I saw on the Cathay site. The Agent was very helpful, and also confirmed that I would book into "I" class, and that "A" class fare was available at that time to use my Upgrade Certificate. Needless to say, I ticketed immediately, and also just applied the Upgrade Cert to the booking (now waiting for the official confirmation of upgrade within the 72-hour window).