Worst call centre
 

Which call centre do you think is the worst among all?

Initially thought it is the Guangzhou one, but my recent experience suggests that Manila is miles behind Guangzhou. There was once I asked about the break down of tax and surcharge on a redemption booking and they claimed that a designated department would be responsible for the calculation hence they couldn’t provide such information. Well…..I was jaw dropped. The reason I called was just because I didn’t have enough miles in my account that allows me to proceed to the payment page where I could see all the breakdown. Another incident was asking them to price a ticket and it ended up to be a mess after 20 mins, and they promised to deal with it. After hanging up, I called the Chinese hotline and got whatever I needed within 10 mins. Then after an hour, I finally received a call from Manila with the same solution. The way they gave out all excuses were exactly the same as what my helper told me daily for things she couldn’t do or wouldn’t want to do

I experienced same issue with the Guangzhou center and they cost me hours to wait: unable to price a revenue ticket with mixed cabin, reply with wrong fare difference to charge for ticket change, and fail to check tax breakdown of award ticket. And I really don’t know if the HK center agents excelled themselves nowadays. It seems to me that the frontline representatives have lost direct connection with the reservation/ticketing team so that they have to submit case by case and wait for the team to respond, like an outsider to Cathay.
I do miss good old days (pre-pandemic) when there is an efficient group of people can get things done within ten minutes and they are the top notch in the industry if I can say. I guess we just have to accept the reality and live with it.

There is something seriously, seriously wrong with the Manila call center IME. I have never experienced such incompetence; this dates back to late 2022, when I restarted the travel engine. It's at the point where, for most queries, if I get Manila I just HUCA. I will avoid posting all my complaints here just to say, even the simplest of things you get wrong answers from them like water. It's appalling how patently incorrect information is just regularly passed on as fact; I can only imagine less-frequent fliers are getting totally screwed.

I am an English and Mandarin speaker, but not Cantonese; my experiences are with the call centers in India, Poland, Manila, HK and wherever the Mandarin service center is (somewhere in mainland China I think). I find HK to be superb, and Poland, India and mainland China good too.

Unfortunately this is 100% my experience with the Manila call center as well. No matter how clear you explain the issue, its playing music to a cow. I usually just call again and hope for a different call center.

So I assume that which language one selects at the start of the call (English, Cantonese, Mandarin) is somewhat related to the call centre that receives the call. If I want to increase the chance of my call being routed to the HK call centre, should I select Cantonese even if I don't speak Cantonese? I assume the HK based CX call centre staff will be able to speak either English or Mandarin in addition to Cantonese.

Based on my previous experience with CX call centres, I also found Manila to be least competent. HK & Mainland China were both better.

You may be routed to Guangzhou if your status insufficient to merit routing to Tsuen Wan.

Even with the top status, most of the time you are routed to Guangzhou centre with only handles Cantonese and Mandarin. If you call during the day HKT and choose English, there is good chance you will be routed to Tsuen Wan, otherwise you will go strict to the great Manila centre. Having said that, I find them being the best of telling you information which you already know such as what your booked flights and departure time :cool:

Does anyone know what the best-guess logic is to "avoid" the incompetent call center? Say, from this time to that time, if you select English, most calls are routed to Manila, then another time period to Guangzhou, etc.

My experience with Manila has been mixed and depends on the actual CSO. One person gave me completely wrong information about having to pay a fee to change a redemption flight that was moved by a few hours, but calling back again got someone who immediately understood what needed to be done (without charge).

Guangzhou on the other hand messed up something as basic as changing seats immensely and could barely communicate in simple English.

There’s no Tsuen Wan anymore even for the Cantonese line / DM. There is a DMP team (24/7) in CX city, but otherwise it’s almost 100% default Guangzhou for everyone who chooses Cantonese. And their Cantonese is simply not the same as HK cantonese (let alone their poor English ability)- this is a common complaint but it doesn’t seem like CX cares at all.

nowadays I actually think Whatsapp has its merits. If something goes wrong, it’s way easier to record evidence (for fixing / asking for compensation) than having to have them go through the call recordings (and they may eventually disagree on their wrongdoings).

I feel blessed to be bilingual in situations like this because I think the Manila call centre is the absolute pits. I'd much rather deal with Guangzhou in cantonese. If you guys ever use the online chat function in your MP account, going with English is usually asking for trouble, because it'll route to Manila and they are seriously borderline retarded. every time a simple query will take over an hour to process. Now i just roll the dice and go with cantonese if things need to get done. Not to mention the Manila agents will randomly leave the chat in the middle of a conversation (where im actually not being a jerk for once). its happened over 10 times for me. No more manila for me.

This thread explains a lot of the trouble I have had in one of my past call - rebooking a really simple flight to Hawaii on CX/JAL via call center: One misunderstanding followed another one with more than 90min wasted on zero outcome. In the end I cancelled my flight on the website and filed complaint via email. Still not the expected result of having a rebooked flight but at least they refunded the cancellation fee.

I can never get through to someone at all (let alone someone competent) via WhatsApp if there’s an issue with redemption flights. They’d bring you through the rigmarole of asking for all your details then say ooops they’re not the right person to deal with and will connect you to another department… and nobody then enters the chat after that.

Manila agents while friendly have been mostly incompetent. One call last month, calling the Hong Kong number from the US, I go routed to India (what the agent told me, is this possible?). Smartest, efficient, and able to do what I needed agent in a long time. Jus GOLD this year after 15 year Diamond. And may not even qualify for Gold next year.

Does anyone know which call centre does UK folks get routed? Communicating through English was a bit of a struggle but ever since I switched to Cantonese it has been perfect. I find the +44 line quite effective at solving simple to medium level problems. So far this year I’ve had a positive experience when dealing with rebooking/waiving fees/arranging birthday cake. Of course I haven’t had any complicated problems, but to me the hotline does the job.

If you think you're speaking to a European, the Poland call centre perhaps https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/cath...l#post31976182 ?