Have you tried calling in the evening? Afaik after 19:00 calls are routed to Bulgarian tele centre.

IIRC Skype to UK (and US) numbers is free

Yes. It is 22.45 PM and I have been waiting now for 1 hour and "there are currently more than 10 callers in line before you" - like it has been all the time.
It seems I can cancel my award flight(s) via the chatbot, maybe, to at least secure my points, but will lose some money also.
This is a real horrible situation. Finnair does its best to try to sell as many flights as possible, gives a possibility to rebook many times, and just had a big campaign to sell points. All this leads to a heavy burden on the customer service and leads only to annoyed pasasangers, like me.

I hope it works out. I believe the flight changes must occur 48h before departure and not 72h but that is not a huge help, I admit.

What's with these long waiting times? I have been calling almost daily to reschedule flights and my call's been picked up within 1-3 min of waiting every single time. It always says "less than 10 in the line". Regarding the BG office, at first they wanted to charge me 130 eur for a fare difference. I questioned this by having consulted the booking engine beforehand and having an idea of what the fare difference must be. I had to insist on this until he finally changed his tone and charged me correctly around 60 eur, only half of what he originally demanded. I do wonder how it is possible for the BG CS to come up with this 130 eur number and only later after I point out what the fares actually currently are the system funnily then agrees with me. Where did he get this 130 eur at first if not from the very same system that I had consulted and that later agreed with my numbers indeed?

My changes appear to have been processed OK, but in manage my booking it's prompting me to agree to the changes (on the outbound leg only). Of course when I select that I accept it does some work but the message to accept doesn't go away, not even after a day or so. I'm worried now I'll be a no show for the original date.

Somebodys responding at least, at email!! I have sent 2 reclamations feedbacks, one was answered in 1 day and another in 2 days. Or actually just ”we have forwarded your feedback to right dept” type response, not really Resolving type of reply

There used to be a caller-id-function that identified tier status and prioritised plat calls. I am starting to think this function too has been enhanced by AY IT, so caller-id is used to randomize your queue position.

I think it's been enhanced by GDPR, at least that's what CS told me two (?) years ago. You do remember the time when you could actually talk to CS in, like 2 minutes?

Not everyone calls Gold or Plat numbers, though. For anyone calling the regular number the queue might be massively different.

It feels like this attempt to overcharge happens almost every time.
For me it has happened 3/3 recently (regular CS, not BG), of which only once it was corrected.

Additionally, whenever trying to change a ticket due to cancelled flights, they start looking for fare difference to charge. Only after being reminded that it should be for free, they suddenly realize and process the change.

I always start by saying/texting that in my booking XXXXX, a flight has been changed/cancelledn, and therefore I want to... They've never tried to charge me anything.

Lucky you! I say the same yet the reaction tends to be along the lines of "Ok, let me calculate if there is any fare difference."

Managed finally to change my flights via the chatbot as it is within 72 to the first flight. But of course first I had to change my language to English because trying in Finnish the chat is closed - with no information in the chatbot that you can chat in English. Same with calls, you have to wait for the voice to end its talk in Finnish and Swedish and then suddenly you are informed that with pressing 3 you can proceed in English ,and wait in line for who knows how many hours. Yes you can see the opening hours on the webpage but not when you actually try to call or chat, that mislead me for too long. Very bad, expect from the guy tonight who did a great and fast job after 1 hour of waiting.

having mixed results with CS lately. Few days ago I waited for over 60 min to speak with an agent. Today I got connected within 5 minutes