Pending need for Katrina/customer service patience...
 

This post is about our preparedness to deal with pending changes in point and mile land. It is about the changes I think will soon be happening in customer service...

There's a reason why it is brought up right now and it is an intricate topic to say the least, but here's what I mean:

Katrina bit the big one and it's going to be a long hard haul for all the victims and their families for a long, long time to come. This post is not meant to focus on the political and social fall out even though I must say I was personally disappointed that the feds acted rather slowly and when they did act, they acted too much on the side of policy rather than in principle. Seems to me that policy dictated how and when they went in, which may think was too late from the get go. Principle would have allowed them and others to "just do it," as the Nike ads used to say, and to do it fast! This may have saved more lives and prevented other problems compounding on your TV sets every single day. Others may have a different view on that, of course, so it will be a tricky thread to navigate, I am sure.

But all that aside, my point of this post is to highlight a ripple affect that WILL come and WILL affect us all in our ongoing quest for travel, miles, points and of course, CONVENIENCE & customer service.

CONVENIENCE WILL SUFFER.
Customer service will change.
We may have to live with some of that.

POLICIES will be enacted that make us have to live with this fact.

Principles may be thrown out the window because busy airline desks will have to buckle down even more to accommodate the inundation of issues and problems to come.

Oh well.

Oh, the travel industry may or may not suffer from all of this, and I am sure many are eagerly watching to see what happens every day, but certainly, you and I, the customer, WILL pay some of the added costs going forward. (Just take a look at your gas prices and ask yourself WHEN we may all get off the oil standard!)

Now, please note that I understand that people's lives are obviously priority one, but within that umbrella of assumed collective understanding, I am asking people here to think about how all ofthis will affect that which we do here in FT.

Mark my words, you will soon be hearing things at airlines and hotels and rental agencies, and of course, in Customer Service tele centers across the nation that "Katrina relief efforts have slowed our systems so please be patient with XYZ at this time"

And we should...

But we should also not necessarily let too many CS departments get away with too much! I mean, in the wake of 9/11, I recall going into a Staples store for ink and the excuse for not getting service and then not finding the ink was that 9/11 affected the whole store and chains surrounding it. Has anyone else experienced this kind of thing? It was not good.

That store was in the city of Boston, no where near the airport, and that city had no plane crashes in its downtown like NYC had. Also, this was in March 2002, but the store employee was telling me that as if it happened yesterday.

My point is that while we should be focused on trying to help victims and families, trying to restore order and of course the cities affected by the large disaster, we should also be reminded that some of the things we do in here at FT will slow down and be affected in days and weeks and months to come. Our own travel quests and mile issues will indeed change, and so may some of the expectations we are used to. They change a lot already these days, but now you may see even more, I think.

Keep good records on your travel and your own mile intake or usage, print things out, be thorough in claims to CS on missing miles, etc, but be patient with them if you can. I don't know how many CS tele centers may have been located in L.A. for example, but I know about ripple affects and this one is coming. All those "10 business day" things, or the "4-6 weeks until miles post" things, and the "Sorry sir, my computer is slow, can you please repeat your account number--again?" things... they are gonna get WORSE!

thoughts?

:)MM

I can think of one thing that may be affected by Katrina as I needed an expedited passport prior to the tragedy. The turnaround was 8 days: going to Pittsburgh 1st for the money processing and to New Orleans for the passport processing. If you have a passport expiring soon or already expired I would not linger on that as other processing cities will be burdened w/New Orleans work.

I do understand that many things will be affected (yes, gas; mail/shipping; airports;etc) It really burns me that anyone would use this as an "excuse". I still hear the "since 9/11....." story, when they weren't anywhere near NY, and didn't know anyone personally affected by it, and they have no idea what it means to have your life changed by such a disaster. Just cause your company cut back travel does not mean you can use that as an excuse 4 years later. Please.

Agreed! And then I would tell them about my flight 11 father and that would normally get them to shut up. ;)MM

This really isn't about how Katrina will affect miles and points so I don't see it as appropriet for MilesBuzz.

A topic about how Katrina affects award seat availability? Sure, why not. Or how airline X has all their international award reservation agents helping out with the Red Cross and so they can't book awards? Sure, why not. But that's pretty much what it would take, I think, to make it MilesBuzz material. ;)

Regards,
Gary
aka gleff
MilesBuzz and Delta moderator