LH - between immediatly and 10 minutes, it used to have a 12 cent/minute number, now its only a long distance call

UA - between immediatly and 15 minutes, also a long distance call

KLM - under 4 minutes, its an international call to the netherlands!

Northwest Gold line has rarely, if ever involved unreasonable levels of "hold time" that I can recall. I book awards and other flights almost exclusively online and I think they have a fairly decent tool for this, but I generally locate award seats on the unofficial "WPPA lister" site before going to the NWA site to book.

It seems my whole life has been spent on hold. But then I travel more than most.

Of course, one must learn to combat the busy/hold times with sophiscated re-dial and on-hold fone equipment.

Historically, DL is more often busy than not for me, which always makes me dread a call placed their way. Infact, they've lost tons of business from me because, I now expect them to be busy, and so I just first call the competition.

1 min. waits only (no status) when calling AA's reservations, AAdvantage of Web Support lines.

No wait when calling WN, usually at night.

------------------
Best regards,
Dairenn Lombard
Los Angeles, CA

Over here in Australia:

Telephone - normally within 30 seconds of entering FF#. If the premium desk is busy, you are diverted to the top of the queue at the alternate call centres.
Email - response the next day.
Facsimile - once had a response same day.

This is for QF Platinum (top tier) - equivalent AA ExP.

My father is QF Silver (3rd tier) - equivalent AA Gold - and reports hold times of "usually less than a minute".

SW (Southwest): picks it up on the ring.
AA: One has press numerous buttons (but is fast when you memorize it) then enter in your FF number by voice command, it then says arrogantly "Did I get that right"? And one has to say "Yes" again (rather than say pressing 1 when they read off, slowly, the first number). Then the 30 second hold begins.

SHADO

BA is the worst I regulary have to wait 45 minutes or more over the last few years. I had a schdeule change on a partner award ticket and had to call them to have the times changed because there was a 3 1/2 hour lay over now in ORD. I called on July 3 and it was still an hour wait for them to pick up. They do have great music so to listen to it on the speaker phone isn't bad.

Hold times on Delta have definitely gotten longer. In the not-too-distant past, a call to the SMS # would get you instantly connected to a well-informed individual on the other end of the line. This is no longer the case
As gleff pointed out:
As a Delta GM it takes no more than a couple of minutes on hold when looking for award travel. What's bizarre is that it takes 15 minutes on hold to purchase an international ticket.

I called SMS recently and pushed the appropriate number for "awards" on the menu. Phone was answered within 5 minutes.

Called a while later to make an international reservation for a family member and pushed the appropriate number for "international travel" and was on hold for about 20 minutes.(Still using SMS line as a PM)

Later,another family member was at my house and wanted to make an international reservation and called the regular reservation number and gave up after 40 minutes on hold. This was not a reservation he could make on-line. Ultimately, I made the reservation for him ."Special" is not quite as special as it used to be, but, clearly, still better than having no status. Yet, another sign of erosion of benefits.

NW Plat Elite Line - less than 15 seconds after computer prompts complete (entering worldperks number and pin code.)

Midnight EDT to 5 AM EDT calls are handled by a Seattle Call Center that is not integrated with the other CSR centers and all information is asked by the CSR (not by computer)

RC

I've hardly ever phone the Onepass Service Center. When I have the wait time hasn't been long. Mostly they just pick up.

The CO Plat. res. number I phone a lot. They pick up in a ring or two. One out of eight there's a 1 minute wait. It's rare that it's over 4 minutes.

NW no status. Variable, sometimes if there is a wait it's just a few minutes. Sometimes 5.

Not an airline hold, but hotels. You call a property directly and they transfer you to the toll-free res. line an then you're spending LD minutes that you don't want to spend. I was on hold with SPG the other day for about 20 minutes in total. I can understand that for select service hotels, but full service hotels that have an on-site reservations office or reservatios manaager should not transfer you directly to the toll-free, especially if you ASK for in-house reservations. It's a real pain. Every time I call a full-service Sheraton (even ones that I know for a fact have someone who can help me at the hotel) I get transferred to the toll-free. I'm calling the hotel directly because i'd be requesting something that the toll-free can't help with. It's frustrating.

I have to say US air for award travel is terrible. In trying to book travel for two different trips (several phone calls, different days,times) the average wait time was 45 MIN!!! It didn't help that I had to call back several times to get better flight times/connections.

Also, trying to book award travel or do something simple like an address change over the website is HOPELESS. The site gives an error message or just refuses to go further.

What really gets me though is that I talked to a rep two days in a row. AND the first person did not tell me I was about to enter the 2 week period thus costing me an extra $50.

But I should not compain b/c it was a free ticket and I got to spend time with my baby brother.

Back to the point, waiting over an HOUR is crazy.

Well US Airways for award travel is just fine (i.e. no wait) if you are calling the Chairmans Preferred line

In fact the CP line is about as good as all those stories the AA people tell about the EXP line