I had been on the phone for 64 minutes, trying to upfare an EYW itinerary (i.e. a complicated one) to business class from Flex.

She had finally come back with the correct quote ($244 CAD each for 6 segments, one of which is YYZ-SFO, so totally worth it).

Then the call dropped.

I almost started crying (the rates desk had been having issues, hence why it took 64 minutes).

Then my phone rang. Caller id showed Air Canada. She had called me back.

I've heard Delta does this all the time, but I've had a bunch of calls drop when speaking with AC, and they've never done it before. In fact, I've talked to various people (all SE, if that makes a difference), and they've never had a callback from reservations.

So was this just the most amazing agent ever, or could this be the start of a new policy?

It would actually be a good policy, because I was literally at the "here's my credit card number stage", so she only need a couple more minutes to finish, but a new agent would have taken significantly longer. This helped reduce call volumes.

She's going to be the first phone agent I ever write in about.

I've had AC do it a few times in the past... glad to hear it still happens! Concierges of course, reso a couple times in my recollection in my experience. Of course, I rarely called the reso or concierge, opting to try to do everything self-serve. Even ignorantly booking 5 separate PNRs for YVR-YYJ EYW turns and paying airport fees, rather than book on to one PNR.

Had this experience with Delta and UA too; in two cases not a call back but even calls to let me know confirm the status of a PNR change after it had been done already.

I've never thought to write in a compliment on this, only because I think it's expected, but I suppose if it's an improvement then it should be reinforced.

Actually, CC should remember a recent time he was on speakerphone, he was on hold with AC SE reso, the hold music died and a CSR answered, and we were both reasonably certain she could hear his request but chose to feign a "Hello? Hello?" response. The hellos were too perfectly timed between CC's talking. CallerID should have had the agent call back to ask what the request was. It was also an unusually long hold time for SE, but better to draw a fresh agent who wants to help than one who would rather run away.

Even better would be some asymmetric method of communicating. I guess twitter is becoming that method.

I've had it with concierges before, but never reservations. I want to point out that distinction.

Yes, you were the DL in my post

That's my thought too. It's not that I think it's the most amazing thing ever, just that it improves my experience enough that I'd like them to make it SOP.

Keep in mind I was running Android N Preview 1. One of the known issues was the microphone not unmuting properly. I am not willing to blame the agent the for "feigning" not being able to hear me, because there is a reasonable chance in that occasion that she actually could not.

never received a call back..ever.

*experience as recent as last two weeks

I've had this happen to me numerous times, and they called me back most of the time.

One time, the agent called back and asked. "Why did you hang up on me!?"

Right. But this could be something new.

"I've never experienced this in the past" isn't contributive to the thread.

The intention is to figure out if this is new or a one-off. Your past negative experiences do nothing to confirm either of those.

Interesting.

On one hand, I want to say that it could be due to the fact that the only time I call in is for complicated things, and I can see why an agent might want an "easy out".

On the other hand, if it's simple, I do it online.

I now start most calls, after the basic greeting, with a verification of my callback number. I tell the agent "just in case we get disconnected".

I was working on an existing PNR that had my number on it. My number is also on my Aeroplan profile. And it's the number I was calling from.

I understand why you would start a call like that, but it does not provide them any information. All it does is tell them "I expect you to call me back if the call drops".

But that shouldn't be necessary.

If the call drops before they even pull up the PNR, I don't care if they call me back. I can call again.

If it drops after that, then I don't want to deal with a new agent, and I want a callback.

That's a first

It depends on the agent. The problem lies in the call centre system. Without elaborating on internal procedures and information, sometimes an agent can call back a Pax. Sometimes they cannot. As of late more agents do call back if the call is dropped (remeber the call back system that AC implemented a few months ago when wait time is too long? That brought in some changes at the call centres). But generally speaking it's still a rare-ish occurence and will be for the time being, but it's far from being a 1 time deal also.

Cheers

Edit: for clarification I'm talking about gen res, not sure about concierge.

Thanks for the information.

When you call a concierge, you're Super Elite and have an "issue" on day of travel. They will ALWAYS call back when the call drops.

Unrelated to the thread's primary issue, but: do you mean that for $244 you were able to change from a flex fare to business class, on a multi-segment trip including YYZ-SFO? How is it possible that it could be that cheap? Or am I mis-understanding what you've done?

There are lots of flights where I would be delighted to turn a flex fare into business class for $244 but I've always assumed the price differential would be far greater.

Replied here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/26765007-post482.html

Let's keep this thread on topic as long as possible

..until they audit and suspend your SE status

"Mr. Cow, on these 8 dates you called and asserted to our phone system that you were flying that day. Our records and reviews of the calls show you did not travel on those dates. We spent $74,000 investigating this and expenses are still piling up"

Actually there were two times in 2016 I took a lot of concierge resources and almost didn't fly.

The first was that my SFO-YVR was delayed, and I was going to have to overnight in YVR to make it to YYC. Lots of concierge resources used. When I arrived at SFO, the GA recognized my name, realized the concierge wanted to talk to me, and called her. She came to talk to me.

I was tempted to go home with a "screw it all" attitude.

However, I ended up flying.

The second was when a concierge who had spent an hour on the phone with me told me "well, it's Latitude, you can cancel and go home". That was not an amusing comment when my only goal was to catch my flight. But I almost did go home.