MP Goddess

FIRST POST ALERT!

Ummm...hi. You don't know me. But believe me, I know you. You people put food on my table and a roof over my childrens' heads. I don't know if you've heard it recently, but I personally thank you for choosing United. Seriously.

I've been lurking here for the last few months and I've started to pick up on how some of the people here tick. Not all, but some. I've noticed people who seem to know the program pretty well--keep up on their accounts and read the terms of promotions. But then I've also noticed people who think they know the program pretty well but really don't. Some things have kind of been itching at me to ask of you, so if you don't mind reading the rest of this post (which promises to be ridiculously long) and answer some questions, that would be great. Thanks.

Keep in mind I'm doing this out of my own curiousity/boredom, not for work or anything like that.

1. Why is it that so many people here complain about the website? My husband is a 1P, he flies for work twice a week. I access his account, he accesses his account. We request upgrades, we get award travel for the kids' vacations and whatnot...I don't get it. Please explain. Because IMHO, it's perfectly user-friendly.

2. Do you rely more on FT or UA for your UA information? Some things, I understand, CNN will address before UA will get the chance. That's unavoidable. But do you feel like the people here have better information than the people who work for UA?

3. Do you EVER talk down to/get angry with/get demanding with MP agents? If so, did it get you what you wanted? I only ask because it seems I've been speaking to WAY too many elite members in the past couple weeks who seem to think I'm simply a voice on the phone and not an actual person. No reflection on you personally.

4. On an average call to MP, can you get your needs addressed by speaking to a normal CR, or do you feel the need to escalate? Do you automatically escalate every time you call? If so, why?

5. Do you hate me already?

6. What is the hardest thing for you to understand/get an answer to in relation to MP?

7. Have you ever recieved outstanding service from a MP agent? If so, did you escalate THAT?

8. Do you understand the reasoning behind having seperate MP and reservations call centers?

9. Please list the last thing a MP agent did for your account over the phone and when it was done. This may seem odd, but I don't really make very many exceptions, because it's not really necessary very often. But I see so many people here talking about how they got this or that, so I'm a little confused about that.

10. NOW do you hate me?

If you have any questions for ME, I'd be more than glad to answer them. I love to solve problems and puzzles and such, so please give me something to mull over. PLEASE.

jan_az

Are you the one I spent 15 minutes on the phone with today that the end result was " I cant help you"


On a serious note - most of the agents I speak with are friendly and professional. It would be nice if they had the ability to correct issues that even they agree are wrong without having to wait months for someone in another dept.

It would also be nice if they knew the terms of the promotions

chicagorich

Wow--that's an interesting post...

No--I don't hate you-

but I am not an elite member on UA now either...

The last time that I talked to MP in person was when I had to have an award ticket redeposited to my account.

The agent was completely helpful and I had no complaints about the experience.

However, I am sure there are others on here who's questions or concerns are much more complicated getting into the nitty gritty of upgrades, alliances, etc....

I hope things work out for you guys at UA. ^ ^

TakeMeToEZE

First off, welcome to FT!!! We all like to see UA employees here, so please know you're welcome here. I'm sure you're going to get a zillion replies to your questions, but I figured I'd throw in my two cents.

Well, compared to many other airline sites, such as aa.com, it really doesn't compare. I'm sure others will go on at length here, and if you do a search in the forum for united.com you'll get volumes of complaints about the website. If I had to pick my #1 complaint about the website though it would be the award booking. I can't see all possible routings and I can't access Star Alliance awards. It's only somewhat useful, a first stop before calling. My second complaint is the inability to choose what booking class I want to get. If I'm trying to participate in a promotion that only allows me to fly in certain booking classes, the only way to ensure I get in those classes is to call.

FT, definitely. But I think that can be said by everyone on FT no matter what their chosen airline is. There's just so much knowledge here. Not only that but FT definitely drums up a lot of business for the airlines. For instance, I never knew what status really was until the end of 2003 when I started reading FT. Before I only bought my tickets based on cost, not mileage plans. The first time I heard about mileage runs I laughed. Now I'm 1P and I think mileage runs are perfectly reasonable.

So far, no. In general I always stick to the old adage of "you catch more flies with honey instead of vinegar" and this has served me well with UA.

Nope. I have never escalated a call. So far the person answering the phone has been perfectly able to help me, but then I never have any super complicated questions.

Why do you think we hate you?! Quite the opposite! You may see a lot of complaining on FT but I think you will also see quite a lot of positive comments about UA employees and good experiences. FT members are really good about writing letters to UA about good experiences with employees and good service that they have received. As for you personally, I think you're a nice lady.

The hardest thing to understand in MP for me was booking codes/fare classes. But after some FT study I've learned what they are and how they work.

Yes, I did receive excellent service by an airport agent in EZE. I spoke to his supervisor in EZE to let her know what a great job her employee was doing in the face of a 767-full of people who just found out their flight to the US was cancelled and they weren't going home until the next day or possibly the day after.

Yes, and this has not been a problem for me.

I'm not sure I understand your question. Are you asking what exception I asked for from an MP agent or just what I asked them to do for me? I have never yet had to ask for an exception from MP. My last contact with them was about booking an award ticket. Nothing fancy, just wanted to know what my options were for a last minute ticket so I could decide whether I wanted to burn miles or pay for a ticket.

See my answer to #5, above.

I hope this was helpful. I'm a 1P but I know there are lots of people on here who are 1Ks and UGS, fly a lot more than me, and have a lot more contact with MP reps than I do. They might have more input for you. But I hope this was helpful!!

In case we don't say it often enough, we do appreciate you and we are happy to have you as a member of the FT community. ^

Sooner

As a former employee, I found it almost amusing how many times info was posted on the FT board that the company was still denying through official communications with employees. The rumor control section on Skynet was a worthless joke. Now, as a paying passenger, I understand how frustrating it is for employees to think they are passing on correct information, only to discover later it is wrong. When I was at UAL I tried to make it my personal policy never to promise anything I could not ensure was delivered.

Good luck to everyone at UAL and keep lurking. It is a great way to learn more about the customers you need to hang onto.

Mike Jacoubowsky

I haven't had too many complaints about the website, but there are certain things that are very frustrating. For example, UA will come up with promotions that have rules requiring certain types of fare codes (S,V,U etc), but there's no easy way, on the website, to find fares that qualify for the specific codes. I'm sure others have better examples, but this one has come up often enough (for me) to be a real annoyance. FT is a great resource because you get to see the experiences of others dealing with a problem or situation you might have to deal with yourself. This is invaluable, and help you to better understand how things work. Do keep in mind that there are other UA employees on board here, and they'll often make sure we don't get too far out of hand! I've never understood why people get angry at Customer Service reps. Rarely will it ever do anything good; once ego gets involved, reason goes out the window. I've had great experiences with UA CS reps, and some not-so-great experiences. When I've had a not-so-great experience, I never get mad or raise my voice, even though it might be understandable to do so. Keep in mind that UA does, at times, make mistakes. Sometimes nasty ones, and it doesn't make me happy that there isn't a way to quickly resolve them. But I'm the type of person who's never "elevated" a conversation to a supervisor, believing that, eventually, things will somehow work out for the best. They usually do. But yelling at a CS rep isn't what accomplishes it. I wouldn't know, since I've never escalated! Makes me wonder what I'm missing out on??? But I guess that goes to show you that, just because somebody might read here that you ought to escalate any issue that comes up, people will still do their own thinking. FT doesn't turn people into nasty, evil CS-hating zombies! Not even slightly. You're frustrated that you work your tail off, and now, having spent some time at FT, think nobody appreciates your hard work. It's easy to see why that might happen, but, with a few exceptions, it's simply not true. There will always be people who can't be pleased, no matter what. Doesn't matter what business you're in. Why seat assignments get changed on the fly. My wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary with a trip to Hawaii. On the return leg (LIH to SFO), our seats changed from being a pair together in row 31 to individual seats 10 rows apart. And several calls to CS reps over a couple of weeks couldn't get that changed (each rep told me to call back later, as seats might open up). At the same time, there were plenty of wide-open areas in E+. I wasn't Elite at the time (qualified about 500 miles into that flight, yeah!), so there was no way they could put us into the E+ seats.

I dunno... seemed pretty unreasonable to me. When I first booked the tickets, there were many open sections with seats together. For UA to split us up (without a plane change, by the way) and not find a way to get us back together seemed arbitrary & rude. And nobody could tell me why it happened nor what they could do about it. What would you have done in a situation like that? (These were revenue tickets, by the way, not award)Several times, particularly with routing needed to use miles for an award reservation. Without exception the people I've worked with for award tickets have been wonderful.Probably not, especially since I've had a hard time figuring out which number to call for a given situation (and the phone voice mail system isn't quite as helpful in that regard as it ought to be). I think UA would benefit greatly from having an FAQ on the website that would tell you what numbers you call for what type of situations. As it is, phone numbers are (possibly intentionally?) difficult to find.Probably the last thing an MP agent (as opposed to a general reservation person) did that stands out was to clear my waitlist for 926 SFO-CDG instead of having to do SFO-ORD-CDG... about 100 yards ahead of the turnoff that determines whether you go to International or Domestic departure areas. Half an hour earlier I'd called and the MP agent said I wouldn't clear (if I did clear) until after my ticketed flight had already left. But as I neared the airport I thought I'd give it one last try...

I have no idea if she bent any rules or if things open up in a seemingly-random way. She initially said no, not yet, but when I explained the situation to her (that I was approaching the airport and just needed to know for sure that there was no reason to go to the International terminal), she checked again and got me on the plane. I was always very nice about it; certainly I had no right to expect I could get onto 926! But my checks of the F cabin showed they still had seats available to sell, so it seemed like a strong possibility, which prompted me to keep checking.No way! You're hear, seeing what goes on behind the scenes at the other end of the phone. You're a rock star in my book.Thanks for taking the time to ask questions and help out. It's greatly appreciated.

--Mike--

flyinbob

This is the one that gets my attention. Simply put, the website is amateur hour. Poorly run and maintained.

For example, all day today the e-upgrade link has been broken (several threads today about this). Takes you to the wrong page. Simple link problem. United.com has yet to fix it, and may not even be aware of it.

Generally, you are right. I can, about 80% of the time, access my account without problem. And domestic award travel is sometimes available, but the ones you are getting are probably NOT vacation destinations. Yea, you can find flights from Cleveland to O'Hare, or Detroit to Denver. Try Hawaii. Try international F (which many here do because of the volume of miles accumulated). Plus, United.com will not allow any partner airline award travel.

Bottom line, the web site is and should be as professionally run as any phone center, meaning we should be able to do almost anything online that you can do when contacted by phone. United acknowledged as much by imposing fees on customers calling phone centers instead of using the site. However, the web site is light years away from being able to do that, and from the contact that many on this board have had with the web "tech support", we wonder if the site provider is qualified to be doing this at all.

ozstamps

MP Goddess - I admire your superb command of HTML in your debut post. But "welcome to FT".

You even phrase things just like someone else here we all know well.

Good luck with that ever working website. ^

BDLORD

Welcome to Flyer Talk....now go give us all some upgrades!

WindFlyer

Welcome to FT, MP Goddess.

About your questions:

1. The website. Yes it is user-friendly for the most part, but it is (generally) below the standard of UA's competitors' sites. This comes in two forms: features and reliability. In terms of features, it is deficient in simple things like changing seat assigments, or more complex matters like trying to book awards (one should not have to try every hour for departures and returns to see availability for any given dates). But features (or their lack) is something that some of us can learn to live with. Unreliability, on the other hand, is an altogether different matter. There have been threads upon threads about bizarre (and ever-changing) behaviour in the "my itineraries" section of the site, not to mention its intermittent availability--I, for example, have incurred penalties due to not being able to change an itinerary online because the site was down. Another example: just today, the "e-upgrades" was flat out unavailable. It was not mission-critical for me, but I'm sure it was to a number of people.
   
   
2. Primary information. I'm not sure if you mean "news" or information (you do mention CNN), so I'll just stick to information. FT'er information and UA "insider" information are both valuable; the former for its breadth, and the latter for its depth. Let me elaborate. Any one UA employee has great depth of knowledge about their area of work: as an MP Goddess, for example, I would expect that your knowledge of the program, accrual rules when flying partners, promotion terms, etc. is extensive and exceeds that of many FT'ers, but I would be surprised if I were to find out that you are as conversant in matters like boarding priorities, VDB processing and op-ups (unless you did a stint as a GA ). Now as customers (and FT'ers), we get to interact with a large part of the sytem: the reservation agents and their world, the gate agents and their world, the MP Goddesses and their world... so as we pool together our shared experience and information, it gives us a broader "knowledge" that is useful to us, and yes, we do get fanatical about it.
   
   
3. I have not gotten angry at MP agents; frustrated a couple of times, yes. And in those cases (is that a round trip or a circle trip?) I found it better to just end the conversation and take up my issue another time when the agent would more willing to get to the bottom of it and to sort it out. And that is all I personally want: what is just, and if I misunderstood something, just set me straight. Now as for the "just a voice," I can't apologize for others. But for me, if you were to get me on the phone, you can expect to hear "Oh, yes Ms. MP Goddess, good afternoon, how are you?," lots of pleases and thank-yous, and if you really impressed me, my asking your agent number and center you are in so I can send a word of commendation. BTW, reservations agents hear that too (and at the airport, I make it a point to try to read agents' name tags and address them by their names).
   
   
4. I have never had to escalate things on calls to MP agents, as most agents I have spoken with this year have been more than sufficiently competent to handle the issues at hand (though some of them were complex enough that the agent herself escalated things for approval, and I understand that and have no problem with it).
   
   
5. See #10 below.
   
   
6. I guess I'm familiar enough with the MP program that I seldom have more questions about it... There are, however, a couple of things about which I have some difficulty getting clear and reliable information. One is the earning of miles on partners. The other is T&Cs and rules about promotions (for example, I am still not sure that I have the right rules about the RTW award from the Washington DC promotion). I do realize that MP has to get this information from others (partners and marketing). Still, I'd be nice to get it more easily and dependably.
   
   
7. Of the ten or so interactions with MP agents this year, one was poor, five or six were very good to excellent, and three were outstanding. And yes, I wrote (escalated) those three experiences (noting, by the way, that the majority of my other interactions had also been satisfactory).
   
   
8. Yes I do. I would be surprised if they were one and the same.
   
   
9. A couple of weeks ago there was a power outage at an ATC center in SoCal which screwed up air traffic for about three or four hours. As result of that, I ended up flying a different (shorter) itinerary than the one I originally ticketed. A week or so later, I called MP and inquired whether I could receive credit for my ticketed rather than flown itinerary. The request was granted and my ticketed flights posted (and AFAIK, this is not an exception, as the change was involuntary). What was at stake? I needed those 500 or so extra miles to pass 10k on the quarter and collect 2 CR-1s.
   
   
10. No, of course not. On the contrary, I thank you for coming out and jumping into the discussion. One of the things that makes FT a more interesting place is that people from both sides of the counter (or phone, if you will) get to express their personal (unofficial) thoughts and opinions.

I'm not going to ask you any specific questions now (don't want to hijack your thread), but I would encourage you to post away as questions come up.

Again, welcome to FT ^

currumbin

MP Goddess: I used to participate in a certain car enthusiast forum. This forum was designed for one specific model of a manufacturers' line. The car was rated by ALL as an awesome piece of machinery - anyone that reviewed it rated it 5-star. However, if you visited this car forum and spent about a day on it you'd see mostly complaints, leading you to believe that the car is plagued with problems.

Consider posts with topics like this:
"Meal was great in coach today"
"Website actually allowed me to book my award travel"
"CSR did her job today, and she seemed happy"
"MP website working fine today"

Topics like this would really clutter up the forum and in general are not very valuable. You see, these are things we expect, and when things go wrong we complain about them. You will see a lot of praise for UAL on this forum but it will probably never outweigh the complaints.

The point I'm trying to make is that many of us here think UAL is an awesome airline and we want to make it better. Trust us, with millions (probably tens of millions) of miles in the MP bank we want United to succeed!

Welcome to this awesome forum!

MJonTravel

From an ex-airline person, who didn't work for UA, but flies UA about as much as my alma marta, welcome. I discovered FlyerTalk before I left the airline, but didn't post. Now that I have to travel with work, I came here looking for information, and did I ever find it. I wish all airline people read this wonderful forum. I think it might help serve Customers better.

I think you'll find everyone to be very welcoming if an employee. I know I've learned a lot from FT.

And from an alumunus of one of your main competitors, let me say thank you. My old loyalties aside, United and Mileage Plus have been very good to me.

afwen

Well, since you asked....I tried to book my most recent trip on the United site, but I couldn't do it--although it showed the outbound and return options that I wanted, it refused to sell them to me as a pair. I wound up booking the itinerary on Orbitz for $5 extra.

-Alvin

UA_Flyer

Welcome to FT! I always enjoy reading posts from current and former United Employees. They always provide valuable information. For example, I have learn quite a bit from UnitedSkies and Gman. I look forward to reading your future posts.

Answers to your questions:

1. Website

I don’t know where to begin. I have tried to book through United.com as much as I could. But, unless I am flying a simple domestic direct routing or a direct flight from IAD to Europe, I found it hard to book desired routings I want on United.com. For example, on several occasions, I could not book transpacific flights to SIN through LAX/NRT with a stopover in HKG, and return through NRT/SEA/JFK with a stopover in SEA. I ended up calling my travel agent to issue the tickets. In addition, the inability for us to book the fare classes we want has been a most discussed problem on FT. For example, we know there is H fare available, but the website only gives us Q fare or Y/B fare options.

Award Booking: one stop-over is allowed across the Pacific, but we cannot book the stop-over award on United.com. Also, I do have the flexibility to choose the desired routings, as United.com usually gives me no more than two options, when other routings are available for award travel.


2. FT or UA

Definitely FT. I discovered FT after being a 1K for 8 consecutive years from 1995 through 2002. I had a dedicated UA sale agent working on my account for 4 years in my previous job, and knew several UA employees personally in that span. I thought I had pretty good knowledge of UA and M+, but I felt like I was a high school student amongst all these UA/M+ PhDs when I first joined FT. The amount of experience and knowledge here are incredible, and most important of all, people on this board are very helpful, and they understand the issues and problems a UA frequent flyer has. They go out of their ways to find answers and doing research for people posting the questions.

3. I have always had good experience with M+ agents, 1K, 1P and 2P desks over the years,


4. Never have to escalate to Supervisor level, but on several occasions, the agents took initiatives to check with their supervisors before responding to my inquiries.

5. No

6. Sometimes I get frustrated with that CSAs who don’t understand all the rules and terms of the MP promotions, but nothing significant.

7. I get outstanding services on many occasions, and actually sent in some of those “appreciation certificates” UA used to hand out.

8. Yes

9. May be you can tell me if this is possible: I learned from FT, MP can provide me a printout showing the details of members’ historical activities, if I request one. I called several times, and kept getting the No answers. I ‘d like to have a copy as I will cross the Million Mile mark shortly, and would like the printout for my own personal record. Is this possible?

10. Definitely No! Thank you for taking the time to communicate with us

euslaner

MP Goddess, welcome to FT!

And thanks for your interesting post.

The UA website leaves much to be desired. Much of the time, it or parts of it are down. As others have commented, "My Itineraries" is down so often that it gets very frustrating. And after I log into the 1K website (which somehow does not allow my password manager to fill automatically), I need to log in again to go to My Itineraries. Also, I fly a lot internationally and often I find it useful to fly IAD to FRA but back from MUC (times, prices, upggradeability, bonus mileage credit). But to get this sort of routing and information, I almost always need to talk to someone at UA. The web site just doesn't do it. So now I'll have to pay extra for this information.

Most of the time I have received excellent treatment by calling the reservations line or the MP line. But often I get either misleading information and I have had instances in which one agent was particularly helpful, even bending the rules a bit (not a lot). And then I have had to call back and other agents undo this "favor" and threaten me with retaliation. Yes, I did escalate and got better treatment up above. Sometimes the 1K email line gives me grief--I had to go pretty high up in management to get my 500 mile bonus for joining the Ted Club as the 1K line agent denied that Ted was part of United. And getting credit for other promotions is often a real horror story.

When I do get excellent service either on the phone or in the air, I do send an e-mail to UA complimenting the agent and I know that these compliments are posted to the employees' record. Overall, I get much more excellent than bad service from UA--but when service is bad, it is sometimes horrid. And for any business, that is not good news. The good news is how much better service has gotten.