babyjesus

ok, so I called UA on skype and I think I have the old number from when I was a 1K, and the agent was curt and barely helpful. But she answered my question and confirmed a schedule change.

Have you noticed how they never hang up first? So I was thinking do I hang up now because she did help me (curtly) or do I not hang up for 2 minutes to give her a break? Because I think until we hang up they don't have to take the next call.

Shall we reward helpful and courteous agents by not hanging up for a few minutes?

Obviously i have time on my hands....

channa

An agent got upset with me the other day when she had to do a reissue, and I suggested that she could let me go while she did that. She said she'd get another call the minute I hung up, so that wouldn't work. So I waited for the 15 minutes.

PMUA's business process was so much more efficient in that regard -- they sent the lengthier transactions like that to the back office to be processed within a day.

I think as a test, next time they put me on hold to do a reissue, I won't say anything but my call may drop, and I'll see if it gets done anyway.

Anyhow, they used really focus on call time metrics and encourage agents to be as brief as possible, so I suppose this would have been less of an issue. But I understand that since 3/3, I've been told they have not been focusing on that metric because the systems and processes are more cumbersome. So I can see how they may not want to terminate the call to buy them more time if needed.

One 1K agent told me she used to take as many calls in an hour as she takes in a full-day shift now.

IADOrange

I'm guessing one of the performance metrics agents are evaluated against is average call time, so you're probably not helping them at all by trying to keep them on the line for longer.

In high school I was a CSR for a different company. I would have much rather moved on to the next call and taken care of another customer rather than have to make small talk with someone because they didn't want to get off the line. If anything, I would have put a note in your record to say that you're a "talker" and that the next agent should work to (kindly) expedite the call and end it as soon as possible while still completing your request.

I can only imagine. I spent 1.5 hours on the phone getting put back on a waitlist after the system dropped me last week. The agent spent the whole time on hold herself waiting for a supervisor to perform some magic on my record. She did take my number in case we got disconnected, but I didn't want to hang up and risk having to repeat the whole process again if something didn't go through.

babyjesus

But I'm not suggesting that I would talk at all. Just not hang up. I can hear the live line continue on her end.

She has the choice to end the call if her metrics need help. I am just asking if it can be a reward to give the agent the choice as to when the call ends.

willryu

You could say, "Thank you for your help. I'm going leave the line live, and please hang up when you are finished at your end."

Will

MSPpete

The agent wants you to hang up first so you don't complete the 'short survey' at the end of the call, if you chose that option at the beginning of the call. If the call didn't go well, they don't want you to document that on the survey. If you hang up, there is no survey - if they hang up there is a survey.

izzik

Obviously there is nothing left to complain about except who hangs up the phone first.....

Top Tier

I'm sure the next customer waiting to be served would prefer you hang up.

greenpau

Credit where it's due to United over the past two weeks - I've seen a dramatic improvement in a) the time to answer; b) the attitude and disposition of the agent answering; and, c) most importantly - a dramatic shift in agent's empowerment and ability to solve an issue on the spot... both for Reservations and the MileagePlus SC. The latter had become abysmal, so this step change is welcome.

My understanding from talking to United corp people is that they've been focusing recently on messaging to agents that tells them they are empowered to make decisions without Supervisor intervention - apparently, fear of retribution / "the stick" had become an issue after 3/3, which was basically requiring an employee to wait for a supervisor to do anything more than confirm a schedule change. We'll see if this continues, but for now, I see improvement.