Does UA rank/track customer interactions? Can you complain too much? Agent shopping?
 

I have read occasionally in this Forum that the MP Service Center keeps track of all complaints ever made by a member.

What evidence is there about this?

Has it been communicated to you from MP?

What did the MP Service Center say?

So what if they do keep track?

Can they threaten to close your MP account if you have sent in legitimate complaints?

I thought that they wanted feedback about how to improve service.

The few times I have complained, I have always made proactive suggestions. I have never requested any compensation. Sometimes, MP has proactively given me compensation.

Of course. They undoubtedly use an advanced CRM to track their relationship with every customer. This includes any communications, compensation paid out, revenue, bookings, frequent flyer information, etc.

Any company that has more than a few employees definitely uses CRM software these days.

And it probably works as well as the rest of their IT.

If you expect them to note your special requests or exceptions they've made for you, you should assume they note complaints too. Customer service 101.

They can close your account at any time for any reason. I've never heard of it happening for complaints. I think it's more reasonable to assume if you call asking for a favor or to bend a rule, you will be less likely to get what you want if you have a long history.

It's not uncommon for companies to "fire" bad customers. From what you've described you don't sound like bad customer. I save my complaints for really big things. "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" is not just a nice children's story. :)

Ask the good rabbi who got kicked out of NW's program....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/ar...en-months.html

That article was about NW/Delta.

My questions are about UA.

I think the practical implications are that if UA decides it pays you compensation too frequently, they will become less generous with compensation. If they decide they are bending the rules too often for you, they might choose to be more strict.

I think it would be very difficult to complain enough to prompt UA to close your MP account - they are not oblivious to the potential PR blowback. I would guess that in the Northwest case, the gentleman was an undesirable customer for other reasons, not just his complaints - or, perhaps, he asked for compensation every time he complained. For practical purposes, the probability of account closure is a nonissue, especially if you are simply writing in to comment on the service you received.

If they see you repeatedly breaking the rules (e.g. using hidden city ticketing), then that is a different story.

Sure. I said it was about NW. It was years ago. I'd be shocked if UA didn't keep a log of interactions with its customers. It's the year 2016 now. They may not invest sufficiently in customer-facing IT feature, but this has been standard CRM functionality for decades.

Around 15 years ago, I read a letter to Business Traveler Magazine that went something like this:

"As I boarded my (Air Canada) flight, my ticket was scanned and up on the screen popped a note saying, 'This passenger complains constantly.'"

The letter went on to talk about how embarrassed the passenger was. She wrote that in the past couple of years, she had written AC a few times because of issues.

POC

POC? Unsure what that means!

Proof Of Concept that airlines do keep track of complaints.

As other people noted, United certainly uses Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software. A quick online search lead me to a 2002 article about United's partnership with IBM for their CRM system: http://www.travelmole.com/news_featu...?news_id=76773

A more recent 2013 article about airline CRM systems has this quote:
Source: http://www.businesstravelnews.com/Mo...irlines&a=proc

CRM systems are designed to track every transaction (within reason) related to a customer. Without question, complaints are being tracked.

This may explain an unexpected high amount of compensation for first-time non-elite MP member's complaint ($150 in travel voucher) of a 4+ hours domestic delay. This amount is usually given to high-status members, I guess.

Did this passenger write in to AC to complain about being tagged as a complainer?