When the nation’s third-largest airline stops taking complaints by phone, what does that mean? Yesterday’s news that United Airlines would shutter an Indian call center that took complaints after a flight, telling customers to send a letter or email instead, has a lot of air travelers scratching their heads. I count myself among them.
“Why?” asked reader Jonathan Yarmis. “Instead of asking why people aren’t satisfied with the phone response and fixing it, they just say, ‘Hey, our phone line sucks. Let’s cancel it.’”
United says it is able to respond better to customers who write, since they often include more detail, making it possible to provide a more specific response. And it has a point. I almost always encourage people who have a problem with any airline to write instead of calling.
Asking people to write instead of call is not necessarily a bad idea. But should it be their only choice?
What about the many passengers who still don’t have access to email? Sure, they can still mail a letter, but response times are considerably slower. These folks on the other side of the digital divide already pay more for their airline tickets because they have to shell out an extra booking fee for using the phone. Are they being punished for not owning a PC? It looks like that.
I remember the last airline that tried this. Skybus told its passengers not to call it, but to write. Eventually, it stopped responding to emails. Then it closed down.
I’m not sure if the same fate will befall United, although my colleague Peter Greenberg seems to think the airline is on a path to oblivion.
I also wonder if this means the same thing for all United customers. Will the super-elite Global Services frequent fliers have to put their complaints in writing to the United employees who were trained to serve them, too? Somehow, I doubt it.
(Let’s not be too hard on United. Remember, Southwest Airlines, which is said to have some of the best customer service in the airline industry, doesn’t accept email. How retro!)
United is doing the right thing by encouraging its customers to use email to communicate with it. It’s more efficient, faster and in most respects better than a phone call. But unplugging the customer complaints line may be taking it too far.
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I am a landlord, so I understand perfectly what UAL is doing here.
I always require complaints, requests for application criteria/rejection, etc., to be submitted in writing for “both of our legal protection.” This is a true statement–I certainly would not want to go in front of a judge in a “he said, she said” with no paper trail–but it is every bit as much about limiting the number of complaints.
When I require someone to put it into writing, that’s asking the person to make an extra effort, and that person will have to decide for him or herself if they really want to know badly enough why they were rejected. Badly enough to actually write a letter, that is. I’ve had hundreds of people ask me by phone why they were rejected. I have not once had someone ask me in writing, as I require.
That’s what UAL is doing here. They are making their customers decide for themselves whether or not their complaint is worth taking the time to write a letter over. I think UAL will find that most consumers, when facing the burden of taking 10 minutes to transfer their complaint to paper, will decide that they weren’t really that upset to begin with.
While I agree that shuttering the phone line may be taking it a bit too far, oh, how I wish some other companies would see what United is doing and emulate them: by allowing people to submit queries (and complaints) electronically at all! Several companies I deal with do not even have an email-based support option, which I find frustrating on a number of levels (given my strange work hours, normal office hours are virtually useless to me, and I often find it much easier to sort out my thoughts in an email and have a few minutes to think about and include all relevant data, whereas I am quite bad at thinking on the fly in a phone conversation and always leave some point undiscussed).
If I had to choose one, I think I might very well pick email support over phone support. However, phone calls do have their place occasionally.
Perhaps United should go the route of their reservations department and charge customers $10 for complaints filed by phone… ;)
UMMMMM Perhaps it needs to be Federal Fricking Law that every company HAS to offer both phone and email or their executives be arrested.
This mentality “Let’s just refuse to talk to any customers whatsoever so we don’t have to care” should automatically mean a business gets shut down.
You are in business to provide a service. You shouldn’t be able to stay in business if you refuse to keep it competitive, which means having to listen to feedback and improve.
Anyone who disagrees with this basically is making an argument for fraud and ripoffs and scams and unethical criminal business types doing whatever they want unchecked.
Chris makes a point about the digital divide. Is United punishing people without e-mail? Yes and no. It seems to me that at some point, a technology becomes so ubiquitous that a company just assumes that its customer base has access. A quick google search suggests that 80 percent of Americans have e-mail access. When you consider that most libraries have free internet access and most of us have friends with e-mail, communicating by e-mail is not hardship. but is usually a choice.
Therefore, I reject the notion of the digital divide. United is reasonable to expect most of its customer’s to use e-mail for communication. I think though that United should retain an Amerian telephone number for those folks who require immediate assistance and are happy to pay the long distance cost.
Imagine how many business owners, especially small ones, will surely complain of being forced to spend more time, money and effort doing that because of such a law, to the point of possibly closing down if it becomes too cost-prohibitive. Can you be expected to do that as well if, say, you run a business yourself, especially if/when it grows?
You can answer you can. But others want to be able to decide on their own how much support they can afford to give, depending on various factors.
IMHO United, or any “big” company that can really afford it, ought to retain the customer phone option. While there’ve been cases where issues were best resolved via email, I’ve had a couple where it was fixed quicker via phone.
Do away the toll-free line if it’s really costing them a lot in their eyes. It’s unfortunate some people talk to “robots” via phone, but I gather many still enjoy talking to a live human being. :)
I wonder if Chris has gotten this one right. An article in today’s Honolulu Advertiser (picked up from the Bloomberg News Service) puts a rather different face on this matter. According to them, United is bringing 165 call-center jobs BACK to the U.S. from India, these jobs to be split between Honolulu and Chicago. These jobs will be filled, they state, by workers who now handle reservations, and who will see duties involving customer relations added to their present jobs.
It is true that United will be urging customers to use e-mail or snail mail for both complaints and comments rather than telephoning, and that when they discontinue their customer-relations phone number, United reservations agents will be handling complaints. Perhaps the matter is not quite as dire as Chris seems to feel.
In any event, bringing jobs back to the U.S. from overseas has to be a good thing, given the present economic state of affairs. I’m no fan of United, but I think they’ve done a good thing this time around.
Hum… what about calling the reservation center and, if you are on a situation that needs to be taken care of right away (i.e. you are at the airport and something just happened) then I will call reservations and speak to a supervisor to see what they can do… hum…. it is a catch-22…
@Morton L. Brown. The story you’re referring to is here: http://www.starbulletin.com/business/20090211_United_preserves_isle_jobs.html
I just saw it, and I agree. It’s an interesting spin compared to the AP story carried by USA Today on which I based this post.
I do hope this will lead to an improvement in customer service at United. I think we all do.
Hmm, from that article you linked to, Chris:
I wonder if Delta/Northwest will process their vouchers in the U.S. rather than their Indian call center this time and cut down the 10-day time? Heh.
Chris -
I’m a proponent of email or “forms” contact as well, based on experiences at a non-travel company I work for that’s in the top 20 of the Fortune 500. With email, it’s easier for us to hone in on key complaints to do trend analysis. Are our customers experiencing problems with a new change in policy? Not like a component of service? Well, that gives us key indicators to work on to improve the customer experience. And, in a day in age where there’s so much competition for everyone’s money for goods and services, knowing your customers is extremely powerful.
With calls, and with offshore call centers, how sure are we that the call is being logged for the correct reason? You can flag the call for whatever reason, based on the metrics that are demanded to you by the outsourced call center management. Feign ignorance when they ask you why the call was flagged incorrectly, because, hey, who in their right mind would screen thousands of calls and check on you?
On a personal note, I’d much rather write an email or write a letter. It gives me time to formulate my thoughts in a clear and cohesive manner, and allows me to take the emotion out of my message. I don’t know about you, but if I had to call an offshore center with a few loosely framed talking points, I’d end up at a new level of frustration based on the canned responses expected from such a center.
Most of the airlines already use e-mail, fax or mail as a form of contact of the customer relations department. You can usually request in your first communication to call you to discuss your past travel experience and a representative will call you.
Ok, So if they close the call center in India, does that mean I don’t get to hear this again….. So your flight originated in “DC”, what state is that in??????
My wife and I were given United vouchers due to problems with our flight. When we came to use them we discovered that they could not be used for an alliance flight but they could be used against the United part of that flight. This eventually caused additional expense , additional travelling time and a smaller luggage allowance. Complaints were politely ignored. Indian call centres are merely a way of ignoring complaints.
this is insain I have been trying to resolve a problem with them for 2months now and the email back and forth with no personal contact is horrable … its just another way to dodge your customers …. united you suck