Travelocity promises that you will get what you book. Or we’ll fix it.

Travelocity promises to fix mistakes made by our travel providers by being your advocate or we will refund your booking.

Travelocity promises to provide english speaking persons to answer your telephone call within 1 minute of answering who have the authority to honor our guarantee – not read from a script in Bangla Desh and bump the problem back to the States after trying to get you to hang up.

Travelocity promises to fix any mistakes WE make. Period.

Travelocity promises to reimburse you for mistakes we make which prevent you from getting what you bought in a reasonably timely manner, and to reimburse you for reasonable expenses incurred to obtain human needs like shelter and on-going transportation. p
i.e., if we screw up your hotel or car rental or fail to provide paper tickets when needed and you have to spend money on the spot to fix it –

THE ABOVE IS A GUARANTEE. What Travelocity has is a promise to eventually talk to someone else to try to fix a problem. And have you called their phone lines? Hence the request to avoid speaking to overseas script readers.

And the reason newspapers are struggling is due in large part to this wonderful thing called the Internet, which offers instant news gratification in just a few clicks.

Also, positive stories weigh far more heavily in a reader’s mind than positive advertising. Super Bowl ads cost a fortune, but nothing brings people in faster than news of a company providing meals for starving children or doing something good. By the same token, nothing runs them off faster than tales of poor customer service. So advertising is largely ignored in favor of positive or negative reports from people about good or bad customer service.

To speak with Yoda: “Do, or do not. There is no try.”

(Most) Words have a clear meaning, that is not up for opinionating.

Obi Wan Kenobi – so what I told you is true…from a certain point of view.

Heh, here we are quoting from Star Wars…

The reason why I am pushing this point is that I am really upset about the constant abuse of language by advertisers (and lawyers, politicians, etc). (Most) Words have a clear meaning, that is not up for opinionating. The evil of this ‘Fair and Balanced’ shtick is that not everything is based on opinion. There are facts too. They must not be treated as opinions.

It is not valid journalism to just ask the opinions of “both sides”. Journalism is to get both sides and then figure out who has the fact on her side.

Well let me cover two things. @Jasper. I wouldn’t take that hard of a stance on Chris. His work as an ombudsman is beyond spectacular. He goes to bat for the people he represents to the best of his ability. Chris is the advocate every consumer wants, and every company knows. Simply put, Chris Elliott is the man you want on your side of the park. He does his job well and gets resolutions in many cases where one can be found.

Now as for the fluffy journalism. I understand you MUST pander to people at times, but I disagree with giving them 99 percent pander. I said it above. There are ways to word questions that don’t make people defensive. You can get TRUE AND HONEST responses in a fashion that leaves people to give a defense and explain how they will prove. As long as you don’t target and point a finger, most people will be willing to offer a critical response and give solutions on how in the few cases they can do better. I said it earlier, NO COMPANY is perfect and all have areas where they can grow and improve. That’s just the business world as a while.

Justin

It is perfectly possible to have a good interview without copying the ads texts of a company. Chris is a fair ombudsman. He quite often mentions unreasonable complaints and mistakes by travelers. There is no reason why companies would not want to talk to him. If all they want to is tout their advertisements texts, they can buy space. I am sure Chris has banners for sale.

I travel more securely knowing that if I get screwed over by a travel company, Chris is out there with his contacts, reputation, relationships, and standing in the travel industry to help me out. So he has to occasionally allow these companies to toot their own horns on here. Big deal. In the meantime, when one of us gets ripped off, he’s out there asking the tough questions, getting us our money back, and pulling no punches in his blog when he writes about it.

Yay Chris! Keep it up. I’ll read your fluffy pen, because I know your mighy sword is still there when you need to use it.

@Joe Farrell: So what kind of guarantee are you looking for? What you seem to be asking for is not legitimately possible. All ANY travel company can do is TRY to find a solution…nobody can guarantee that a solution that gives the traveler exactly what they want will be found. But at least they are guaranteeing they will work on it. That’s better than many other online agencies, who seem happy to pretend they never heard of you the moment things go sideways. Travelocity is certainly not perfect – and Chris has brokered quite a few resolutions when they screwed something up in the past – but at least with their guarantee, they are committing to not just abandoning you once they get your money. And if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you’d know how often THAT happens!

Mileage varies, Joe. Depending on one’s expectations.

OTOH, one shouldn’t necessarily promise what one can’t keep, right? Obviously no one can promise they’ll solve any problem or make the situation completely alright always, but they’ll at least try.

I guess trying isn’t good enough for some people. But…that’s the least anyone can do.

The ‘guarantee’ provides:

Everything about your booking will be right, or we’ll work with our partners to make it right, right away.

OK – so your booking will be right. That does not mean they can get you a hotel room at a sold out hotel after a screwed up reservation. All it says is that they’ll work with their partners to make the booking right, not make the situation right.

But you must call us right away-if you wait until after your trip, it’s too late. We’re available 24/7 to help ensure your trip goes as planned. Of course, there are some things we can’t control, like weather or mechanical difficulties, but in those rare cases when things don’t go the way they should, you can count on us to work with our partners on your behalf.

All they promise to do is work with their partners – they can’t actually do anything. Thus, the promise is actually meaningless and not enforceable since if their ‘partners’ tell them that the entire island is sold out, and there are no rooms and no cars and no flight, well, oooops. Thats it. They’ve worked with their partners and thats it.

I agree too with these Q & A sessions. They seem to highlight 99 percent positives without asking meaningful specifics.

Chris, just a suggestion, but maybe it’s all about the wording on whether or not you get an answer. For instance, if you take it in a non confrontational tone, people might be more apt to give a response.

Here’s one way to ask something that gives them a chance to “reflect without attacking”.

For instance, being a travel Ombudsman, I have heard cases where the Travelocity Guarantee has not always been successful. One instance would be…. What can be done to prevent future reoccurances from happening and can you outline some steps that might be taken with agents to better handle a similar situation in the future?

While obviously this question would lead to “some promo”, it would at least give specifics on instances where things have not been ideal. While I love you travel blog and read it daily, I must admit the interviews get somewhat fluffy due to the same basic premise being taken. Granted, I love to know what works, but I also want to know how areas that DON’T will be addressed. Even in an ideal world, no company is perfect. There is always room for growth and change.

My 2 cents any which way.

Justin

As I mentioned in comments after last week’s Cheapoair interview, I think it’s impolite to ask a series of entirely negative questions. I’m not sure I could get anyone to answer those even if I tried.