There’s a thread over on Flyertalk which talks about a United customer service email which a heap of us received recently.
The email goes like this…
Dear Wandering Salesman:
Thank you for engaging with us by responding to ualsurvey.com. We are working to achieve industry-leading performance and reputation by focusing on: safety; on-time performance; having a clean, workable product; providing courteous and respectful service.
In 2009, we took our first significant step by being the #1 airline in on-time arrivals as compared against America’s five largest global carriers. We know we have more to accomplish.
In your recent survey response, you answered that you “Would recommend United to a friend or acquaintance.” What would it have taken to motivate you to respond that you “Definitely would” recommend us? A member of our leadership team would like to discuss your assessment and understand any suggestions you might have to improve our service. Please reply to this email with the phone number we can use to contact you and some times that are convenient for us to speak with you. If more convenient, you can provide us feedback directly by replying to this email.
We look forward to hearing your thoughts on how best to make you a United “promoter.”
Sincerely,
Rob Bradford
Managing Director – Customer Solutions
After a healthy dose of cynicism on subsequent FT posts, we all decided that it was thinly veiled attempt by someone in IT to prove to his bosses that he had worked out how to use the mail merge function on his pc.
But a funny thing happened late this afternoon.
My phone rings and there’s a Japanese speaking woman on the other end of the phone.
“Holy shit…” I thought to myself. I was sure I paid that last bar tab in Tokyo.
The nice lady proceeded to tell me that she was A Very Important Person from Customer Service at UA in Tokyo. “Go on”, I ventured.
She then went on to tell me that she was following up from one Mr. Lobert Bladflord…
When I realised she was legit and not same scam to get me to subscribe to some dodgy porn service, I got quite excited and then proceeded to tell her to grab a coffee, pull up a chair, and cancel the rest of the day because we were going to get busy and I was about to unleash the mother of all “How I would run your airline” speech.
Or something like this.
Forty minutes later and I had told her everything from the wine they serve in Business Class is dogwash, the food barely edible, complained about Starnet blocking (even though I have never experienced this before and even though I booked a J class long haul award last month between Singapore and Vancouver and it took all of 10-mins on the phone), complained about the lack of in seat video in long haul Y, and proceeded to rant like a banshee about people who complained about their SWU’s not clearing on W class fares should be told to piss off and fly Delta.
Or something like that.
She’s probably drinking heavily by now. And wishing she hadn’t drawn the short straw in last week’s karaoke competition, which resulted in her having to call all the losers like me.
But on a somewhat serious note, I was impressed that UA had bothered to follow this up. The fact that someone from Japan called a mentally unstable Aussie who happens to live in Singapore and who was sitting at home with nothing better to do was probably not part of their grand plan.
But it was a start.
I can’t wait until the next phone call. Hopefully it will be some tool from Continental promising that it will be “business as usual” after they take over. As if.
Bravo UA. Bravo.
It truly does appear that you might be listening…
*Image courtesy Gaping Void, Hugh McLeod
