Article: Qantas Considers Bringing Call Centres Back to Australia

[RichardMEL]

I find it definitely helps but not always. Not too long ago I had an agent in Cape Town sigh and snap at me "just read it out normally" when I used the phonetic alphabet to read out a booking reference... like geez I was just trying to make it easier. Not surprisingly the rest of the interaction was also of a poor standard and the issue wasn't resolved

oh wow.

Not always, but sometimes agents will thank me for doing it that way. You can't win sometimes huh?

I'm going to suspect that particular agent was unfamiliar perhaps with phonetic alphabet which is the problem. Agents who are tend to be more experienced I guess (generalisation I know).

I certainly don't do it (and nor did you) to be a smartass or anything but to genuinely assist THEM because alphanumeric PNR's and names, specially more complex than Smith, Joyce or Hudson, to correctly spell out. And of course, correct spelling with such things is so very important.

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

"We are experiencing a very large number of calls and your call has been placed in a queue, your estimated wait time is 30 mins, for a call back press 1, or hold for the next available operator... Our website address is www.yyyyyyyyy(.)com..."
And you get to know the name of those songs they play while you are on hold, as you use your neck to hold the phone to your ear, while your hands type on the keyboard, waiting, waiting, waiting...
VH can make a move even now, to cancel the overseas contract, but I guess she is going to let its run its course, till the end date of it.
Maybe it cost millions to rescind the call center contracts.
===
You have exceeded your wait call limit...
Maybe that is why the call center drops us off, if we have been waiting too long.
There is a thing I found called IVR scrips.

 

[kyle]

Unpopular opinion: I think they should outsource the call centres to countries that get customer service (e.g. USA). And while they’re at it can they please bring back customer service desks at airports so that when a flight goes IRROP I don’t have to be put on hold for several hours? It would also be nice if they could hire Americans to work in those customer service roles here in Australia (again they get customer service)

-RooFlyer88

Wonder if you have to tip them to get great service?

 

[kevrosmith]

Two experiences helped me understand how much local cultural knowledge impacts Call Centre operators and their ability to deliver locally-appropriate service:
1. A work colleague in Sydney, who was originally from India told me when he first worked in an Australian-focussed support centre back in India, when Australians finished an email with "Cheers", instead of "Regards" or similar, he said they all imagined us Aussies finishing our emails by clinking drinks together in celebration.
2. I worked with an Apple Business Account Manager based in Texas, USA, working Australian East Coast hours. I asked him what he noticed different working with Aussies versus Americans, and he noted how we read out phone numbers e.g. "Triple zero" instead of "oh-oh-oh" or "four, double-two-nine, six, double-eight, three" for 4220 6883, instead of "five-five-five, six-eight two-two" for "555 6822". I had not thought about that sutble difference previously. I also note that Flight Attendants in USA would often say "flight number twenty-five sixty-eight" for 2568, rather than "two-five-six-eight", which I'd expect more common in Australia.

 

[MelbFlyer]

I personally don't care where the consultant is working from - I'm more concerned if they can do the job at hand correctly and have been given the proper tools to do said job.

ie. Why should a call centre agent in Hobart be able to see reward flights that you and I can see, but overseas agents can't?

Considering the amount of QFF members and reward bookings, If all consultants had the same visibility as each other and us (ie. what we can see online), there would be a lot less calls to have to take.

I've called Qantas well over 100 times over the past year to try to get a simple amendment done on my rewards booking - 85%+ of the time it's been unsuccessful.

Had there been consistency across the board, I wouldn't have had to call even 5 times!

 

[RichardMEL]

I certainly don't count the US as a culture that does good Customer Service imo. Putting aside service in places like hospitality and the whole tipping culture (which does anything BUT encourage good service imo), while one can get decent service in parts - and I've been the recipient of such in many ways (eg: one UA agent who went above and beyond.. and then some in LAS to get me out of there near 0100 on a day of hell) and others, I've also experienced absolutely shocking service, rude agents/clerks, disinterest and plain "meh" - not to say same doesn't happen in Oz or other places, but if you asked me a place to expect good customer service, the US of A, much as I love it, wouldn't come near the top of that list.

now there may be a confusion between Customer Service execution and Customer Service Policies - such as the "flat tyre" rule and other policies that seem, in general, more customer friendly in some parts. I see these as two very different things.

IMO.

 

[anat0l]

So open a QF call center in Japan?

An irony of Japanese having "great customer service" is that the majority of Japanese aren't just used to complaining. Often, they just take things in their stride, and they are also used to some fairly verbose processes that for us should be automated or far too much bother.

It's like the culture which does it so well is perhaps one of those that need it the least. Kind of like seat comfort as well (Asian carriers can have some of the most comfortable seats but their prime audience are overall in better shape than Western carriers)

 

[kangarooflyer88]

So open a QF call center in Japan?

I've had issues with the Aeroplan Japan call centre giving me wrong information for a routing rule (i.e. insisting that I couldn't cross several IATA zones on a multi-city booking), which is one of the benefits the Aeroplan programs lets you do (in my case flying Sydney to Zurich then onwards to Toronto in business class for 110,000 points).

-RooFlyer88

 

[KSC]

VH can make a move even now, to cancel the overseas contract, but I guess she is going to let its run its course, till the end date of it.
Maybe it cost millions to rescind the call center contracts.

The reason you can’t just end the overseas call centers straight away, besides possible costs, is the call traffic will need to be managed. Thus the Australian call center needs to scale up and would make sense for this to be done at a manageable pace.

 

[Eastwick20]

My money is on their overseas call centre contracts are up for re-tender so they have " leaked " that they might bring them back to Oz in order to scare, sorry I mean assist with negotiations.

 

[Danger]

(For context to this post, please read this post, this post and this post first.)

Today I had something I've never experienced with Qantas. Following my call with Suva the night prior, I woke up to find I had 10 missed calls from Qantas and 10 voicemail messages. Each message was almost identical and all from the same agent, the same agent I'd spoken with last night.

As my phone came off silent at 6am I was able to answer the 11th attempt at reaching me. She was calling to tell me two things. First, I was right about platinum members being entitled to additional baggage on AF and KLM and she was wrong in stating, multiple times, it only applied to codeshare flights. She apologised multiple times, apparently now having been able to find the largely useless information on the QF website that simple says platinums (and golds and silvers) get "extra checked baggage allowance" (but as the other thread I've linked to shows, no one knows what this is in reality).

Second, instead of the refund of $204.50 for cancelling a CDG-AMS Y award she promised me last night, my refund would now actually only be $57. To be clear, this was the fourth amount I'd been quoted in four days. I wasn't having it, though. I told her we'd agreed on $204.50 and it was on that basis I had cancelled the leg. She largely seemed to gloss over that and simply said she'd go about having the ticket reissued.

I waited until this evening and still no new e-ticket. Conscious that the itinerary also includes CX and fearing the whole thing would go the way of Alan Joyce, I phoned the "premium" line again. And yet again I was answered in Suva. This agent now said I wouldn't be getting back the full 10K points I'd paid (as also promised the night prior) but only 4K, despite the previous agent waiving the cancellation fee. Second, she also was adamant my refund was only $57. I told her to forget it.

Still concerned about the ticket reissue, I phoned 1300 304 318 and actually ended up in AKL. I explained the pitiful service from Suva over several days, the different responses, the 11 calls, the complete lack of clarity on the QF website about the baggage allowance. Sadly, the agent could see the CDG-AMS leg was still showing in the ticket, so he went about removing it and recalculating. Now get this: my refund is actually going to be $332. That's the fifth different response in four days!

I had a new e-ticket before the call was finished.

 

[Seat0B]

OMG @Danger I thought I had a rough trot with BS answers and fob offs but this truly takes the cake.

 

[Scarlett]

@Danger you’ll really need to let us know what amount actually hits your bank account in terms of the refund: I expect it could be anywhere between a debit of $35 up to a refund of maybe $9000.
The QF call centre Wheel of Random Responses (WoRR - that’s going straight into the QF lexicon alongside QP, Enhancement, and Consistently Inconsistent) could really deliver anything. I can just see it now, you wake up to 140 missed calls and an email noting that they’ve accidentally credited your bank account with $170,000 and need to discuss how YOU’RE responsible for organising repaying it …

 

[KSC]

I can just see it now, you wake up to 140 missed calls and an email noting that they’ve accidentally credited your bank account with $170,000 and need to discuss how YOU’RE responsible for organising repaying it …

You can route Qantas to your call Center and then give the money back as a credit. The credit then has to be redeemed on a separate portal and the fees for the transaction is 99% of the amount transferred.

 

[Mr Bill]

Re Call Centres. The success of any call centre depends on,: Product knowledge, good enunciation (understandable english in our case) and good technical connections and empathy.
Product knowledge: At least know the difference between Bangalore and Bundaburg. Understand the differing connection times from international to domestic terminals (vv) say in Perth and Sydney compared to Melbourne or Adelaide.
Good enunciation: I have literally hung up (politely) on calls because the "agent" had difficulty in understanding my request or I could not understand a thing the "agent" was saying. That said, with QF, absolutley no probs with those based in CPT or SUV. I find the worst (not necessarily QF) have been agents based in India and the Philippines).
Technical connection : I have lost count of the number of times that the phone connection is such a poor quality that neither of us (me/agent) can not understand or hear each other. The other bug bare of course is when the "line" drops out completely during the conversation.
Notwithstanding the above, my most recent interaction was with the HBT QF call centre. A request to upgrade a rewards PY seat (from SYD to JNB), to one of the newly released J rewards seats, was handled swiftly without complication and with a pleasant conversation to boot !

 

[Danger]

...

Now get this: my refund is actually going to be $332. That's the fifth different response in four days!

A refund of $332 was in my account today. Hobart (almost) never fails to please.