Social Media and Customer Service

[rickylee]

I wanted to share my experience on this and see if they are shared by others, perhaps on the same and different airlines.

I am an active user of Twitter and Facebook and I often use both platforms to make comments (usually complimentary) about service, either in lounges or on flights. However, there have certainly been occasions that I ended up using social media to raise a complaint or concern and have found different responses and different outcomes, depending on the airline.

With QF, on most occasions when I raised a concern or problem on social media, they tend to be dealt with promptly and satisfactorily.

With CX, there was an occasion where a HKG-LHR flight starting having mechanical problems with their toilet pumps. About 2 hours into the flight, all of the toilets on the starboard side failed. As the flight progressed, the toilets on the port side began to fail one by one from the front of the plane towards the back, until about 2/3 into the flight when all toilets failed. The flight attendants sealed the toilets but didn't make an announcement about the toilets after the passengers were woken up for breakfast service and drinks were served. Let's just say that I have never seen a torrent of people rush to toilets upon landing at LHR as I saw that day. I wasn't the only one who took to social media to complain and found that we all had the same response: "Thank you for the feedback. We shall work harder."

I have never even seen an acknowledgement or response from BA to social media complaints.

 

[prozac]

Call me old fashioned as I don't use Twitter or facebook. AFF is the social media I use. When I complained on AFF last September of poor Virgin service I had an almost immediate pm response from an AFF member, a Virgin staffer appalled at the service I encountered and offering support. This was followed by contact from the AFF Virgin rep who referred it to Virgin. They investigated and eventually (weeks later) offered an apology but appeared too weak to take any action against the person who caused the drama, a dopey FA who locked us in a stairwell during boarding and was very rude about it. We nearly missed the flight!

Point is I got a response by posting on AFF.

 

[RooFlyer]

Call me old fashioned as I don't use Twitter or facebook. AFF is the social media I use. When I complained on AFF last September of poor Virgin service I had an almost immediate pm response from an AFF member, a Virgin staffer appalled at the service I encountered and offering support. This was followed by contact from the AFF Virgin rep who referred it to Virgin. They investigated and eventually (weeks later) offered an apology but appeared too weak to take any action against the person who caused the drama, a dopey FA who locked us in a stairwell during boarding and was very rude about it. We nearly missed the flight!

Point is I got a response by posting on AFF.

I'm with you. Twotter is for narcissists (and business trying to make a living) and FacePimple is for those, well I can only speak harshly here, so best left unsaid.

Edit: and as for complaining / feedback via 'Social media' : I favour fronting up, in person. Act like a human and you'll more likely be treated like one. 'Social media' is a bit of an oxymoron like 'reality TV'. I've never seen the 'real world' as portrayed in so-called 'reality Tv' programs, and 'social media' seem to be very anti-social.

 

[Princess Fiona]

I'm an avid user of social media and have had prompt responses to complaints and compliments from both QF/VA/AA. The AA team is fantastic and I think over the past couple of years both QF and VA have put more resources into social media and the service has improved.
Whether we like it or not, the move towards customer service on Twitter and Facebook is well underway and I think business and customers should embrace it

 

[amaroo]

I have never even seen an acknowledgement or response from BA to social media complaints.

BAEC are very active on FT. Nicci (the BAEC RedRoo) sorted an issue for me in 2011 that saved me around 10K.....it was my first foray with FT/AFF. Started a thread got a stack of replies/advice and voila, Nicci sorted it.

 

[prozac]

I'm an avid user of social media and have had prompt responses to complaints and compliments from both QF/VA/AA. The AA team is fantastic and I think over the past couple of years both QF and VA have put more resources into social media and the service has improved.
Whether we like it or not, the move towards customer service on Twitter and Facebook is well underway and I think business and customers should embrace it

Maybe twitterbook would have got us out of the locked stairwell had our shouts failed. Don't know what effect it would have had regarding our lost luggage when it failed to arrive at our destination.

 

[prozac]

BAEC are very active on FT. Nicci (the BAEC RedRoo) sorted an issue for me in 2011 that saved me around 10K.....it was my first foray with FT/AFF. Started a thread got a stack of replies/advice and voila, Nicci sorted it.

Good result. Power to the press.