The next decade....what's in store?

Caribbean Star or LIAT?

You will know from reading this blog that I am a frequent Caribbean traveller. The first time I flew LIAT was in 1990 on my way to Carnival in Trinidad. I can't say that my experiences have been bad. Sure, sometimes I cuss, but it's nowhere near the cussing I am about to give Caribbean Star. (Isn't it great to have a blog to vent?)

You remember me saying that LIAT changed their schedule for September, October and November and that I would have to regrettably book Caribbean Star? Well, that process started about three weeks ago.

Went to their website and found that when I clicked Grenada as the origin, Barbados did not come up as a destination I could select. After emailing them through their feedback form and getting no response, I called the IT department. The gentleman who spoke with me promised to call back within a certain time limit to update me on what had been done. This he did, and generally kept in touch over the period of two weeks. I said to my colleague who was also trying to book the same route how impressed I was by the service.

Eventually they were able to get that fixed, but then the Web Only non-refundable fare of US$50 one way, was not coming up, so that was my next issue. After the matter had stepped out of the domain (pun intended!) of the IT guy, I was referred to two guys, whom it was said would get in touch with me. Over four days, I did not hear anything. So I called one of them this evening.

Waste of flicking money, for although he was pleasant and empathetic in trying to understand my query, the person who he referred it to is in serious need of customer serivce training.

It wasn't that this E-Commerce managerwho called told me that the web fare wasn't available on that route, or that he didn't offer an explanation. But rather, it was that....

1. He spoke so quickly that even after asking him to repeat his name, I couldnt not tell you what it is.
2. He had a triumphant condescending tone when telling me that GNG/BGI/GND is a different route from BGI/GND/BGI (where the US$50 fare is available) and the fares weren't applicable on that route ( an easy cop-out answer as far as I am concerned, so that I wouldnt bother them again....any airline people can tell me why the fare would be available on the return leg of BGI/GND/BGI route but not on the GND/BGI route?)
3. He showed NO EMPATHY....one of the biggest mistakes when dealing with a displeased customer. He was matter of fact, business-like, brusque, curt, and any other synonyms of those words that you can think of.

Don't get me wrong....it is not a huge problem re the fare because the next fare is U$75, and LIAT has a US$25 fare from Barbados to Grenada. So the money is not the issue. All those things above are the issue.

And to cap off my horror experience with Caribbean Star, the online booking system does not accept non-US credit cards! It has Zip Code as a mandatory field, and when I put in the customary 99999 or 00000, it nah wuk! Means I have to call that call centre to have some spanish speaking operators deal with me like they are robots.

I don't think people really understand the thing that pisses off passengers. Well here is a good description above. Learn from it.

Thank goodness the next time I have to fly in December, the LIAT schedule will be back on track.

Posted by yamfoot at September 27, 2006 06:08 PM