Travel is one of life’s joys. Being able to get away and just be somewhere else is an essential part of the human experience. However, most people seem to have bad experiences with travel, almost every time. Anyone who’s ever spoken to a friend about their vacation will likely have a complaint about the journey.
Between vacationers and business travelers, reasons for travel becoming a point of crisis and stress are numerous. Below are three common scenarios where your customer service in travel needs to shine, and how you can solve for them with ease.
“I can’t find any information on the website!”
An issue that customers face both before and after they’ve purchased tickets and is a fairly common one, unfortunately. Not having easy to access information, no regular updates, and links that lead nowhere. Some travel sites don’t even have an up-to-date FAQs section. Studies say that the average time spent on a site is not more than 20 seconds. That’s all the time you have to capture prospective customers.
In the case of a return/refund/cancellation query, having all of this info needs to be easy to access and clear enough for just about anyone to understand. Several sites make the mistake of hiding this information under layers of pages and unintelligible jargon. While you might end up making the sale and protecting yourself from a refund, it more likely left a bad taste in your customers’ mouth, they will never come back, and that’s never a good thing.
Easy fix
1. Dedicated chatbot trained on queries and with all relevant information
2. A self-service portal, where anyone can find the information they need
“Why can’t I get anyone to listen to my complaint?”
Travelers with complaints or questions are often in a hurry. They might be waiting on a connecting flight, waiting for a cab to the airport, or even at the station staring a reservation sheet with their name missing.
All of these situations and more require quick and immediate responses, and in case of a cancellation or delay, there are likely to be tens, maybe hundreds of these calls and DMs. A breakdown in communications cannot be an excuse for any travel provider, but it is all too common.
Easy fix
1 . Customer service in travel can handle enquiries effectively only if they have an omnichannel setup to collate all information and help agents answer questions and close complaints in the first call
2 . Being convenient and easy to reach makes a big difference in times of emergencies, a live chat with an option to speak directly to an agent is a lot better than a long-winded IVR menu that helps no one and frustrates the caller
3. Dashboards, persona creation, automated responses and post-call follow-ups are all not only vital, they should be handled by one CX platform
“I’m in a hurry, why do I have to repeat myself every time I speak to an agent!”
Any time a traveler in crisis is on a social DM, then on the chatbot, then moves to call or email customer support, they are made to repeat what their query is and it gets even more frustrating when the call center agent passes the call onto a supervisor and the whole conversation starts again.
Another point of contention for many travelers is canned responses. Agents answering calls and on live chats simply respond based on a preset script and no one wants to hear that when they are on the way to somewhere and have a problem that needs fixing.
Easy fix
1. AI-powered tools eliminate repetitive tasks and helps agents by pooling information and filtering through knowledge databases
2. An omnichannel dashboard makes it possible for all the information from one customer come together in one place, so the agent has not only the current data, but also every input made so far in the open ticket
3 . An advanced, automated CX platform makes personalization of resolutions, responses, and offers possible for service agents and gives customers a great sense of being heard and attended to.
Want to learn more about a custom-made CX platform for your customer service in travel and tourism company, follow this link to learn more, contact us for a quick product demo and see what Kapture CX can do for you.
