I absolutely hate Air Canada!!!!!!!!! I can’t stand them and company’s like them. First off, you should NEVER have a call center in India for booking errors. That’s the most retarded, junked up piece of shit strategy I’ve ever heard. I sure fire way to further piss of customers you’ve already pissed off. How many times has the Canadian government pulled Air Canada from the abyss of bankruptcy and now they have all of their complaints/bookings communications coming out of India? Splendid.
So I go to book my flight. I try and get Aeroplan points using Tipu’s card. That’s apparently impossible. No I cannot do that while using my credit card. The thing is that I’m going to a conference and have to use my credit information for reimbursement so it has to be under my name… ok whatever.
Then I go and book my flight. I realized I left “Mr” instead of “Ms” in front of my name so I call Air Canada service number… in India. The guy transfers me to reservations… also in India. The guy says he can’t change the title but will reimburse me my money so I can go and redo my booking. THE PROBLEM IS THE RETARDED CHIMPANZEE HELD MY FUCKING CREDIT!!!!!!!! How in God’s name, sorry, why in God’s name would you put a customer in such a financial process which is supposed to take moments and hold their credit such that the reimbursement goes through after up to SIX WEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!! Why didn’t he warn me about the credit? So then I called up my credit card and got my limit increased. However I’ll still get interest for Air Canada’s purchase because they hold on to it for so damn long.
I want to make a formal complaint but you can’t can you? Huge companies like Air Canada do not even leave an avenue for communication. I tried to complain to the Indians representing Air Canada but that doesn’t seem like quite the same.
update: sadly i ended up rebooking w/ air canada b/c westjet didnt have the flights when i needed them.
I am not a fan of air canada either. I also had to deal with their call centre on the other side of the planet when they lost my luggage. Well, they didn’t lose it, apparently there wasn’t enough room in the cargo hold of the plane for everyone’s luggage. The guy at the airport was pretty helpful, he said they’d probably put it on the next flight and someone would call when my bag arrived. 12 hours later I hadn’t heard anything, so I called the number he have me (india), and the response I got was “according to our tracking system, your bag has arrived in Winnipeg and may or may not have been picked up by a courier. The courier company’s phone number is 1-800-###-####, but don’t call them because since they may or may not have picked it up, they may or may not have a file on you yet, in which case they will not be able to tell you anything”…… not helpful at all. It would have been nice to get in touch with someone at the airport who could have physically checked and told me “yep, your bag is here”. Eventually they dropped the bag off at my place about a day and a half after my flight, no apologies, no nothing. I fly westjet now whenever I can.
ya…u gotta have the name matching the areoplan number..itz messed!
Then again…Air Canada is our only choice besides west jet…why can’t Royal and AirTransat and all those other ones come back…
I just sent you an email letting you know how you can make a formal complaint. Let me know how it goes.
Buddy… that is rough. Sorry about that. I try to stick to WestJet, but of course, sometimes it’s not offered. I hope you get through with a formal complaint because that is really ass. Also, dear Air Canada, India is a really stupid idea. People try to avoid India, generally, not get more intimate with it. Please do not have communications routed into India because chances are they will not help.
Being a brown person of sub-continental background, I can attest to a few things I have learned to differentitate when it comes to language, customer service and culture. Also, I have had hands-on experience dealing with both sides of the phone.
Western businesses need to come to terms with the fact that a “native speaker of english” and a “person who speaks english” are two different things. Let me give an example: (CSR-Customer Service Representative, NESC- Native English Speaking Customer, PC - Punjabi Customer with little command of english)
CSR (India): Hello, Thankku for contact-ting Air Kanadda, how can I help you, Sir.
NESC : Oh God, yes I want to fix the name on my reservation.
CSR: No problem Sir, Sir I will transfer you to the reservations and they will be able to fully resolve your issue, Sir.
Brief pause for transfer and some audio prompts and protocol…
CSR (India): Hello , Thanks for calling Air Kaynada, how may I help you?
Frustrated NESC : Yes, I want to change my name on the reservation.
CSR (India): I am sorry Sir, but you reached our Customer Service for inquiries only. However, let me see if I can help you?
NESC: Yes, I want to change the title Mr. to Ms.
CSR (India): Oh , I am sorry Ma’am. I don’t have the proper authorization to make name changes I will get my supervisor.
10 minute of silence, CSR forgot to play the music or something…
CSR (India) : Hello Sir, I am sorry Ma’am, my supervisor has advised that I transfer you to reservations who will be happy to fulfill you request. I will transfer you now….
CLICK…Hang Up by NESC
NESC : F***ing a**holes.
====Another Scenario=====
CSR is native speaking.. PC is punjabi speaking with little command of english
CSR (Montreal): Hi, welcome to Air Canada, this is Mary speaking, how may I help you.
PC: Ya, I wantta changee my name of the tikkit Air Kannada.
CSR : OK, let me pull up you records, do you have a reservation number?
PC confused, talks in the background to daughter who is born and raised in Canada.
Oye Parminder, gori kuri ki gaal kenda reservation number ketthey?
Translation : Hey Parminder, this white girl says something about reservation number, where is it?
PC: I don’t know number, where number? No number have. My daughter have number.
Call is abruptly transferred to daughter…..
From these two situations it’s easy to follow that there should be ways to accomodate both situations. Ofcourse, in my experience, CSR in Canada are better trained to understand the multicultural nature of their client base.
Bottom line, Air canada should deal wil companies like TATA that are now doing this :
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/08/06/100141303/
rob, i sent an email to the address you gave me. thanks.
that email address doesn’t work anymore. the mail bounced back. i called a local Air Canada office and they said on the website under “past travels” there are avenues for complaints. i’ll do that next week maybe.
did you use ‘.com’ or ‘.ca’? I’m almost 99% sure it’s ‘.com’.
used “.com” and just tried “.ca” to see if it bounces too
the email is “.ca”
i got a response from the ceo’s assistant basicly stating that nothing was done wrong and that procedures were followed. as for the indian call centers they claim the have other call centers from other countries as well and that it allows for 24 hour service. furthermore, the assitant says that air canada never received any financial help from the federal or provincial government and their success is a result of their “sound-restructuring plan”.
w/e.