Sunday, October 28, 2007

BA apologises to customers the old fashioned way - handing out money

You may recall that on a recent trip to London on BA I discovered that the new BA in flight video on demand service had caught the "not sure why but it is not working" bug that plagued Qantas for so long. At the time I commented that while both systems seemed to have the same bug that the BA attitude and response was much more apologetic and customer focused than that from Qantas.

Now BA have gone one step further in sending me a letter and GBP100 worth of vouchers to be used in the on-board shop (or mail order). That is an Australian $250 apology for not being able to watch a movie all the way through. The contrast against the "process culture" at Qantas could not be more stark. You may also remember the response from David Cox the E-GM of Engineering when he was asked about the constant failures in the VOD system.
"As with any complex system there have been some technical issues,...The problems usually involve a small number of seats and the passenger can be moved to a different seat in these cases. We are dedicating considerable resources to address these reliability issues, including through the supplier Rockwell Collins."

So while BA apologised and took strong steps to compensate a customer for their VOD failure, the Qantas response was no apology and a statement more like "not a big problem and not our fault".

5 comments:

Travolution Blogger said...

One of my contacts recently had a problem with his in-flight entertainment system on a flight to the US from the UK.

He complained online and received 60,000 airmiles as compensation.

nice.

Anonymous said...

So are you going to buy something for BOOT strap ?

Anonymous said...

You need to wakeup. Do you really think us mere mortals would receive the same star treatment?

You are someone with a lot of swaying power (you have a popular blog, you're in the travel industry, people listen and respect your opinion)of course they want to treat you well/shut you up.

Anonymous said...

Madame Boot graciously accepts anything branded Lancome and the first class pajamas at all times

Anonymous said...

Strap your not cracking the whip hard enough