Southwest CX Goes South: 8 Mistakes The Airline Made
Add bookmarkI’ve written it before when it comes to the airline industry, and I’ll write it again. I accept that things will go wrong. As a customer, however, I fully expect companies to right those wrongs.
Despite my broken record approach to the matter, airlines continue to fail in the latter regard. Instead of rebounding from errors that adversely affected the customer experience, they somehow manage to exacerbate the problems. They somehow manage to leave me more dissatisfied.
This past week, Southwest Airlines became the newest culprit.
Southwest endured a technological malfunction Wednesday, which led to hundreds of flights being cancelled and many others being delayed. I can give Southwest the benefit of the doubt in assuming that there was nothing it could have done to avoid the malfunction or mitigate its immediate impact. I cannot and should not, however, accept the quality of the company’s response.
The Story: I had a Thursday morning Southwest flight in conjunction with commitments for a wedding. Due to my schedule, it was essential that I get there by early Thursday afternoon.
When I went to bed Wednesday night (well after 2AM), Southwest maintained that my flight was “on time.” When I woke up shortly before I was due to head to the airport, I noticed an e-mail confirming the flight’s cancellation. The concise e-mail provided a link at which I could “rebook” my flight; it also claimed I could call to request a refund for any “unused portion of [my] itinerary.”
Given my tight schedule, I needed to get on the first available flight. Rebooking was the only suitable course of action.
Unfortunately, the link provided was not working. I was similarly unable to rebook using the mobile app. Panicking, I called the support line. When I realized I was looking at a hold time, I also Tweeted Southwest for assistance. To keep the process as streamlined as possible, I also followed Southwest’s Twitter account to facilitate a DM conversation.
With no response in sight, I had no choice but to book an alternate Delta flight for the afternoon. The refundable flight was, somehow, not exorbitantly priced, but it still required me to commit extra money (without knowledge regarding when I would receive a refund from Southwest, let alone compensation for the price difference) and accept that I would arrive hours later than I planned.
Hoping for a better option – a flight that would leave earlier and not require me to retroactively seek remedy from Southwest – I remained on the line. I also continued Tweeting.
Not one of my four Tweets received even a dismissive, courtesy response (they are actually still without a response). I meanwhile waited on hold for two hours, constantly hearing an ironic recording about how much Southwest likes its customers.
When the agent finally did pick up, she showed little empathy for the situation. She was not particularly cordial or apologetic. She did nonetheless find me a flight, and I was luckily able to cancel the alternate Delta booking.
I raced to the airport to make the flight, and then learned that it was delayed by an hour. We also faced a delay while in the air, and I ultimately landed about two hours after the new flight was supposed to land – and five hours after my original flight should have reached Chicago. I missed two of my crucial appointments.
The scary thing? From looking at other stories online, it appears my awful experience was far from the worst endured this past week.
Southwest’s Mistakes
Unprepared: If a technological malfunction can cause this much chaos, it should have been built into the company’s risk management strategy. Preparing for the worst is a customer-centric course of action, as it mitigates the impact of accidents (or incidents) on the people who are supposed to matter most. That so many flights were affected, that the response channels were so worthless, and that the airline admittedly took days to get back on track (and still delayed my return flight three days later) suggests Southwest was not optimally prepared.
Did Not Think Like A Customer: Before elaborating on Southwest’s execution issues, let’s look at their original message. They offered me the option to rebook my flight or receive a refund. What if neither was suitable?
There was no guarantee, after all, that another available Southwest flight could accommodate my schedule. And a refund would not have gotten me to my destination.
The best option may have been to rebook with another airline, but Southwest’s initial statement did not clarify terms for doing so. Specifically, the statement failed to articulate whether Southwest would reimburse me for any price differential. Insofar as I would be trading a flight I booked months in advance for one I’m booking on two hours’ notice, that differential could be significant.
Without that assurance, rebooking with another airline would put me at risk of compounding the day’s inconvenience with hundreds of dollars in new charges.
This scenario exists, I argue, because Southwest did not think like a customer. It neglected that certain passengers were bound by specific time and price constraints. It neglected that asking customers to potentially choose between arriving late or paying through the nose was imposing a burden they were not in a position to bear.
It shouldn’t matter that rebooks and refunds are more convenient and affordable for Southwest. A customer-oriented company, especially one accountable for righting a wrong, focuses on what matters to customers.
Omni-Channel Without Value: Let’s face it: amid this sort of debacle, customer contact volume is going to be through the roof. While a great, customer-centric company would ensure it can scale its contact center on a moment’s notice – whether that means bringing in overflow staff, relying on at-home agents or even contracting outsourced support – it may not be able to efficiently manage all inquiries in the voice channel.
To successfully manage call volume, the organization needs to offer robust, helpful, efficient communication alternatives.
Southwest clearly understands this from a philosophical standpoint; it, in theory, communicates via social media, provides web self-service options, and offers a mobile app. It unfortunately failed to utilize these alternative options in practice.
The web and mobile channels were worthless; they did not allow me to rebook my flight. The social channel was worthless; no agent responded to my inquiry. As a result, I needed to wait for a live voice agent, adding to the volume and creating a vicious circle of customer dissatisfaction.
Unacceptable Phone Wait Time: Without viable alternative options, customers were forced to call for support. The result was a volume too great for Southwest to efficiently handle.
It was well over two hours before I was connected to a live agent. A wait in excess of two hours, whether for an urgent, time-sensitive travel issue or a minor informational matter, is simply unacceptable.
When things go wrong, ensure you have the resources, whether in the form of alternative channels or sufficient manpower, to handle customer inquiries in a timely manner. The expectation that you will provide a quick, effortless, satisfactory resolution does not disappear in the wake of an incident. It actually becomes more pronounced.
No Social Media Response: Social media networks are not platforms for brands to unilaterally issue marketing messages. They are, similarly, not platforms for customers to unilaterally share feedback. They are platforms for engagement.
Someone forgot to inform Southwest.
None of my Tweets – all of which communicated the urgency of my issue– received a response when I needed one most. Days have passed, and Southwest has still neglected to connect with an apology. It simply did not feel pressure to respond.
That is a problem. Do not engage in social media unless you are prepared to respond to customers as quickly and completely as you would in more “traditional” channels like voice, live chat and e-mail.
Of course, if you are not prepared to offer that caliber of service, it might be time to rethink whether you want to do business in the omni-channel world of 2016.
That question remains unanswered. What I can say definitively, however, is that you should never respond to a customer experience issue with a sour, off-putting demeanor.
That is the demeanor I received from the agent who, after more than two hours of holding, finally picked up my phone. She handled the logistics with aplomb – she quickly found me a seat on the next available flight – but completely botched the “human” element of the customer experience. She may not have been overtly rude, but she was definitely not overtly apologetic or endearing. She did not express a deep-seeded desire to make up for the inconvenience I and all the other customers suffered. She was not interested in connecting; she dismissed any remotely “conversational” comment. At one point, she even seemed to expect sympathy for the long, stressful day at work.
Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely would have hated to be in her shoes. But I also wanted to know that she would have hated to be in mine. Her job was to convince me that Southwest is so upset about what happened to me, the customer, that she and her organization would do everything in its power to make it up to me. I didn’t even get the impression she was upset about my plight, let alone vociferously committed to making me smile.
No Experience “Enhancements”: Given the stress I – and so many other customers – endured Wednesday night and Thursday morning, a customer-conscious airline would have provided some amenity upgrades. Perhaps express check-in or boarding privileges. Perhaps food at the terminal or a free drink on the plane. Perhaps a bonus credit toward a future travel.
Southwest instead opted for “none of the above.” In fact, it only made the experience worse: my departure flight ended up delayed.
Whether it failed to understand that the situation would have made me upset or felt no accountability for making me happy, Southwest was wrong.
Downplaying The Future: To the extent that the “unprecedented” technological malfunction now has precedent, one can assume this specific issue is less likely to happen in the future.
But what will happen the next time something unprecedented transpires? What will Southwest do to minimize response times on the phone and in social media? How will Southwest ensure customers can get to their scheduled destinations on time? Will Southwest partner with other carriers to offer seats on replacement flights? Will Southwest provide stronger reimbursement and experiential compensation amid future issues?
Image: Southwest press photo
