When important clients of the Consulate come to Chicago through O'Hare airport, it is my job to liaise with the airlines to manage the passenger's smooth transition through the check-in process and make sure that they don't encounter any problems with immigration or lost baggage etc.
I was attempting to do exactly this today, and was dealing with Lufthansa for the first time. Given that we do not have an existing relationship with this airline, I called O'Hare Airport (the busiest airport in the world) and was given a phone number to call. So I did, and spoke to a very lovely person who gave me yet ANOTHER number to speak to VIP Services people. Cool. Calling that number, I spoke to a perfectly genial young man with a delightful accent who then put me on hold so he could discuss my requests with his supervisor.
I was starting to get a bit irritated but I needed to resolve the issue, so I politely waited on the line and listenened to some of the most annoying music I'd heard since the Polish festival.
When he finally came back on the line, he outlined the very complicated process I'd need to follow in order to help our Australian visitors. I was almost at my wits end and so I said to him - "am I calling you at O'Hare?". I could hear him smiling. "Oh no Madam," he said "you're speaking with Cape Town in South Africa.".
WHAT THE?!
I know that major companies outsource their call centres to foreign lands, but for heaven's sakes - putting me on hold for 14 minutes on an international call is just evil. So I rang O'Hare back and got through to the first class lounge at the airport and told them that I was not a happy girl. Then I waited on hold at O'Hare for another 18 minutes while they scurried around and made frantic phone calls to supervisors and managers and whoever else was necessary to placate me and ensure I got what I wanted.
In the end though, my persistence paid off, because I now have a phone number and a fax number of the person at O'Hare who can help me. Allegedly. Partly I think they drew straws about who would be the poor bunny to help me, and this hapless fellow left the room for a few minutes at the crucial time. Tough. But what's the bet that he will be on sick leave for the rest of this week?! Just my luck....ARGH
2 comments:
We run an entire Public Service here like that .... and being in the "pepper-grinder" is no guarantee that you will have any more success than the poor "idiot" on the other end of the phone who started the whole thing.
We had an idiot ring us at work wanting to speak with the "Telephone Accounts" person. We asked where he was calling from and he said "Victoria, Melbourne".
Wanker!
Even Marilyn Monroe got it right in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes when she called it "Paris, France" - because that's where she wanted to go.
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