I was surprised to discover a few months back that Air Tran had started accepting PayPal for airline tickets. Now I know a lot of people have issues with PayPal, but I was impressed by this sign of modernization in an industry which has been somewhat slow to accept change, or even to recognize that it occurs.
When I decided to help out a financially struggling friend (who I later learned was neither struggling nor a friend) by advancing her the money for a flight to a job, I took advantage of Air Tran’s offer and reasonable rates and tried this new payment method. As it turned out, I came to my senses before I was further ripped off by this friend, and was able to cancel the tickets.
In fact, the woman with whom I spoke at Air Tran was very nice, and even — to my surprise — waived part of the cancellation fee. I was told that the confirmation numbers I had received would reflect the credit, and that I could use them at any time for up to a year.
Today I tried to use them, and found out about the daisy-chain of deception on which Air Tran’s policy is built. First I tried to use them on-line, and could find no way to apply a credit when making an on-line purchase. Okay, fair enough; they are hardly the first company to drop the ball on that sort of thing. So I called their toll-free number, and was informed by their overseas call center that I could only use the credits if I joined their A+ Rewards Plan on-line, call the 800-number again, gave them the confirmation numbers, and asked for the credits to be applied. That seemed a little Byzantine, but it’s a free rewards plan, so I thanked the fellow, hung up, and sashayed through their game of “Air Tran Says.”
[NB: When you call the 800-number and enter your rewards code you get a woman with a Southern American accent. It isn't exactly a huge improvement over an Indian accent, but — if intentional — their corporate decision to make the use of an American call center a perk for their Rewards members is fascinating.]
On the return call I made an interesting discovery. Air Tran treats PayPal as cash. If you buy a ticket and pay using PayPal, it’s as though you walked up to the ticket counter with a briefcase of small, unmarked bills and told the agent to “Put dis guy on da flight and don’ ask no questions, see?” They refused to issue me a credit because their system lacks the ability to connect the PayPal transaction ID their reservation ID. That’s right, if you use PayPal Air Tran has no way to tell who paid for a ticket. I was penalized specifically because I used the service they tout on their reservation screen.
[NB2: Air Tran has also started charging an additional $15 for making a reservation through a human operator. In other words, if you need to use a credit voucher and aren't a member of their rewards club they will skim $15 bucks off the top because you can't do it without speaking to an operator.]
This isn’t the end of the world, because the tickets were cheap enough that the credit barely came to over $100. And frankly, I’m not even that annoyed with the rudeness exhibited by that lovely Southern Belle who just slapped me into Muzak hell without a word of warning; really, who in their right mind expects friendly customer service from any call center anywhere? More than anything I am irritated because what could have been an example of a company in a failing industry using technical integration and recognition of changing social patterns to move into a stronger position has turned instead into a just another way the airlines get it all wrong.
For pity’s sake, can’t Amazon or someone start up an airline?
Any Air Tran staff who (a) have some authority, and (b) are willing to discuss matters in writing, please feel free to contact me. If I was misinformed by your telephone staff, and have subsequently passed on this misinformation to my readership, I will be happy to correct any documented errors. You can reach me via Gmail at mkhall, or via Twitter at mkhall. For that matter, if you’d like someone to explain things like e-mail, Twitter, the Internet, and/or customer service to you, my rates are quite reasonable.
