NEWS YOU NEED TO KNOW 4
‘Help combat call wait times’ plead P&O and Cunard
Hollie-Rae Merrick
hollie@travelweekly.co.uk
P&O Cruises and Cunard have admitted trade call wait times of up to three-and-a-half hours are “unacceptable”, but have urged agents to help combat the logjams.
Responding to a barrage of criticism on social media forum Travel Gossip, where agents hit out at “frustrating” lengthy delays, the lines argued that many questions could be answered online. And it revealed it was
introducing training modules to help agents navigate its website to find resolutions to more straightforward queries. One agent, who asked not to be
named, said: “The situation is a mess and it has been for a couple of weeks now. Some members of staff have been waiting two hours to get through, but it seems direct customers get through straight away. It’s frustrating.” Pat Sutton of Independent
Travel Experts added: “I called several times over five days to get a name on a booking changed. I’m dreading getting my phone bill.
Cruise lines admit some agent callers were kept waiting for three hours
5 STORIES HOT
“I know some agents are asking unnecessary things online, but cruise can be daunting to those who haven’t sold it before.” Natasha Richardson, director of sales operations for the brands, said supporting agents was her team’s top priority. She said the top three reasons
for agents’ calls were to check cruise availability and flight times and to upgrade cabins, all of which could be resolved online. She added: “We have identified
that 68% of our agent calls are to obtain information, of which 47% can be self-served online. Our focus is to help agents to use
CCS.com so they can find the answers online. “We have reviewed our Ask CCS
Q&A tool on
CCS.com to make sure that every conceivable query can be answered online and that all the guides are easily accessible.” John Cooper of Vision Cruise
said his business wasn’t affected because his staff used
CCS.com for the majority of issues.
5 Sales to US rise despite dollar rate
Amie Keeley
amie.keeley@
travelweekly.co.uk
Bookings to the US are confounding expectations of a slowdown due to a post- referendum slump in the value of the pound against the dollar, according to operators.
US and Caribbean specialist
Funway Holidays said bookings to the US were up by 60% in the week of the referendum compared with the same week last year, and up by 89% last week.
The value of the pound dropped
to its lowest level in three decades against the US dollar on Tuesday to $1.31. Funway managing director Stephen Rhodes said: “We’ve not seen any let-up. We even had a number of big bookings in the last week for £15,000 and £20,000.” Asked why the vote for Brexit
had seemingly had little impact, Rhodes said: “Us Brits like our holidays. People may have delayed before the referendum, but we’ve now seen that life goes on – we’re still driving our cars, going to work and need to book our holidays.
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travelweekly.co.uk 7 July 2016 “We’ve had massive growth over
the last nine months and that’s carrying on. You would assume it would be the opposite.” Rhodes said fixed priced elements on some Florida bookings, such as the Disney Dining Plan, meant customers are not being put off on price grounds. John Donnelly, managing
director of Co-operative Florida Holidays, said more customers had been asking questions about whether prices were going up since the EU vote and if they should wait to book their holidays. However,
he said there had been no drop-off in bookings. “There will always
be Mickey Mouse and people will continue to have children, so they will find the money to go,” he said. Harry Hastings, joint chief
executive of Florida and California specialist Ocean Holidays, said the company had seen some “short- term volatility”, but was confident bookings to the US would return in the peaks as normal. “Florida is a
very resilient market,” he said. › Comment, page 30
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