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NEW SURVEY SHOWS WHICH AIRLINES ARE BEST AT LISTENING TO SOCIAL MEDIA COMPLAINTS.
As everyone learned when a passenger was forcibly removed from a United Express flight, social media and the ubiquity of cellphone cameras have shifted the rules for airline customer service. The best and worst corporate interactions speed across the internet, with potentially dire results for corporate targets of public anger.
For air carriers in particular, “the world changed” last April after the Chicago dragging incident, Oscar Munoz, chief executive of United Continental Holdings Inc., said in a June talk at the Wings Club in Manhattan. This new reality is largely the reason so many airlines now staff social media departments around the clock, offering quick service while monitoring internet chatter for potential trouble.
A survey released Tuesday by customer service firm Conversocial Inc. attempts to quantify how large airlines are interacting with the public on Twitter and Facebook. The firm sought to measure how often and how rapidly 20 big carriers respond to internet posts directed at them — many of which originate from unhappy customers who want the airline to remedy a problem.
Among North American carriers, JetBlue Airways Corp. and Virgin America, part of Alaska Air Group Inc., were quickest to re- spond to Twitter posts — in less than five minutes — while United was the laggard at more than 90 minutes, according to Conversocial.
Of all the Twitter posts directed at North American airlines, American Airlines Group Inc. responded to the largest share, at 32.5 per cent. WestJet Airlines Ltd. was the seventh-most responsive, at 17.5 per cent, while Air Canada was last, at 10.3 per cent.
The vast majority of airline responses relate to customer service issues, although some react to more general complaints and compliments, Conversocial CEO Joshua March said. The data were compiled from Twitter posts made between Oct. 5 and Oct. 8 aimed at airlines based in North America, Europe and the Middle East.
“We recognize that oftentimes social media is the most convenient way for customers to interact with us and we are continuing to work hard on a daily basis to improve our response time,” United spokeswoman Maggie Schmerin said in an email. The airline wouldn’t reveal how many people work on its social media team but she said United plans to increase that staff by “more than 150 per cent” in the first quarter.
Deutsche Lufthansa AG, the quickest European airline to respond, was also tagged least responsive in that group, meaning the German company reacted to the fewest number of Twitter posts but was speedy when it decided to do so.
Despite the public’s fascination with customer- service meltdowns, Twitter and Facebook may soon become old hat — the growth in customers messaging directly, and privately, with airlines is exploding, March said.
“People will still occasionally throw stuff up when things are really wrong or when they’re really upset,” he said. “But I think the vast majority of day-to-day customer service issues will be happening privately. In the end, customers don’t really want to air their dirty laundry in public either — they just did it to get help.”