Southwest VS Delta - Best Experience VS Worst Experience

Posted by Beaches360 Administrator on Friday, May 2nd, 2014 at 9:10pm

We've all made mistakes.  Some we want to admit to and others we don't.  I made several tonight.  Basically I learned not to work on major projects when I am mentally and physically spent.  The other thing I learned was that Southwest Airlines comes by their good reputation honestly and Delta works daily to maintain their reputation for utter frustration and poor customer service.  

Not to put you through torture to get to the point, I'll share the "short version".  I was trying to book a trip to the Real Estate Webmasters conference in Nanaimo BC for my husband, son and I.  We had planned to visit Seattle to see friends and family on our way there and back.  I was very proud of myself as I had managed to arrange a flight, hotel, car rental and ferry to get us to our destinations at the least possible cost.  In trying to book a Southwest Flight for my son, I ended up booking three times instead of one because the Southwest web site did not update quickly.  When I called Southwest to explain my delemma, I got an agent within 5 minutes who cancelled the extra bookings and refunded our credit card.  Next, I had planned to book a flight for my husband and myself on Delta because we had frequent flyer miles. Again, I made a mistake thinking my husband had more miles than he did on his account.  It ended up costing me $540 more than I intended to spend.  I contacted Delta to see if they would refund the mistake and then I would find an alternate plan to get my husband and I both to Seattle around the same time our son would arrive at the best possible cost.  I waited 30 minutes to spend 15 minutes finding out that the young lady could not help me.  She promised I would be given directly to another rep to handle the problem.  You guessed it, I was put on hold again, this time for 40 minutes to spend 20 minutes on the phone with a young woman who told me that Delta Skymiles are good forever and she was so sorry she couldn't help me without spending another $180 to undo a mileage transfer from my account to my husband's and the other costs were absolutley non refundable.  

Thank you Delta and thank you Southwest.  You gave me the perfect example of "the best customer service experience" and 'the worst customer service experience" all in one 2 hour time period.  Thanks Southwest, you've become my new additon to my Customer Service Hall of Fame.  

1 Response to Southwest VS Delta - Best Experience VS Worst Experience

Mike Smith wrote:

So true. I fly every month and with southwest whenever I can. The customer service is instilled in their people. I often use their examples in running my own company.

Posted on Saturday, May 3rd, 2014 at 6:07am

Leave A Comment

Format example: yourwebsitename.com