Budget Airlines, are we really saving anything?

I used to really enjoy flying when I was younger.  My father used to travel in his job and as my parents wanted me to have an undisrupted education, I attended boarding school.  Although I hated being away from my parents, I used to really enjoy the adventure of travelling to Hong Kong or Cyprus, which I did many times.

When I first started flying to Hong Kong I was 10 years old, and I used to fly by myself.  I was dropped at the airport by my guardians, and they would hand me over to someone from British Caledonian and they put me into the Lion club, which was for young flyers.  I used to feel so special, getting a pack to keep me entertained through the flight.  Even as I got older the flights were enjoyable, it was still an adventure.

I realised today that all the enjoyment and adventure has gone, thanks mainly to budget airlines.  I had the displeasure today of dealing with Jet2 for the first time, and hopefully the last.  Not only has the enjoyment and excitement of booking your flight gone, its been replaced with frustration and anger.

I used the Skyscanner website to find a flight to Cyprus from Leeds / Bradford next year.  Skyscanner found me a flight with Jet2 for £425.96.  I thought that was a great price and so decided to book it.

I was forwarded to the Jet2 site, and asked to fill in some details.  Now this is where I quickly figured out that the £425.96 was just bait to draw you into the site.  Once in the costs would be added on.

Now the first thing you get hit with is baggage.  It states that hand luggage is free, however if you want to take anything to go in the hold its going to cost you: £41.98 per 22kg bag.  Lets be honest, who is going to go on a 2 week holiday without taking at least one suitcase.  So there is definitely going to be that charge added on.

Next thing you're hit with is: Online Check-in or Airport Check-in.  Now the Online Check-in is £10 extra (Not exactly sure why it costs anything, but there we go).  However, if you want to Check-in at the airport it will cost you: £36 (Now that is just scandalous).

Once you click to move to the next page, you get a pop-up that asks you if you want to take anymore baggage as Jet2 are doing a special deal at the moment:  50% off baggage costs.  Wow!  Sign me up!

Its great to see a company giving something back, they're so generous.  Enough of the sarcasm.

So I got to the next page, and I find a diagram of a plane and it asks me where I would like to sit.  When I click on a seat it says its either £6.99 or £24.99.  So basically I have pay for a seat.  Not only that but I have to pay for it on the return flight also.  Surely a seat would be a prerequisite of a flight.  I mean I cant really fly without a seat, its not like its a bus.  Pathetic!

Then we move onto the next page, the meal.  Now I'm aware of meals on most flights cost extra these days, so its quite easy to skip this one.  There's no way I'm going to pay £40 for 2 of us to have 2 meals outbound and 2 inbound.  Also we're not going to buy Jet2's insurance at £19.54 per person, or their entertainment pack for £40 for 2 people for both flights.

So we're finally at the check-out, not bad so far.  However once you select you want to pay with a Visa/Debit card, you then get hit with an £18.21 booking fee.  Ouch!  That however isnt the worst.  You want to pay with PayPal that's: £10.21 on top of the booking fee.  However on a Credit Card, you're looking at £18.87 on top of the booking fee.

Anyway, lets add all this up.  Lets say I was going to pay with a Debit Card.  Now the amount I was quoted on Skyscanner was: £425.96.  The actual amount I was expected to pay was: £524.11

In the end I booked with Thomson and got it for £381 flying from Manchester.

Now the point of this blog was vent my anger at the so called budget airline industry.  It seems like all the budget with none of the cost saving.  Also to warn other people of the perils of using budget airlines.

Get rid of budget airlines they offer nothing.  You're stressed when you've finally booked your flight due to the fact that its nearly £100 more than what you thought you would be paying.  Or you end doing what I ended up doing, going through the whole process getting to the end and then going to look elsewhere having wasted about 45mins of your life.

So are we getting anything out of budget airlines?  My personal opinion is no.  Bring back all inclusive flights.  I'd much rather just buy a ticket and know that its all included and I'm not going to get hit with a charge, like somewhere to bloody sit.

So for me the pleasure and adventure has gone from air travel.  Please bring back all inclusive flights, I'm fed up of the poor service and hidden charges.

Please be aware when looking for flights, that the initial cost your quoted wont be the one you have to pay. Oh and just for the record, I think its quite funny how Jet2 have taken there Twitter account down.  There was probably too many complaints about the hidden charges.  That cant be good for their PR if everyone is complaining.

If you're looking for PPC jobs, SEO Jobs, SEM Jobs, Search Jobs, Social Media Jobs, Display Jobs, Digital Planning & Buying Jobs, Mobile Jobs, Web Development Jobs or Senior Digital Jobs, just give me a shout.  Or if you have any questions drop me a line on: dale@digital-minds.co.uk

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eCommerce: Are we valued as a customer? Part 2

Yesterday I wrote about the shocking service I'd received from an Online retailer, and it got me thinking about another incident that happened to me when I used Quidco to get cash back on a mobile phone.

The offer I saw was £80 cash back when I ordered an HTC Incredible S through Carphone Warehouse on a contract with Vodafone.  I thought this was a great deal as I was looking to get a new contract anyway and so thought I might as well earn some money back for doing it.

I signed up for the deal on the Carphone Warehouse site having been directed there through the Quidco site.  I filled out all the details, and asked for the phone to be sent to my nearest store.  Unknown to me this store was still being built.  This is where all my problems seemed to start.

I got an email from Carphone Warehouse saying that my order was being processed and I would get sent an email once it had been confirmed.  No email ever arrived, so I thought I would go into the store to check if the phone would be arriving.  The store advised that the order was on its way, and even though the store that it was supposed to go to wasn't ready, it should be directed to them.  It hadn't arrived yet though, so asked me to come back.

Eventually it arrived, and I went into the store to pick it up.  I went in on my lunch break and was in there for over an hour as there was a problem with my order.  There was a computer error that didn't allow them to close down my order.  They spent most of the time I was in the store on the phone to head office trying to sort this problem out.  It was left that they would try and sort it out and I should go back after work.

I went back into the store and they said that the only way they could do anything was to cancel my order and then put it through again.  I was obviously concerned about this affecting my deal with Quidco and was advised that it should be ok.

They put the order through and I started using the phone, however as I was checking on Quidco to see how my cash back was tracking, I noticed it was only tracking at £20.  I checked on Quidco to see if this was normal and it said that Carphone Warehouse deals did track at lower rates.  I decided to contact Carphone Warehouse direct by email and they advised that they would give me a complimentary £20 due to the problems I had received.  I wrote back asking if this was £20 instead of the £80 cash back as if this was the case then I didn't agree.

I heard nothing back from Carphone Warehouse.  About 4 months after I saw on Quidco that my cash back had been rejected.  On enquiring with Quidco they advised me that Carphone Warehouse had rejected it.

This is where the situation becomes laughable.  I spoke to Customer Services at Carphone Warehouse and they advised me that Quidco had decided not to pay me as I hadn't passed their T&C's with regards to the deal and I should check it.  I contacted Quidco and they asked me to send the order confirmation, as it had been Carphone Warehouse that had rejected it.

This is just a case of each one blaming the other, however I'm really not happy with Carphone Warehouse.  I feel like I have been conned by them into getting a phone through them.  They have tried to palm me off with £20 when I should have received £80.  They have seriously got off lightly from serious mistakes they have made, and that's not acceptable.  Why should I suffer for receiving poor service?

I hope to continue using Quidco, however this has left a bad taste in my mouth as am I going to go through this with other retailers?

I'm not expecting any response from Carphone Warehouse as they have palmed me off and ignored me all through the process.

If you're looking for PPC jobs, SEO Jobs, SEM Jobs, Search Jobs, Social Media Jobs, Display Jobs, Digital Planning & Buying Jobs, Mobile Jobs, Web Development Jobs or Senior Digital Jobs, just give me a shout.  Or if you have any questions drop me a line on: dale@digital-minds.co.uk

eCommerce: Are we valued as a customer?

I have recently been buying lots of things on-line, which I have been doing for quite a number of years.  I'm a typical bloke and I hate shopping.  I really detest the whole experience.  I don't like people when I'm shopping, they get in my way, they infuriate me as they don't seem to know what they want and where they want to be.  I don't like trying things on, as that's time out of my life I'm never going to see again.  Due to the fact that I hate the experience so much means I'm not an enjoyable person to be around when shopping.  My girlfriend will vouch for that.  Anyway, I established many years ago that I would much prefer to purchase as many things as possible on-line, so its something I do regularly.

The reason for this post, is that I recruit for a lot of retailers and I like to understand how they work as a business, so explore their websites and see the comments people have made about them. This helps me understand my clients and enables me to offer advice to my candidates.  I recently had two completely different experiences from two different sites and I wanted to discuss it, to see if anyone else has noticed this worrying trend.  The two sites I used were Game.co.uk and Amazon.co.uk.  One, the service was second to none, the other was absolutely disgusting, followed up with shocking customer service.

Firstly, lets talk about the positive.  Amazon.co.uk.  Admittedly I ordered from Amazon, however the products were dispatched by independent suppliers, but still the service was immense and I was felt to feel appreciated as a customer.  Now the suppliers in question were Areema Limited and PJP Electronics.  Both products I ordered were delivered well within the time stipulated and actually arrived on the first of the five day window they stated.  Both companies deserved the 5 star rating that I gave them.

Now here is the reason that you'll find the service so good on Amazon.  There is so much competition on Amazon from competing suppliers that there is a fear amongst them.  If they do a bad job then they wont get any more business.  Customer feedback is the key to getting better service.  Its the best form of marketing for these companies, and its free.  All they have to do is do a good job.  This is how business used to be, and its how business should be.  What happened to the customer is always right?

If we look at Game.co.uk on the other hand, this definitely doesn't apply.  They clearly feel that they don't really have much competition, and therefore if they don't do what they say, it doesn't matter as the customers don't have anywhere else to go.  This was made clear by the service that I received.

I pre-ordered a product well in advance of the release date, it was a massive release and was going to be in high demand.  Game contacted me to advise that due to the amount of pre-orders they were going to take money from my account early, not a problem I thought.  All I'll say is that the product eventually arrived 5 days after the release date, although I'd had to go out and buy it on the day of its release when it hadn't arrived.  This is bad service in itself, but when you mix this with the fact that they were updating their website, and their phone system, so there was no way of contacting them, it makes it atrocious.

I eventually managed to find an email address on-line and contacted someone.  A few days later I got an email from their customer service department with attached terms & conditions with regards to when a product doesn't arrive.  Not the response I was expecting, no apology.  I wrote back to advise that I have spent a lot of money with them in the past, and threatened to take my business elsewhere.  I eventually got a response over a week later, from this I gathered they didn't actually care as they had enough customers even if they lost my custom.

When you look at these two examples it just goes to show that competition clearly leads to a better service.  Game.co.uk clearly feels it can treat its customers any way it likes, as there isn't enough competition for them to go elsewhere.  If this is the case, then someone needs to step up to the mark and show them how its done. I'm sure I'm not the only one that's been made to feel like this by Game.co.uk

I'm not saying the Amazon way will work for everyone, but if it means that retailers are scared into offering a good service then I'm all for it.  Too long we have suffered from poor service.  We're the customers and we're always right.  Remember that!

If you're looking for PPC jobs, SEO Jobs, SEM Jobs, Search Jobs, Social Media Jobs, Display Jobs, Digital Planning & Buying Jobs, Mobile Jobs, Web Development Jobs or Senior Digital Jobs, just give me a shout.  Or if you have any questions drop me a line on: dale@digital-minds.co.uk