Many of us remember the news about the Atlanta airport fire that severely affected travel. As the largest airport in the U.S. by passenger count, anything that affects Atlanta ripples throughout the whole transportation grid. I was scheduled to travel through Atlanta during that time, and like hundreds of thousands, had to change my travel plans. I had booked a hotel room at a Comfort Inn using reward points; the reservation had to be cancelled, but it was after the cancellation cutoff time for that day. I decided to send an email to see if they would return the points into my Choice account:
From: *************@gmail.com
Sent: Mon Dec 18 2017 16:37:13 GMT-0700 (US Mountain Standard Time)
To: ihelp@choicehotels.com
Subject: Fwd: Reservation Confirmation for Sunday, Dec 17, 2017
I made a reservation for the Comfort Suites at the Atlanta airport for Sunday, Dec. 17th. Due to the Atlanta airport fire, I was unable to fly to Atlanta and could not use that reservation. I would like to request that my points be put back into my account for use at a future property for a future date. My reservation info is below.
Eight days later, I received this response:
Greetings!
Thank you for your email. I’ve checked your reservation and found that it was already a past stay. Due to the high volume of emails we received, I was not able to attend your concern on time. I apologize for the late response and for the inconvenience it has caused you.
Thank you for your inquiry. We hope to see you at a Choice hotel next time your plans allow!
Dominador
Email Resolution Desk
Now, aside from the cheerful “Greetings!” that opened this email, there was literally nothing satisfying about it. If Dominador had simply said, “I’m sorry, we are unable to refund your points,” or, “As much as I would like to, a fire at the Atlanta airport is beyond the control of Comfort Suites and we cannot refund your points,” I probably would have thought, Well, it was worth a shot; you get nothing unless you ask. But his response,, “We had so many emails, I couldn’t get to this in time for me to do a credit for you,” that really burns me. Why is your ineptitude my problem?
Besides the fact that Dominador is a an imposing-sounding name, and likely well suited to deliver bad news, this email left me no comfort. When sending a “we are so sorry” email, it is important to not create new doubt about the abilities or efficacy of your entity when making that appeal. I am not sure if this is Choice Hotels corporate policy or just a rogue employee, but either way, I am less likely to make future reservations at one of their properties since their idea of great customer service does not align with mine. And they show up in my blog as an example of what not to do.
Take a hard look at your communication with customers in events such as this one and deliver bad news straight up, with no apologies for any issues you have on your end. Then take care to fix the problems on your end to avoid having to make excuses in the first place. It’s really not that hard to do the right thing.