Daniela G.
Yelp
In January, my husband and I booked a ticket with you. Due to Covid restrictions all around the world, we had to change our flight for a week prior to what we had originally planned. When we tried to change the flight, the customer service representative at that time (January 11th, 2020, around 10:00 am Eastern time) suggested getting the SAS Travel Voucher, in order to avoid the penalty of $270 USD that it would have been to change the ticket. With the promise we would be receiving our voucher to rebook within 3 to 5 business day, we agreed and patiently waited. After 4 days had passed, and with the pressure of Immigrations requiring proof of flight tickets; in the United States of America, and Denmark, our final destination; we started calling SAS customer service to follow up about the voucher, we talked to two customer services representatives explaining to them how important it was for us to have that ticket, and in both occasions they told us that they had put notes to expedite the process due to the urgency. They said that we should revise the voucher at any time from there.
On Monday, January 18th (6 business days after our first call) we called again since we didn't receive any voucher. This time a customer service representative, told us that the 3 to 5 business days lead time was before Covid-19, and nowadays the waiting time was 5 to 7 business days She apologizes for the "confusion" and said that she also put notes for the voucher department to expedite our voucher, and once again, we didn't receive any voucher. By January 21st (our deadline, since we had an appointment at the New York Court, where we needed to present our tickets), I had to call directly to SAS offices in Sweden, wake up in the night to make those calls, and to be honest the first representative I spoke with, was so disrespectful and unprofessional, our call got disconnected and she didn't even call back, no decency or good customer service. I called again, and another customer service representative picked up the phone, he was trying to help and notified us that the voucher was able to be issued that same day, and we should receive it at any time. After speaking to at least 5 different representatives, we finally end up with a person who tells us that there is a department that can manually process this straight away. We received the voucher at 8 am Eastern time on January 21st, not in 5 to 7 business days as you promise, but 9 business day; and after all these time, calls, long waiting for customer services etc, we had to find out ourselves that we couldn't used the voucher, because SAS system didn't allow to use vouchers the first 48 hours after received it. It is really worrying, that no one mentioned this all the time we were describing the delicate situation. How it is possible that you breach your own rules, and lie to customers or completely disregard their situation?
Furthermore, the ticket we were planning on getting had increased above the $270 of the original price when calling about the voucher, and even though we understand that prices change, we would end up paying much more due to the wait time imposed by you along with all the time wasted on customer service and the stress of not knowing, whether we could not get approved for immigration.
We ended up having to sign up for euro bonus point sharing, which a family member then transferred and depleted from their account to avoid having to pay an additional $1,300 besides the amount you are still holding as a voucher. We have been traveling with multiple airlines all around the world, and with everyone else, a voucher is issued and ready to be used immediately. This voucher is, first of all, a big expense to have stuck with you and there is no saying that we will be able to travel/use it within the expiration time. That is if we would even want to use SAS again, as this situation was so poorly managed and your systems seem to be more outdated than the most basic low-budget airlines.
We filled a complaint the same day, and we had to wait more than four month to get an email back, saying that there is nothing that they can do. They don't have a department you can call, when you try to call them the customer service is TERRIBLE, unprofessional, and disrespectful people. They are super rude, they don't treat people like human beings. They literally don't give a F... about us customers! I can't understand how this company is still in business.