Monday 17 February 2014

My Customer Experience Journey with Thomas Cook International Prepaid Card

This blog is inspired by CX (Customer Experience) Design, more specifically using the Customer Journey mapping tool, applied to my experience of trying to acquiring an International Prepaid Card.

We, as a family, had been planning a short vacation to Singapore, so on my way to recent Business Travel, I saw a large display advertisement at the Thomas Cook booth at T3 International terminal, New Delhi Airport. I went to the booth and wanted to buy the prepaid card. I was disappointed by the message delivered by the booth sales person, he said something like: "This is just an advertisement, please visit a city outlet to acquire the card". So, this was the first opportunity, missed by Thomas Cook to sell me the product. I was at the airport, ready with my Passport and boarding pass, they were willing to sell me traveler's check or change my currency, but NOT the product they were prominently displaying.

I What's Apped my wife about the Thomas Cook International prepaid card and requested her to checkout the city Thomas Cook outlet, she googled and found a nearby store at Sector 50, Noida, she was in the market at the time, so she just walked in to the store and asked if she could acquire the product. Surprise!!! She was told that this outlet does not sell it, but she needs to visit another outlet at Sector 18, about 5 kilometers from our home. She just let it go, did not bother. This was another opportunity lost for Thomas Cook to sell.

When I came back from my trip, I caught some fever, probably due to sudden change in weather; However, I requested her to try it online, at thomascook.in  , though skeptical, she gave it a try from her Android Tablet, it failed. Then she went to laptop, the transaction failed, she shared the screen shot with me on G+, and I tweeted it with the screen shot. Thomas Cook replied asking me to call the number on their web site. End of my journey to acquire the Thomas Cook Product.

Not a Happy Ending. but an excellent case study in how NOT to design a CX.