Challenge
The Crystal Cruises office is based in Los Angeles in the United States, and they have customers all around the world. However, Crystal Cruises has been using the same phone number for their reservation office globally.
This became an issue when customers from other parts of the world contacted the company after business hours. For example, their UAE consumers would try to call an American phone number during the Gulf business hours. At that time of the day, nobody was available in the Los Angeles office to handle the calls and assist callers. In some cases, the time difference was as stark as 7-10 hours.
Crystal Cruises is a 6-star cruise line and their customers expect the highest level of service. However, the time difference created a delay in how Crystal Cruises was able to serve its clients and travel agents. Voicemails were missed. Emails were sent out from the reservation staff 48 hours later . As a result, Crystal Cruises was losing out on valuable sales.
Solutions
To resolve this issue, Century Travel set up a local website called CrystalCruises.ae for clients in the Middle East. Global Call Forwarding provides virtual phone numbers advertised on that website. Incoming calls to those numbers get automatically forwarded to a sales and support center in Cyprus.
Results
Using reliable local phone numbers that route to a regional contact center, Crystal Cruises has continued to offer dedicated and localized customer support in Gulf Standard Time. Not only has this helped eliminate delays, but it has also boosted clients’ confidence in the company as they can interact with a local business that is easily reachable.
Crystal Cruises is set to reopen in 2021 and will do so while providing the highest levels of safety and client service.