Two months after a failed upgrade, things are getting better albeit not great. What are your thoughts on the new Hawaiian Airlines reservation system? Read our experience and add yours.
Two months after a failed upgrade, things are getting better albeit not great. What are your thoughts on the new Hawaiian Airlines reservation system? Read our experience and add yours.
I have tried multiple times to make reservations round-trip Honolulu-Lihue for my husband and me. We both have Hawaiian FF#’s, although we’ve not flown Hawaiian since 2019. Same errors each time. I’m unable to book without giving a Redress Number (which we don’t have), and which is listed as “Optional” on the website. I can get no answers from humans when I call.
Mildred, I’m sorry you’re going through that frustration like I did a few weeks ago. It doesn’t make sense, “Optional” but you can’t go on without that number. Finally, one day when I tried again for the 100th time it went through w/o the number! I don’t know why.
I dared not call reservations because all the res agents are in the Phillippines eager to help but doesn’t happen. it’s difficult to converse with them-at least for me. Yesterday all I wanted to do was change my date of departure. After doing that I found out when double checking my reservation that I didn’t have a seat in fc anymore. She had taken me out of fc and put me no place. 5 hrs & talking to 6 agents later, it got cxld & rebooked correctly. Beyond frustrating.
The new system has been frustrating! I had to cancel a flight due to it being delayed 4 times!!! I was told they would refund me $161.80 back to my credit card. Never happened then I was told I had to “request it be refunded!!!” Insane Never can get an agent that speaks clear English. After an hr I said I’m done and disputed the charge w/my cc bank. Still waiting for it to resolved. Absolutely terrible customer svc.
Now, I’m just finding out after almost 2 hrs that my change of date on another trip was changed and I was put in the main cabin after booking a week ago in FC. 1 hr 30 min and still not resolved!!
Companion Fare offers are no longer found on the website and will not be going forward. Hawaiian said those would be sent “as a discount code via email instead of through the HawaiianMiles member dashboard.” We have never received these.
I did receive one of these emails but the system wouldn’t let me use my companion fare discount
even with the discount code from the email. Called 1-800 support no help. No one even answered the chat line. Filled out their complaint form and filed it online. I did get an answer in several days but no help.
I am really starting to wonder what the upper management is thinking.
I assume they are not totally incompetent, but this is beyond puzzling!
Hi Lee.
True that. We gave up on our two companion fares when the emails were not forthcoming.
Aloha.
Unfortunately Hawaiian airlines is doing just about everything to ruin the company, by not having a computer system still not working after months, refund policies are not as good as any airlines that flies here, i.e. Alaska ,Southwest United, and more. Customer service is handled from the Philippines , the phone service between here and there is not very good, I have been on the phone and chat service for over 2 hours sometimes and nothing gets resolved. Last time they or the computer system accidentally cancelled my reservation, i didn’t even know about it until i got a call from a supervisor and then spent another 30 minutes redoing it.
Our family trip from Phoenix. Even though we had reserved seats on all flights, when we checked in to the Kauai flight online, we found that our seat assignments had been dropped and we were seated away from our children. I called reservations and was told the new system dropped the assignments and nothing could be done. It was not a good flight to Kauai! At that time, I also checked the flights home from Kauai to Phoenix. Those seats had also been dropped meaning we would be flying for over seven and a half hours separated from our children and without the premium seats we had already paid for. That was unacceptable
Normally used to Alaska air refunding or crediting price reductions to fares, not so with Hawaiian. The air fare for our upcoming flight was reduced by $200 and so I reached to ask for an adjustment. Was told no can do and furthermore that if I canceled the flight and rebooked using the credit, it would all have to be used and any balance would be lost. Not sure if this airline is subliminally telling me to fly other airlines.
The call center needs to come back onshore. Sometimes you can’t understand the person on the other end.
We booked 3 seats for August travel with a 10 year old and they wouldn’t accommodate seat assignments in advance because we got economy basic, new even lower class seats we weren’t aware of. Even been to Hawaii many times and never faces this. Called the agent and couldn’t even pay for an upgrade. Only option is to show up very early 2 hours before to talk to agent at desk and even then seats together aren’t guaranteed. We could grab seats at check in but that’s usually a cluster and no guarantees there either. We likely won’t fly Hawaiian again because of this. Ridiculously rigid for a relaxing vacation flight and opportunistic like other airlines. Hawaiian had been differentiated and accommodating… Not any longer.
I believe advance seats selection are only available for “Main Cabin” Basic and higher. I had no problem with seat selections when purchased “Main Cabin” basic. Of course, it costs more Y_Y.
Pualani Elite status and no priority boarding available, no priority baggage handling, no access to Gold/precheck TSA line in HNL, no credit for segments flown, and no hawaiian miles earned on trip 5/15-5/20. Flight was delayed both directions. Pilot made up for it on return flight home but had to wait on the tarmac cause the gate was occupied. Sat there for an hour then those connecting had to run off the plane. Then baggage took over an hour to come out. Flight landed in HNL at 1230 got my bags at 240. These problems are not with the reservation system, but are with other aspects of HAwaiian. Sent an email to them when we got back home and still no response nearly a month later. It’s almost as if they no longer care.
I joined the premier club and cannot access it and Hawaiian refuses to do anything about it. Every time I call in I have to start at the beginning and the representative says its been fixed but it is not. In frustration I asked for a extension and was told No. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I have been Pualani Platinum for the last 3 years and my experiences with HA are horrible. The actual flights are awesome, but the reservation system and Pualani Elite call center are bad.
A week does not go by where I do not call service center for something. The people at the call center have real issues with English and I know more about their Contract of Carriage.
If I ask the same question for 3 agents I get 3 different answers. It’s like they do not understand English because the replies I get are not really relevant to the question asked.
Don’t get me started about the problems they are having with the roll out of their new website and app.
I spend a lot of money with HA. They need to do better.
Thank you gentleman.
Hi Kelly.
Thanks for your thoughts on this. And everything else the past three years.
Aloha.
Absolutely correct! Poorly run airline, nothing works like it should anymore . It is turning into a joke unfortunately!
Aloha,
And with this upgraded system, they absolutely 100% need the availability to cancel online or the app. The ridiculous amount of time spent and wasted on chat/text/calling is 2000. If they want to continue to compete with Southwest, which has an extremely polished and easy to use web/app experience, I’ll happily book there instead. Ease of use in 2023 is real.
Mahalo,
Hi John.
Your point is well taken. We do believe that’s where they are headed, the first step of which was getting over to Amadeus. But time will tell.
Aloha.
Similar experience, flights on southwest were also almost half off of those that Hawaiian had.
Bought upgraded seats online prior to change. Received confirmation and online noticed pop up saying my partner had a seat credit. Called and was told no seat credit. After change tried to change seats to window seats and couldn’t do it online. Called to change to window seats and agent spent over 30 minutes cancelling current seats, reserving window seats, taking credi card for the difference. Received no confirmation. Noticed online that I had no seats and someone else had my window seats. Called again and I was told ‘tough’ and I was offered window seats in the back of the plane. So I think this shows their new system didn’t work for the agent that cancelled my first upgrade and then failed to reserve or purchase the window seats I wante
I had previously posted regarding my frustration trying to use a $100 companion fare coupon during this meltdown. The reply from HA did nothing to resolve the problem nor my suggestion to extend the expiration date of the unused coupon for another year. I have now cancelled the HA credit card and replaced it with a card which is airline neutral so our rewards can be used for whichever airline is providing the best service.
I have recently booked an interisland trip and a mainland trip….
Have they done away with the fare calendar? Have not been able to find it and have not been able to compare pricing, even the option of arrowing forward or backward a couple days to check pricing does not exist.
Also, I can’t seem to share my itinerary like I used to, or for that matter I’m not able to print out the entire itinerary.
Rose, the fare calendar appears to be gone, which is a significant disappointment. I noticed this a few weeks ago. I almost always use the fare calendar to settle on my dates of travel, but now it has become tedious. They do allow you to switch dates forward and backward (at least on the desktop site), but you have to try all combinations of departing and returning flights to find the best fare.
I recommend checking for different dates on Google flights and then going to the Hawaiian site to book. You can filter the search results to only show Hawaiian airlines. Much faster.