Amex sent me a mailer jointly with Swissotel, last week, puffing their new hotel in Tallinn, Estonia, including an online raffle for a weekend break there, via a web page, which gave a 404 error. Normally I'd then have binned the mailer, but this time I decided to persist.
The mailer had a mailing address for Swissotel Global sales, so I googled it for a phone number, and called. Not too unexpectedly, they had no idea what I was on about, and kept offering me an email address to try instead!
Amex were much better; their operative was very smooth, and said that he was sure that the Swissotel site was down for maintenance; given that the rest of it was working fine, I gave him 0/10 for accuracy, but 9/10 for customer service. That was Friday. The web page is still 404 today. So what I see as the whole point of the mailer, in driving me to a specific place on their website, has totally failed.
Now, even if the mailer was the winning one - matching a number, there's still the obstacle of claiming - the mailer has to be sent to Swissotel Global Sales at the address given (and with no receipt, of course). Given that when I called they has no idea what I was on about, sending the dinning mailer, even if I had it, might not actually generate any results. And then, given the ineptitude shown so far, would one actually want to go at all?
Mick Moignard May 19th, 2008 07:55:32 AM