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A bit of context to the question: I took a flight this Saturday with Iberia and my checked-in baggage was lost. I had all my clothes there so I had to buy some and according to the Passenger Rights I'm allowed to ask for a refund. They gave me my bag today.

I would normally ask for the refund in person and file a complain in the same airport but the company told me that I can just do it via phone or their web page.

I had to do it via the web page because I couldn't call today but I was wondering if any of this ways is more effective than the other in terms of getting a quick response from the airline and achieving the refund without much trouble.

I ask this because lately I've had to fill a few complaints against Iberia and some times they were solved very quickly and some others were much more difficult to resolve.

How can I maximize my chances of getting a quick reply and succeeding with my complaint?

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    You can try following the airline's twitter or if they have a separate twitter account for help / support then that and then tweet to them and then give the case # in DM . That helps sometimes. Not always. There's no silver bullet. – chx Dec 21 '15 at 21:21
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    Re: the title question, standing in the street shouting at the airline's planes as they fly overhead is usually less effective than other methods. – David Richerby Dec 22 '15 at 1:50
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Twitter. Seriously, twitter.

I've not done it a lot, but have had to complain to a few airlines in my time travelling.

  • Phone: they didn't care, usually, just wanted to end the call.
  • Email: sometimes no response, sometimes automated. Sometimes helpful.
  • Facebook: I've not done this, but friends have had better responses here as it's also pretty public, and others usually chime in with your complaint.
  • Twitter: within hours/minutes, a response to take your query offline/private, and to help deal with it. They do NOT like complaints being aired on twitter, so they try to help ASAP with that outlet.

(Disclaimer: currently a contractor at an airline)

edit:

  • twitter - apart from Jetstar Australia, when I tweeted that they were no help and I'd had to buy a ticket with Virgin instead, replied "have a good flight".
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  • I would be surprised if someone didn't get seriously reprimanded or even fired at Jetstar for that tweet! – Burhan Khalid Dec 22 '15 at 5:53
  • @BurhanKhalid I wouldn't :/ (disillusioned) – Mark Mayo♦ Dec 22 '15 at 6:01
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    What if you don't want them to suddenly figure out who you are on social networks? What's the best method then? – user541686 Dec 22 '15 at 7:50
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    @Mehrdad Get a second account dedicated to communicating with airlines :-) – Mast Dec 22 '15 at 11:22
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    @Mehrdad Since Twitter was the definitive winner in this question I don't see how that's a problem. As for Facebook, let's just say creating a believable enough alias isn't as hard as it sounds. But that would be off-topic here. – Mast Dec 22 '15 at 20:20
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Social media is the way! file a proper complain via the airline's webpage or email, then follow up in Twitter or Facebook.

Airlines hate it when people pick on them publicly. They will love to look like they are doing a good job and then reply you online to undo whatever image damage you have done.

This is my advice as a person working for an airline.

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You can also try Airline Complaints, an online forum aimed at rendering complaints against airlines public. They state that they automatically contact the airline as soon as the complaint is lodged:

3) What happens when I post a complaint?

It immediately becomes public and we notify the airline directly that your complaint has been filed with us.

Although forum boards are kind of old school, publicly airing your complaint on a dedicated platform might work.

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