If your flight has ever been delayed or changed at the last minute, you’ll know how stressful it can be. That is why we have a Guarantee team that is tasked with protecting you in case of changes or cancellations caused by the carrier. This team of selected agents was set up in 2017, exactly 5 years ago! Before the Guarantee team’s creation, Guarantee-related tasks were distributed all over Customer Support.
Barbara Tambini, our Operations Manager, said that the choice was made to put a spotlight on the passengers’ experience at the airport. We wanted to provide dedicated assistance during times of distress and in the most vulnerable moments of their trips.
“Guarantee Specialists have to think on their feet, multitask to find and book alternative flights for passengers on the spot. They do it all while navigating our customers through unexpected air travel emergencies such as strikes, natural disasters, and airlines that cease operations,” said Barbara.
Are you interested to learn what it was like to work on the most sensitive interactions with passengers 5 years ago and how it is to work with it now? Read on to hear stories from people who started in the first team ever and where they grew later and stories from those who are in the team today.
Pioneers of Guarantee team
Once a Guarantee team, always a Guarantee team – Karen Abrahamyan
Personally, it was a big shift to move to the Guarantee team (GT) as it was both a new team of people and a change of my work model from part-time to full-time. The decision was done in one second and I did not hesitate even a little bit. When I reminisce now about those days in Guarantee, I realize how much I miss them. I miss the people, and the atmosphere we had, especially at the beginning. I am very lucky that our original team is still at Kiwi.com and we gather once in a while. I worked for around 1.5 years in the GT and moved to the Quality Assurance team as a Quality agent for the GT. Now, when I work as a risk and insurance analyst, my work is still at some level, connected to the Guarantee team. Once a part of Guarantee, always part of Guarantee!
Helping people makes me happy – Barbora Klečková
Joining the original Guarantee team was quite an adventure, as we had to combine skills and knowledge from different departments across the Customer support function, a feat that was not common before. Working different shifts, day and night, handling the most sensitive and complex calls from our customers, was exhausting yet rewarding and enriching. I cannot count how many people I helped to get out of the airport to their destinations, and that fact makes me happy. I’ve also lived through the shaping of Guarantee as a whole, from unclear rules and a “punk” approach to the product as we know it now.
After almost 2 years, I joined Learning and development, training new agents, not leaving the Guarantee team behind for another year. Now, I am working as a Learning Specialist, helping to develop the skill set of our trainers from all departments.
Guarantee team today
One of the most interesting departments ever – Henrieta Radičová
No doubt that Guarantee is one of the most interesting departments on Kiwi.com. We are responsible for handling cases that are happening in real-time at the airport and I would describe my colleagues as little ”heroes” assisting those passengers that got stuck due to canceled, delayed, or otherwise affected flights. As you can imagine, there are pretty challenging moments, and some portion of courage, patience, and willingness to help is more than required. It is one of the reasons why I’m more than proud to be part of a team full of unique and smart people. We are challenged daily by many obstacles, but nothing can be compared to the feeling of satisfaction of knowing that a family with little kiddos is safely on their way back home.
Guarantee team is the most interconnected team – Dalibor Cimprich
I consider the Guarantee team to be the most interconnected team when it comes to communication with passengers as well as our back office. As one of the many hearts of Kiwi.com the team evolved drastically multiple times and as one of the few people who has “seen it all” I can attest to this. I got into the team very naturally as I transitioned from my previous position to this one as was needed at the time.
Before the Guarantee Team had its current shape, we were split into two teams and we did most of the things manually – I can only express my appreciation as to how much our programming and automation have come in these years and made our lives easier.
The dynamic nature of our task makes the people in the teamwork especially hard together as a team and it gives everybody an opportunity to shine every day at the same time. People here are just fantastic – one of the reasons I have stayed here for so long. You never know what will come next in the GT world.
If you want to join our team and make this way of cooperation your daily life, hover over our open positions and don’t hesitate to apply!