Nobody can figure out how to book a flight with the flight search changes you all made

[jerielderbsci]

Hi Concur Travel Folks-

You all seem to have changed the flight search so many people at my company are having trouble using the tool at all and have to call our Travel vendor to book instead.  What used to take 2 minutes to book on Concur now can't be figured out.  They can't figure out how to select the time frame, they can't figure out what to click on to book the first leg of a flight, then can't get Concur to go to the return leg of the flight to book it.  Why did you change something that worked beautifully before into a 30+ minute process?  Even looking at an itinerary is harder.  You're upsetting your customers for changes that aren't better, but are worse.  Why in the world would you do this?

[KevinD]

@jerielderbsci sorry to hear about the frustration your users are having. I'm not on the Product team, so I cannot speak to the changes that were made and why. I do know we aim to make for a better experience when we update our tools. 

The time frame is easily accessible by clicking the little calendar icon for where you enter your travel dates. See below. The sliders allow for increasing and decreasing the search window. 

When you see the options, Concur Travel returns available flights with the different classes of service available. See the Delta example. The user clicks on the option that is best for them which will display a few more details and the Select Fare button for them to choose this option. Once they click Select Fare, the Return flight options will appear. They follow the same steps from here. There isn't anything users should need to do to go to the Return leg other than click Select Fare for their outbound flight. 

Once they have selected both, they will see a screen showing them their choices, their Traveler information, estimated cost and the option to Book and Continue. 

[JohnDixon300]

I agree, the new system is absolutely awful, common opinion amongst my team.

Not being able to see return flight times until you select the first leg is ridiculous.

[KevinD]

@JohnDixon300 we do have a program where you can submit enhancement requests for our products. 

I did a little testing and showing outbound flight options separate from return flight options seems to be the industry standard. I looked at two different airline websites and then Expedia to see what the user experience is, and all of them were designed the same way where you won't see return flight options until you choose the outbound. 

Some would say that Concur Travel used to show outbound and return together, which is true. However, this experience ends up not being as efficient because the choices you are presented with might have a good outbound time bundled with a not so favorable return. The user would need to look through all the choices and even then might not see a bundled outbound and return that meets their travel needs. Showing outbound flights first gives the traveler more flexibility in making flight selections to ensure they get the flights they want.

[JohnDixon300]

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for the response.

I can only speak from personal experience and that of my colleagues I've spoken to, nobody seems to think the new system is an improvement.  You're usually restricting the flight times to what is acceptable anyway so seeing them as a round trip worked well.   The other issue I had in the end was that one flight within the time range I'd picked simply didn't appear.  In the end I gave up and called our travel agent who booked it all quickly for me.   

[KevinD]

@JohnDixon300 totally understandable. This same topic was mentioned in another thread. I shared it with our Travel product team. You might not believe it, but the search window option was the number one voted on feature in our Customer Influence program and at Fusion this year, that is why it was implemented. However, the feedback received wasn't what was expected due to this being a feature customers seemed to want. 

I do know that the product team is looking into this and will be addressing the feedback received. Here is a link to the other thread and a response from someone on our Travel team: https://community.concur.com/t5/Concur-Travel-Forum/Flight-Search-Showing-Limited-Departure-Times-by.... 

[jerielderbsci]

@KevinD Keep telling your customers they're wrong.  See how well that works for you.  We're all telling you the new design is terrible and you should go back to what you had before.  Why a business would do this is beyond strange as it sounds like the opposite of customer service.  When you're hearing it from multiple people, everyone can't be wrong.

[KevinD]

@jerielderbsci I replied to your comment on the other thread. 

Just wanted to state that here in case you didn't see my reply.