Pages

Wednesday 27 May 2015

Super amazing news!


I have some wonderful, joyful news! After an absence of almost 3 years, which I can't quite believe, I am going to Turku! In just over two weeks I'll be getting the ferry to Finland for a few days, and I really am so happy. I had had it in the back of my mind since I got to Stockholm that I should travel there, but hadn't got to it. Then I had a message on Friday from one of my Finnish friends asking when I would come back, and now it's happening! I really hope it hasn't changed too much, my friend Emmi who I met in Turku but now lives in England goes back to see her family now and then, and has mentioned some things about it to me, but I really cannot wait to be back there myself.
However, I must say that my first experience booking with Viking Line has been fairly ridiculous - much more hassle than it needs to be, and both Finnish and Swedish friends who I've asked have told me that they also think the website is terrible.
It's not user friendly - the Swedish site is only available in Swedish, which is ok, but if I'm spending money I often prefer to use a website in English so I have no doubt over what I'm doing. I certainly don't think that services in this country should have to be available in English, and I've been critical of others I've met who expect this. Anyway, I spent all of yesterday attempting to buy tickets, using two different computers, my phone, two different cards - both of which had sufficient funds to make payment, and only ever received error messages. I thought it might be my error as I'd been providing my Swedish address, but my cards are registered to my parents' address in England. I tried their address, that didn't work either! Something that should be so easy was causing me so much stress.
This morning I called their customer service team to try to make the purchase over the phone. The lady I spoke to was helpful, but once she'd made a booking for me she instructed me to go to their website to make payment, which was the problem in the first place! She then tried to make a payment over the phone, the card still didn't work! Maybe their system dislikes cards from outside of Sweden, but I told her it was a UK card and she didn't mention that they didn't accept this. They make reference on their website to ID requirements for non-Nordic citizens, and I would think that for people who are travelling using the ferry would be quite a good option, so I really don't see why a card from another country should cause such problems. 
After payment failed yet again she advised me that I could pay when I check in, and just needed to take my booking number. This is fine for me, but as this has been such a hassle so far I'm anxious that something else will go wrong and my booking will mysteriously go missing or something like that. In fact, I will need to call them again anyway, as when I entered my booking number and name into the website to check that everything was correct the message advised that the name did not match the booking number. I appreciate that my name is unusual for English people, let alone a Swedish person, and the lady I spoke to probably just misheard me or made a typo, but the whole thing is not filling me with confidence.
So in conclusion I'm very happy to be going back to Turku after quite some time, I really cannot wait to see my friends there again, but I'm not impressed at all with Viking Line, to the point that last night I wrote my first complaint in Swedish. Hopefully it sounded as effective in Swedish as in English, and hopefully my trip will actually be straightforward once I've solved the issue of what name they put on my booking. However, if there's a next time I think I'll use a different service, especially as no one seems to have good things to say about booking with Viking Line.

No comments:

Post a Comment