Emirates raising industry benchmark on turnaround speed for refunds to customers

In the ever-evolving travel landscape, Emirates continues to prioritize choice and flexibility for its customers to help them make the most of the changes that come their way. Since March 2020, the airline has helped over 2 million customers make multiple date or destination changes, or exchange their tickets for vouchers to be utilised for future travel. More than 92,000 customers have exchanged their tickets for travel vouchers, and more than 38,000 of them have flown and are planning to fly with their redeemed vouchers for tickets.

Adnan Kazim, Chief Commercial Officer for Emirates Airline said: “As demand gradually grows for international travel, customer assurance and seamless booking flexibility will remain central to our strategy. Ensuring we have the most customer-friendly booking policies has helped build confidence amongst travellers when deciding to fly with us, giving them more control over their travel plans when uncertainty hits. This means empowering them to make stress-free changes through our generous waiver policy, allowing easy redemption of vouchers, ensuring faster refund processing times, all coupled with our industry-leading multi-risk insurance cover, and the extension of tier status and Miles for our Skywards members.”

The airline rewrote the playbook on booking flexibility, when it introduced the industry’s most generous ticket validity, giving customers the option to hold or use their ticket anytime for more than 24 months. Now, the airline has extended its booking waiver for travel through 31 May 2022, ensuring customers can book with confidence knowing they are fully supported should their travel situation change.

Emirates has also continued its long-standing commitment of honouring refunds to its customers, processing nearly 3.3 million refund requests to date since the start of the pandemic. The airline has bolstered its capabilities to manage refunds for tickets, resulting in a speedy turnaround time for its travel agency partners and customers, raising the bar as the fastest in the industry, building more trust, goodwill and loyalty for the future.

Emirates customers have also benefitted from the industry’s most comprehensive multi-risk travel cover since it was launched in December 2020. The airline was the first to provide additional assurance for travellers, strengthening its proposition for added peace of mind. Since its introduction, over 7.2 million customers have flown with confidence knowing they were protected through Emirates’ multi-risk insurance cover.

Emirates has also been inspiring loyalty and increasing retention among its frequent flyers. Emirates Skywards has extended the tier status for over 630,000 Silver, Gold and Platinum members until 2022. It has also extended the validity of 51 billion Skywards Miles, allowing members to hold on to them for future flights, upgrades and other partner rewards.