Airline service recovery that pays what is owed on time and sizes goodwill to the trip, the member and the budget
Owed money paid on the DOT clock; goodwill sized to the trip, the member and the budget.
See one case, screen by screen ↓Airline Service Recovery is airline service recovery software that decides and issues goodwill and owed compensation after a bad trip, for customer care teams. Eight agents rebuild the trip from nine records and pin every wrong to its proof, work out what is owed by rule and by the customer service plan, size goodwill miles and travel credits inside the matrix and budget, check the offer against similar cases and draft the message. A care agent asks, edits, approves and sends.
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Airline service recovery starts after a bad trip — a cancellation, a dead seat screen, a bag that arrives two days late — and today it starts by hand. A care agent opens seven or eight systems to rebuild what happened: reservations, departure control, flight operations, the cabin log, bag tracing, the loyalty profile and the contact history. Then she works out what the passenger is owed under 14 CFR Part 260, the Montreal Convention and the airline's own customer service plan, picks a goodwill gesture from a PDF matrix and memory, writes from a template, and the miles post weeks later.
That is where the money leaks. Owed cash gets traded for a voucher, a downgrade fare difference or a bag fee is missed, and a refund clock passes — every late refund is a possible DOT violation. The same wrong draws 5,000 miles for one Platinum member and 25,000 for the next, nobody watches the month's goodwill budget until it is gone, and the member on her third bad trip in ninety days leaves before anyone notices.
Estimated split for one recovery case at a network carrier, about 22 minutes by hand, and with the solution.
Eight specialist agents rebuild the trip, decide what is owed, size the goodwill and check it; the care agent approves and sends.
Helena Varga, a Corvane Club Platinum member for 11 years, flew CV 412 from Chicago O'Hare to London Heathrow in Business on October 9. Her seat screen was dead and her second bag arrived 49 hours late. Here is how Nadia Ferreira works the case with the agents, screen by screen, in the working solution.
Overnight the agents read 61 new cases and the canceled CV 1726. Nadia's Today screen shows 23 offers ready for her, 4 owed payments due within 2 business days with none late, and October goodwill at 61% of $2.10M on day 16, forecast $2.31M. Helena Varga is first, and the agents have one question for Nadia about her case.
What the agents found: “Found $412 owed to Jamal Whitaker that he had not asked for: a downgrade is a significant change.”
The trip reader read 9 records and drew the trip from check-in at ORD to the 49 hours she waited in London. Three wrongs are pinned: seat 4A's screen dead all flight, the second bag never loaded, and the bag delivered 48 h 58 m after landing on a 6-night trip. Under it, her last 90 days: a 3 h 12 m delay in August, a cancellation in September with nothing given — third wrong in 90 days.
Trip reader, 97% sure: “She could not have seen the second one; it explains the delay.”
Each pin opens the record it came from. Bag tag CV 418202 was sorted to CV412 at the ORD sort at 16:41, then no load scan: “LEFT BEHIND -- SHORT-SHIPPED”. It arrived at London on October 11 at 07:46 and was delivered to her hotel on October 12 at 08:50. The passage the agents used is highlighted.
“Every value on the screen that cites this record opens here.”
The receipts reader read four receipts and converted them at her card's own posting rate, 1.3246: clothing, toiletries and a charger, £214.40, is $284.00, owed under Montreal Convention article 19 and plan §7.3, due by Thursday, October 22. The £47.00 dinner is excluded with its reason and left to Nadia. No checked-bag fee refund is owed under 14 CFR 260.5 — Platinum includes 3 bags, so none was paid.
Receipts reader: “No duplicates in 3 years of her claims or on the card statement.”
The goodwill planner proposes 15,000 miles for the screen (matrix row S2, Platinum band 10,000–20,000) and a $150 travel credit for the bag (row B2, $100–$200): $330 of her $450 authority. The budget guard re-sized it without seeing that answer: 41 similar cases in 12 months, median 15,000. Nadia types “Why 15,000 miles?” and the planner answers with the rows it used.
Budget guard: “The 9 that got 20,000 were all repeat wrongs. I agree with 15,000 — unless you count the repeat.”
The planner asks: “This is her third wrong in 90 days. Keep 15,000 miles, or raise to 20,000 (+$60)?” Nadia chooses Raise to 20,000 with reason code G3, repeat wrong in 90 days; goodwill becomes $390 of her $450 and the $284.00 owed is unchanged. The budget guard re-checks in the conversation: inside the Platinum band, inside her authority, fair against similar cases — 9 of 41 got 20,000, all repeat wrongs, like hers — and +$60 on an October forecast already flagged to Claire Donnelly.
The owed amount never moves when goodwill changes. Message writer: “Approve the offer and review the message when you are ready.”
The draft says what happened, that this is the third time since August, what Corvane is paying and by when, and what it gives as an apology. Before sending it is checked: it matches the approved offer, owed money is stated as a payment and not a gesture, no promise the agents may not make, grade 7 reading level, 182 words. It can be re-drafted in Spanish, French, German or Hungarian.
Ask the message writer: “Why mention maintenance?” · “Why no dinner?” · “Leave out maintenance”.
Nadia signs as Customer Care Agent with the decision “As edited by me (G3 Repeat wrong in 90 days)”. The issuer posts 20,000 miles at once (L-88271940), creates the $150 credit (CVC-7Q4M-2KXH) and schedules $284.00 to her card for October 22 (PAY-2026-118734). The message is sent at 09:39 in the app and by email.
The trip reader also drafted a note to Cabin Maintenance about seat 4A on N812CV, logged three times since September 30. It names no passenger and waits for Nadia to send it.
CV 1726 SFO–ORD was canceled at 16:55 for a hydraulic leak, within Corvane's control. The flight sweep found all 186 passengers: 47 refunds, $19,862, on the clock under 260.6; 31 hotel and meal receipts, $4,371, under the plan; no credits offered in place of refunds. Goodwill of $21,760 sits in two bands a person approves after reading a sample of five, and 21 cases that need judgment.
“None offered: a credit only if the passenger chooses it” — 14 CFR 260.6(c).
The same recovery case, seen by four of the people at Corvane Airways who carry it: what their week looked like, and what working with the agents looks like now.
Eight specialist agents rebuild the trip, decide what is owed, size the goodwill and check it; the care agent approves and sends.
Rebuilds the trip from reservations, departure control, flight operations, the cabin log, bag tracing, onboard service, loyalty and contact history, puts the events in time order and pins each wrong to the passage that proves it — including what the passenger could not see. Drafts a cause note when the same defect repeats.
Decides what is owed by rule — 14 CFR Part 260, Part 250, Part 254, the Montreal Convention, EU261/UK261 for European departures — and by the airline's published customer service plan, and sets each clock.
Reads receipts in any currency, converts at the card's own posting rate, checks what the plan covers and looks for duplicates in the passenger's claims and card statement.
Sizes goodwill miles and travel credits from the wrong, the cabin, the tier, the member's value and history, inside the goodwill matrix band and the person's authority, and says why.
The second reader: re-sizes every offer without seeing the planner's answer, compares similar cases, checks authority and the month's goodwill budget, forecasts the month and proposes rule changes.
Drafts the message in the member's language: what happened, what is owed and by when, what is given; every sentence tied to a fact, and answers why a sentence is there.
After a signed approval, posts the miles, creates the travel credit, schedules the payment and records each receipt number on the case.
After a cancellation or long delay, finds every passenger on the manifest, sizes owed money and goodwill, groups the offers into bands and leaves the cases that need judgment to a person.
Approve, sign and set the rules. The agents propose; a named person decides.
Ask in plain words on any screen. The agents answer with their sources, and open what they found.
Why does Helena Varga's offer have 15,000 miles?
Her seat screen was dead for the whole 7 h 05 m flight in Business. Matrix row S2 gives Platinum 10,000–20,000, default 15,000; 41 similar cases had a median of 15,000, and the 9 at 20,000 were all repeat wrongs. This is her third wrong in 90 days, so the agents asked you.
Which owed payments are closest to their clock?
Four are due within 2 business days: Jamal Whitaker $412 and Daniel Mercer $388 (CV 233 downgrades, fare difference), Oliver Kerrigan $35 bag fee and Nina Petrova $189 hotel under our plan — all due Tue, Oct 20. None is late.
Will we stay inside October's goodwill budget?
Not at this pace: $1.28M used by day 16, forecast $2.31M against $2.10M. The budget guard proposes miles first for Member and Silver delays — an estimated $186,000 less. Claire Donnelly decides.
Approve the standard band on CV 1726
CV 1726's standard band is 104 Member and Silver passengers: 5,000 miles or a $75 credit, their choice, $7,800 in all. A band is approved only after you read a sample — I opened five for you.
13 screens from the working solution, on its sample data. Pick one to see it large.
Your customer care compensation policy is set as rules: what Corvane must pay, how much goodwill each person may give, and when things are raised. Every change needs a reason and is logged.
| Setting | Default | Choose from |
|---|---|---|
| Refunds — cancellation or significant change | 7 business days to a card, 20 calendar days otherwise (14 CFR 260.6) | Edit with a reason |
| Checked-bag fee — significantly delayed | 12 h domestic · 15 h international · 30 h when a nonstop leg is over 12 h (14 CFR 260.5) | Edit with a reason |
| Delay over 3 h within our control | $75 credit or 7,500 miles, the passenger's choice (plan §4.1) | Edit with a reason |
| Delayed bag — essentials | Reasonable expenses against receipts, within 7 business days (Montreal art. 19 · plan §7.3) | Edit with a reason |
| Goodwill matrix | Version 2026-10 · 7 rows × 5 tiers · repeat wrong up to +50% · premium cabin +5,000 · no cash goodwill · miles at 1.2¢ | Bands changed on the Budget screen by the Loyalty Program Manager |
| Care agent authority | Up to $450 of goodwill per case; owed amounts any size | Customer Care Manager up to $1,500 · Loyalty Program Manager above |
| Bulk band approval | Only after a sample of 5 is read; reason code required | Edit with a reason |
| Notifications and clocks | Owed due in 2 business days · approval waiting over 24 hours · goodwill at 90% of the month's even pace · a third wrong in 90 days | Each on or off; daily summary at 07:00 off by default |
Every figure is labelled: a target the solution is built to, an estimate, a typical published result, or a proven one.
“demo” = seen in the working solution, on its sample data · “target” = the design goal, measured in the live solution · “estimated” = our estimate · “typical” = published figures (49 U.S.C. 46301 as amended by the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024 — up to $75,000 per violation; OAG 2023 survey, via WNS — 42% of Millennials and 38% of Gen Z switched airlines after delays or cancellations; 14 CFR Part 260, in effect October 28, 2024; Montreal Convention 1999, art. 19). Corvane Airways, Corvane Club, its flights and the people named on this page are fictional — characters and sample data in the working solution.
Airline Service Recovery is airline service recovery software that decides and issues goodwill and owed compensation after a bad trip, for customer care teams. Eight agents rebuild the trip from nine records and pin every wrong to its proof, work out what is owed by rule and by the customer service plan, size goodwill miles and travel credits inside the matrix and budget, check the offer against similar cases and draft the message. A care agent asks, edits, approves and sends.
Owed money is what a passenger is entitled to by rule or by the airline's published commitments — a refund under 14 CFR Part 260, the DOT automatic refund rule, delayed baggage expenses under the Montreal Convention, a plan credit for a controllable delay. Goodwill is what the airline chooses to give. The solution shows them in two columns that never mix: owed pays on its clock whatever happens to goodwill, and a credit is never offered in place of owed cash.
Airline goodwill compensation should follow your goodwill matrix: as much as it allows for the wrong and the tier, moved within the band for the member's value and history. The goodwill planner picks goodwill miles or travel credit compensation inside the band and says why; the budget guard re-sizes it without seeing that answer, against similar cases and the month's budget, and says when it disagrees. The care agent decides, with a reason code for any change.
Yes. The receipts reader reads each receipt, converts it at the card's own posting rate, checks what the plan covers and looks for duplicates. Eligible items are owed under Montreal Convention article 19 and paid on their clock; an excluded item goes to the care agent with its reason, and she can include it.
It is passenger recovery after a disruption that starts before passengers write. When a flight is canceled, the flight sweep finds every passenger on the manifest, sizes owed refunds, care receipts and goodwill, and groups the offers into bands. A person approves each band after reading a sample of five, and the cases that need judgment — repeat wrongs, missed events, assistance needs, unaccompanied minors — go to a person.
No. The agents propose, explain and check; a named care agent approves every offer and signs, a manager above $450 of goodwill, and the issuer posts miles, creates credits and schedules payments only for signed offers, at the exact amounts. The message writer never sends. Every step is on the audit trail.
Yes. The owed rules, plan commitments, goodwill matrix bands, premium-cabin and repeat-wrong uplifts, authority limits, bulk-approval sample and clocks are all settings. Every change needs a reason and is logged, and matrix and budget rules are changed by the Loyalty Program Manager.
The Agentic Solution Engine builds and deploys it from your requirements and documents — your customer service plan, goodwill matrix, authority levels and a sample of past recovery cases — and it goes live once every quality gate has passed. In the working solution a dry-run on September re-decided 17,214 cases before the desk started.
Stolen miles stopped before the award is flown, and honest members never locked out.
1-min demoMissing Miles Claims ProcessingMissing miles credited in minutes, each one tied to the flown coupon and its record.
1-min demoLoyalty Partner Billing ReconciliationEvery partner statement tied out line by line, every missed mile billed or credited.
1-min demoWe'll run Airline Service Recovery on a sample of your own past recovery cases, against your customer service plan and goodwill matrix.