CheapOair Named Customer Service Department of the Year in American Business Awards

CheapOair also wins two additional gold, nine silver and five bronze awards in the 13th annual competition

NEW YORK, NY – Jun 30, 2015 – CheapOair, a leading hybrid (online/traditional) travel agency, announced today that its customer service department was honored as the Gold winner in the highly competitive Customer Service Department of the Year category in the 13th annual American Business Awards. This marks yet another accolade in CheapOair’s long line of customer service awards, following prior wins in 7th annual International Service Excellence Awards and 9th annual Stevie Awards for Customer Service 2015.

“CheapOair aims to make booking the perfect trip effortless, affordable and enjoyable, no matter whether travelers book online, via our app or by calling one of our customer care centers located around the world,” said Werner Kunz, chief operating officer at Fareportal, the company that operates CheapOair. “Providing superior customer service is at the heart of our company’s vision and we are particularly proud to add the American Business Awards to our long and growing roster of customer service awards.”

Nicknamed the Stevies for the Greek word meaning “crowned,” the American Business Awards are the nation’s premier business awards program. More than 3,300 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted this year for consideration in a wide range of categories, with more than 200 executives worldwide participating in the judging process to select this year’s Stevie Award winners.
CheapOair also won Gold in the Direct Response Video of the Year category for its latest “Perks” TV commercial and Julia Zamorska won Gold in the PR Executive of the Year category. Fareportal also won a total of nine silver and five bronze awards.

Winning three gold awards puts Fareportal in the fine company of organizations such as: MWW Group (four golds), AT&T, Girl Scouts of the USA, Gulfstream Aerospace, and Isagenix International (three gold wins) and Accenture, Bell Helicopter, Broadstreet, Carbonite, Cigna, Cyracom, IDEXX Laboratories, Hewlett-Packard, Lifesize, Marriott Vacations Worldwide, Roth Staffing Company, Signet, and SoFi (two gold wins each).
For award acceptance videos, please see: Direct Response Video of the Year award acceptance speech here and Customer Service Department of the Year award acceptance speech here. For a post-awards interview about the Customer Service Department of the Year win, please see here.

About CheapOair
CheapOair is the first hybrid (online/traditional) travel agency that enables consumers to book travel online, on mobile apps, by phone or live chat. CheapOair (http://www.cheapoair.com, 1-646-738-4820) bridges the gap between an online and traditional travel agency with trained travel agents available to help find deals and offers to destinations worldwide on over 550 airlines, 150,000 hotels, and 100s of car rental companies. Partner airlines benefit from access to CheapOair’s broad customer base that books high yield international travel and add-on ancillaries at above the industry average. Follow CheapOair on Facebook and Twitter to learn how to travel the world for less.

Fareportal wins Stevie Awards for Sales and Customer Service

Grand-Stevie-for-Customer-Service-logoThe Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service are the world’s top sales awards, business development awards, contact center awards, and customer service awards. More than 1,900 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were evaluated in this year’s competition. Finalists were determined by the average scores of 139 professionals worldwide, acting as preliminary judges; and more than 100 members of several specialized judging committees determined the winner placements from among the finalists during final judging in February.

Fareportal won a total of two gold, six silver and six bronze awards in the 9th annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. As a result of the company’s multiple recognition, as selected in independent judging by more than 200 business judges, Fareportal was also named #5 most awarded company during this year’s competition, among such industry leaders as DHL, Delta, John Hancock, Marriott and Vizio.

CheapOair’s customer service department won gold in the Innovation in Customer Service category and Ruben Bello, VP of international operations, won gold in the Customer Service Leader of the Year category. The company’s silver winners included customer service department, contact center and best use of technology categories, as well as individual silver recognition for customer service agents Devindra Seenarain and Carmen Jimenez. Bronze winners included Roy Sneharthi, SVP of operations, as well as customer service agents Nitin Verma, Yatendri Sahai and Fiona Sailo. OneTravel accolades included silver award for Belinda Bishop, senior director of operations and bronze award for Tony Pham, associate director of operations.

Congratulations to our excellent customer service teams, leaders and agents!

Fareportal wins in Hermes Creative Awards

Hermes-Creative-Awards-platinum-winner-2015About 6,000 entries from throughout the United States and 22 other countries were submitted in this year’s Hermes Creative Awards, an international competition for creative professionals involved in the concept, writing and design of traditional materials and programs, and emerging technologies. Only about 15 percent of the entries received the highest platinum honor, and about 22 percent received gold recognition.

CheapOair’s “Perks” TV commercial won Platinum in the Video / TV Ad of the Year category. CheapOair app and OneTravel website won Gold in Mobile App and Website of the Year categories, respectively. OneTravel app, CheapOair website and both CheapOair and OneTravel mobile websites received Honorable Mentions in their respective categories.

Congratulations to all teams involved in the recent successes!

CheapOair named finalist in Appy Awards

Appy Awards finalist 2015Organized by MediaPost, since 1996 one of the largest media, marketing and advertising online news sources, the Appy Awards highlighted the best in app innovation.

CheapOair was named a finalist in the Travel and Tourism App of the Year category in the Appy Awards.

Congratulations to our app team!

CheapOair wins multiple accolades in Communicator Awards

Communicator Awards website silver winner 2015The 21st annual Communicator Awards drew more than 6,000 entries from companies and agencies of all sizes and marked the largest and most competitive awards program honoring the creative excellence for communications professionals.

 

 

Communicator Awards app silver winner 2015CheapOair won silver in Website, iPhone App, iPad App, TV Commercial and Publicity Campaign of the Year categories in Communicator Awards.

Congratulations to all teams involved!

CheapOair named Nominee in Webby Awards

Webby Award nominee 2015Established in 1996 and hailed as the “internet’s highest honor” by The New York Times, The Webby Awards is the leading international award honoring excellence on the internet. The Webby Awards received nearly 13,000 entries from all 50 states and over 60 countries worldwide this year. From these, less than 8 percent were selected as nominees.

CheapOair app was named a Nominee in the Travel App of the Year category in the Webby Awards.

Congratulations to our app team!

CheapOair wins Horizon Interactive Awards

Horizon Interactive Awards gold winner 2015The 13th annual international Horizon Interactive Awards marked one of the most competitive and well-rounded competitions in the awards program’s history with more than 1,200 entries from 27 countries around world. The top 60 percent of all 2014 entries were recognized and awarded an award classification (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Best of Category, or Best of Show).

CheapOair mobile app and latest TV commercial entitled “Perks” won Gold in the App of the Year and Commercial of the Year categories in Horizon Interactive Awards, with its website winning Silver in the Website of the Year category.

Congratulations to our app, website and creative teams!

CheapOair website wins Platinum in AVA Digital Awards

AVA-Digital-Awards-gold-winner-2015Organized by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals, AVA Digital Awards is an international competition that recognizes outstanding work by creative professionals involved in the concept, direction, design and production of digital communication media. More than 2,500 entries were received in the competition this year, from U.S., Canada and 17 other countries, with winners ranging from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies.

CheapOair website was named as Platinum winner in the Website (Travel) category and CheapOair’s latest TV commercial entitled “Perks” won Gold in the Commercials (Travel) category in AVA Digital Awards. Only 15 percent of this year’s more than 2,500 entrants were recognized with the Platinum award and another 18 percent received the Gold award.

Congratulations to our website and creative teams!

CheapOair crowned “Customer Service Department of the Year” in American Business Awards

American Business AwardsNicknamed the Stevies for the Greek word meaning “crowned,” the American Business Awards are the nation’s premier business awards program. More than 3,300 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted this year for consideration in a wide range of categories, with more than 200 executives worldwide participating in the judging process to select this year’s Stevie Award winners.

CheapOair was honored as the Gold winner in the highly competitive “Customer Service Department of the Year” category in the 13th annual American Business Awards. This marks yet another accolade in CheapOair’s long line of customer service awards, following prior wins in 7th annual International Service Excellence Awards and 9th annual Stevie Awards for Customer Service 2015.

CheapOair also won Gold in the Direct Response Video of the Year category for its latest “Perks” TV commercial and Julia Zamorska, Fareportal’s senior director of corporate communications, won Gold in the PR Executive of the Year category. Fareportal also won a total of nine silver and five bronze awards, including for its HR and marketing executives and departments.

Winning three gold awards puts Fareportal in the fine company of organizations such as: MWW Group (four golds), AT&T, Girl Scouts of the USA, Gulfstream Aerospace, and Isagenix International (three gold wins) and Accenture, Bell Helicopter, Broadstreet, Carbonite, Cigna, Cyracom, IDEXX Laboratories, Hewlett-Packard, Lifesize, Marriott Vacations Worldwide, Roth Staffing Company, Signet, and SoFi (two gold wins each).

Please see the interview conducted after the awards win, off-stage.

Congratulations to all of our winners!

CheapOair Announces Orlando as the Most Booked Destination for Independence Day Travel

Leading Online Travel Agency Shares Top Destinations for Travelers during the Holiday Weekend

NEW YORK, NY – Jun 17, 2015 – CheapOair, the first flights-focused hybrid online travel agency, announced today the top ten destinations travelers are booking for the Independence Day holiday. CheapOair’s data shows that airfare to these top destinations is significantly lower than the average airfare for all booked flights for the same weekend.

“This year, we have seen an uptick in bookings for mid-week July 1st departures, as many consumers will be celebrating Independence Day over a long weekend,” explains Tom Spagnola, CheapOair’s Senior Vice President of Supplier Relations. “Americans are taking advantage of the low cost of airfare this year during the holiday weekend by traveling coast to coast.”

Key findings include that consumers are traveling mostly within the continental United States; San Juan, Puerto Rico and Cancun, Mexico, were the only overseas spots making it into the top 10. Chicago, Illinois, San Francisco, California, and Las Vegas, Nevada have moved back into the top 10 this year. Airfare to the top five destinations all land at below $400 roundtrip, an attainable price for vacation seekers across the United States.

Top 10 4th of July Destinations with Average Roundtrip Airfare:
1. Orlando, Florida: $319
2. Los Angeles, California: $378
3. Chicago, Illinois: $357
4. Las Vegas, Nevada: $317
5. Denver, Colorado: $319
6. San Juan, Puerto Rico: $439
7. Seattle, Washington: $391
8. Atlanta, Georgia: $301
9. San Francisco, California: $429
10. Cancun, Mexico: $491

The average prices above are based on bookings made on CheapOair.com between January and May, 2015, for travel between July 1 and July 5, 2015. Fares are roundtrip and include taxes and fees. Fares are based on historical data, and may no longer be available at the time of booking.

About CheapOair
CheapOair is a flights-focused hybrid travel agency that enables consumers to book online, on mobile apps, by phone or live chat. CheapOair (http://www.cheapoair.com, 1-646-738-4820) bridges the gap between an online and traditional travel agency with certified travel agents available to help find deals and offers to destinations worldwide on over 450 airlines, 150,000 hotels, and 100s of car rentals. Partner airlines benefit from access to CheapOair’s broad customer base that books high yield international travel and add-on ancillaries at above the industry average. Follow CheapOair on Facebook and Twitter to learn how to travel the world for less.