Customer Support Assistant

This is an excellent opportunity for someone with fantastic customer service skills to join our vibrant team in Newcastle.

Our Customer Support Team is seeking a new team member to help make the team efficient, organised and a key department in our travel company.

**About us**

Based in Hoult’s Yard in Byker, The Artisan Travel Company has three distinct brands. All of these brands are underpinned by our strong belief in personal service and our exceptional product knowledge.

At Activities Abroadwe offer unforgettable family activity holidays throughout the year. From reindeer sleigh rides in Lapland to canyoning in Catalonia, canoeing in Costa Rica to Northern Lights hunting in Norway; we use our own families’ experiences to craft your family’s holiday.

TheAurora Zoneis the UK’s original and only dedicated Northern Lights holiday company. With itineraries throughout Finland, Sweden, Iceland and Norway, we do all that we can to ensure that our guests experience the North at its very best, whilst providing the best possible chance for you to see the Northern Lights.

Artisan Travelis all about getting under the skin of the destinations we know (and love) so well with our expert local partners. Every holiday has been designed in conjunction with our local teams to ensure you experience the absolute best of this amazing planet. Artisan Travel is an exciting and vibrant brand which is constantly being developed to bring all of the hidden secrets and insider knowledge to our wonderful clients.

Reporting to our Office Manager, you will be involved in all aspects of the post-booking processes and will help ensure that our clients experience the best possible level of customer service.

**About the job**

This is an exciting and dynamic role which allows you to integrate with almost all departments within the business..

Below we have outlined three main areas of responsibility with a little further info on each along with some other more of the general types of task you could expect as part of this day to day role.

**Administration**
- Processing bookings in our booking system - this consists of doing careful quality checks and producing documents for our clients
- Processing any documents when clients make changes to their trips (adding on activities/changing dates etc)
- Processing payments
- Dealing with cancellations

**Point of contact for all customers post booking**

You will be the friendly voice of the company for anyone with any questions, amends, or problems from after they have made the initial booking through to when they have travelled and returned home.
- You will have responsibility for a number of inboxes and all incoming phone calls via our dedicated admin/customer service line
- Liaising with suppliers and colleagues to make all amendments and adaptions to any existing bookings. Some examples of these types of request include booking additional activities, actioning any specific room requests, making any changes to flights (such as upgrades) etc.
- Work with the Sales Team regarding booking queries
- Responding to client queries as, given the nature of our holidays, people naturally do have questions You will work to answer these in a timely manner working with the product team or overseas suppliers to fully answer questions.

**Managing customer feedback**

When our customers complete a feedback form after their holiday we read, act upon, and respond to each and every one.
- This involves feeding back positive comments to other colleagues before replying to the client to thank them.
- For any problems you will deal swiftly and professionally with client complaints during and following holidays, liaising with all departments and possibly local partners necessary to provide swift and effective resolution.

**About you**
- **Must** have good IT skills and be able to use Outlook, Excel, and Word with ease. Our digital booking system can be quite complex but full training will be given. Decent all-round IT knowledge would be advantageous
- Must be able to work well under pressure and appreciate the need for urgency (many of our tasks are time sensitive)
- **Must** be happy picking up the phone and talking to our clients. Must also be able to confidently call and speak with others in the business and our overseas suppliers.
- Should have excellent attention to detail and take pride in the documents they produce
- **Exceptional organisational skills are required** as there will always be multiple tasks underway at any one time.
- Should be a positive and enthusiastic person. Whilst serious complaints are few and far between you need to be someone who is able to handle clients who might be upset/angry (you will always have a manager to offer guidance and support however)
- Strong English skills are essential, both written and verbal
- Experience working in the travel industry would be advantageous but not essential

**The following are standard responsibilities for all positions within t