Continental Airlines Opens New European Call Center In Brussels

from left to right:
Martin Hand, Continental Staff Vice-President Reservations and
CTOs, Jim Summerford, Continental Vice-President Europe, Middle East
and India, Tom Korologos, US Ambassador to Belgium
Luc Geerts, Continental Senior Country Director Benelux

BRUSSELS, March 24, 2006 - Continental Airlines officially opened its new European Call Center yesterday. The center, which is located in the airline's new offices in Diegem, near Brussels' Zaventem Airport, handles phone reservations for 11 countries: Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
The call center's 54 staff, including three managers and two supervisors, come from all over Europe and together they speak nine different languages.

“With its location at the heart of Europe, Brussels was the perfect choice for the location of this new facility,” said Martin Hand, Continental's Staff Vice President Reservations & City Ticket Offices. “The city's multicultural population has enabled us to find the linguistic skills we need.”
Also officiating at the opening ceremony were Tom Korologos, U.S. Ambassador to Belgium, and Jim Summerford, Continental's Vice President Europe, Middle East & India.

“As the number of Continental routes and flights connecting European cities to the U.S.A. has continually increased over the past decade, so has our European customer base,” said Summerford. “As of May this year, we will be serving 28 cities in 15 countries in Europe, the Middle East and India, and this new call center is a necessity in meeting our goal of providing reservations services to all our customers in their native languages.”

Flights from New York to Cologne, Barcelona and Copenhagen will be inaugurated in May 2006.
Continental sets itself apart through its commitment to personalized customer service and its promise of making the process of booking travel as simple as possible, in the language of the customer's choice.

Although yesterday also marked the official opening of Continental's new Brussels office, the company has been operating in Belgium for the past seven years. Luc Geerts, Senior Country Director Belux & Germany, is delighted by the constant evolution of the Brussels office: “Our Brussels office has become central and essential for European reservations. When we started in 1999, we had a reservations team of 10 agents covering the Benelux. Today we have a total of more than 50 covering 11 countries, which reflects the growing success of Continental Airlines in Europe.”

Continental Airlines (continental.com) is the world's sixth largest airline, with more than 3,100 daily departures. Continental serves 151 U.S. and 133 international destinations - more than any other airline in the world - and more than 400 additional points are served via SkyTeam alliance airlines. Continental is the leading U.S. carrier across the Atlantic in terms of the number of cities served, operating up to 266 departures weekly from 25 cities in 14 countries to its U.S. gateway hubs at New York/Newark, Houston and Cleveland, with onward connections to more than 230 cities throughout North America, Latin America and the Caribbean. Continental was voted OAG Airline of the Year for both 2005 and 2004 by frequent flyers worldwide and BusinessFirst won the Best Executive/Business Class award at the OAG Airline of the Year Awards 2005, for the third year running. Fortune magazine ranked Continental as the top airline in its Most Admired Global Companies 2006, for the third year running. Continental's alliance carriers in Europe, the Middle East and India include - in addition to SkyTeam airlines - Air Europa, Emirates, FlyBE (British European), TAP Air Portugal and Virgin Atlantic Airways.