Conflict brings out truth, creativity, and resolution.

“Conflict brings out truth, creativity, and resolution.” Chris Voss

I was once listening to the video “How to win a negotiation, with former FBI hostage chief Chris Voss”, to the part with his own story, where Chris Voss used his negotiating skills on an airline’s customer-service staff to get a refund for a flight, when it suddenly struck me that I had actually had an experience just like it.

On a trip to India in mid-2024, I applied for my e-visa a month before the date I meant to fly, without allowing for the possibility that the plane would be delayed and the clock would tick over into the very day the ETA expired (the last day on which you are allowed to begin entering that country’s territory). The visa system will certainly help you estimate a lawful entry window from the day you apply, but the visa system cannot allow for your flight being delayed. And I landed in exactly this situation: Vietjet delayed the flight from 19:40 to 20:10, and the staff warned me that if I flew I might be refused entry, because there had been cases like that. This was Vietjet’s fault, because if the flight had gone on time I would have entered before midnight with time enough to spare. And I also saw my own fault: applying for the visa a full 30 days ahead and not ruling out the airline being delayed (at that time almost every Vietjet flight through New Delhi left in the evening at 19:40).

The Vietjet member of staff really did help me and offered a way out: Vietjet would hold the ticket for 3 days and I would only have to pay 1,000,000 VND for a new one. And I began applying for the e-visa again straight away at the airport, but the trouble was that the visa has to be applied for at least 4 to 7 days before the intended date of entry. And that meant I would have to buy an entirely new ticket.

After applying for the visa there at the airport and waiting for the result, I asked the member of staff who had first helped me, but they said there was no other way than to buy a new ticket if I did not leave the country within the next 3 days.

At that point I had decided not to go on, but after Giang, a friend of mine, rang and urged me to claim what I was rightly owed, I made up my mind to go and ask at the flight-problems desk once more (not the first person who had helped me).

I still remember that conversation. I was calm; I did not raise my voice or show anger or lay the blame on Vietjet. I spoke objectively about my own problem — applying for the e-visa too early without allowing for a delay — about Vietjet’s delay, and about how my schedule, my work plans, my tour and hotel bookings had been affected.

And they asked me to wait 15 minutes to consult a superior. And the result was exactly what I had hoped: Vietjet waived the 3-day ticket-holding rule in my case, and I only had to pay one million more instead of five million for a new ticket.

Reading up on Chris Voss’s principles for hostage negotiation, I learned some core ones:

1. Negotiate on emotion, not on logic alone
2. Use Tactical Empathy and active listening: acknowledge your own fault objectively, and feel with the other side from where they stand.

And in another of his videos I learned a further method: use the late-night FM DJ voice — speak slowly, low and evenly, to give the other side a feeling of trust, calm and safety.

And to sum up what I want to share with you:

1. Apply for an Indian e-visa only about 15 days before the date of entry
2. Fight for what you are rightly owed
3. Give the other person the chance to solve your problem calmly

https://youtu.be/tYv44wQYePg?si=goMMgCCzaYwwJgEB