JULY 20, 2026 — Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing how travel clubs and loyalty programs interact with customers, but while many businesses are still experimenting with AI, Custom Travel Solutions (CTS) has already embedded it throughout its customer service operation. CTS helps travel brands drive long-term customer loyalty by creating more engaging and personalised member experiences that encourage repeat bookings, increase customer lifetime value and ultimately generate higher customer spend.
The travel loyalty technology provider has now been recognized for that innovation, winning Silver in the Best Use of AI category at the 2026 US Customer Experience Awards.
About the achievement
The award recognizes CTS’s deployment of a full-stack AI ecosystem across its customer support operations — using AI to analyze 100% of member interactions across voice, email, and chat, score customer and agent sentiment in near real-time, and deliver targeted, evidence-based coaching to its support team. Rather than using AI to cut costs or replace staff, CTS applies it to deepen human capability and improve service quality. The award was selected from a competitive field of finalists judged by an independent panel of customer experience leaders, practitioners, and industry experts.
For travel brands, customer service has become a critical differentiator. Whether helping members amend bookings, answer destination questions, or resolve travel disruptions, speed and quality of service increasingly influence customer loyalty, which ultimately increases customer spend. CTS’s empowered customer service program allows every interaction to be analyzed in real time, helping support teams pivot quickly to provide the best possible service.
Since introducing its human-centric AI ecosystem in 2023, CTS has moved from reviewing a sample of customer conversations to analyzing every interaction across voice, email and chat. The initiative evaluates sentiment, identifies coaching opportunities and helps managers improve consistency and service quality across support teams.
- 135,000+ customer interactions analyzed
- 100% conversation coverage
- 11% improvement in customer sentiment
- 80% reduction in quality review time
- 25% increase in agent productivity
CTS goes a step further than assisting with booking-related issues — the company ensures that each booking is confirmed before a guest arrives at the hotel through its AI-empowered hotel booking reconfirmation tool, Reconfirm.ai.
Paul Kitching, VP of Operations at Custom Travel Solutions, said:
“AI should make travel companies more human, not less. By giving our teams complete visibility into every customer conversation, we’re able to coach better, solve problems faster, and deliver the personalized service travelers increasingly expect. This award recognizes that AI is at its most valuable when it empowers people rather than replacing them.”
CTS’s AI ecosystem combines interaction intelligence, conversational AI, and automated booking verification to support the entire customer journey. The same approach that improves customer service is also helping travel brands increase operational efficiency while maintaining high-quality human support.
Danilo Kusmuk, Awards Consultant, US Customer Experience Awards 2026, said:
“Customer Travel Solutions exemplifies what happens when a business truly invests in AI to solve real customer problems. Winning a Silver Award in the Best Use of AI category for companies with up to 5,000 employees is an incredible achievement given the competition and reflects the calibre of innovation we saw across this year’s entries. On behalf of everyone at USCXA 26, congratulations to the whole team.”
The recognition comes as AI adoption accelerates across the travel sector, with airlines, hotels, tour operators and loyalty programmes increasingly investing in technologies that improve customer engagement while reducing operational complexity. For CTS, the award reinforces its belief that AI will become an essential part of every travel company’s customer experience strategy.
About Custom Travel Solutions
Custom Travel Solutions provides white-label travel loyalty and booking infrastructure to banks, membership organizations, fintech companies, publishers and enterprise partners worldwide who want to grow loyalty, engagement and non-dues revenue through travel. The company is known for a depth of travel inventory and a level of hands-on service that larger, less specialized providers can’t match. Visit customtravelsolutions.com.
About USCXA 26
The US Customer Experience Awards celebrate and champion the organizations and individuals raising the bar for customer experience across the United States. Now in its 12th year, USCXA recognizes excellence across categories spanning CX strategy, innovation, technology, and team performance, judged by an independent panel of industry experts. For more information, visit usacxa.com.