>It's not like human call center staff has never given anyone wrong information, or cost companies money in fines and lawsuit
A human will be more likely to say "I don't know" or pass you along, rather than outright lie.
A human will be more likely to say "I don't know" or pass you along, rather than outright lie.
However I would not expect an airline customer support to make up a completely fictional flight that has never existed. Maybe they could confuse flights or read a number wrong, but making one up?
Case in point, I asked my bank if they had any FX conversion fees or markup. Guy said no. I asked if there was any markup on the spread. Said no. Guess what? They absolutely mark up that spread. Their exchange rates are terrible. Just because there isn't a line-item with a fee listed doesn't mean there isn't a hidden fee in there. He's either incompetent or a liar.
90% of my job was undoing and compensating passengers for the incorrect information either the phone agent or gate agent gave them. The other 10% was dealing with workarounds to technical issues in our booking software.