This is amazing: via Radley Balko an account of a poor old lady who spent ten years saving for an Alaska cruise. Princess Cruises even booked the lady's air travel. Booked her on three different flights, on three different airlines, all to get her to Alaska in, one presumes, the cheapest way possible. So of course this poor elderly pensioner misses the boat, due to ubiquitous travel snafus.
And here's the fun part: not only won't Princess Cruises refund her the money she took ten years saving, they've taken, and apparently plan to keep, the partial refund she got from the airlines. And, stupidly, they continue to be adamant even after being contacted by a Washington Post reporter.
I have to say that if I were a competitor of Princess Cruises, I'd give the old lady a free cruise to Alaska. Then I'd have her tape a commercial saying "Princess Cruise Lines screwed me out of my money, but Cheerful Iconoclast Cruises treated me like a queen!"
Showing posts with label Customer Service. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Customer Service. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Friday, October 5, 2007
ALL The Planes Are Late
I've been known to post a missive or two about bad customer service, and particularly about how U.S. Airways customer service really sucks. Now James Fallows links to this Patrick Smith's latest Salon "Ask the Pilot" column about why that plane is always late. According to Smith the answer is simple: the airport doesn't have enough slots to accomodate the number of takeoffs and landings at peak times. In particular, he thinks that regional jets are the big villain:
Fair enough -- he's a pilot, and he can see and make sense out of what he sees outside his own window.
If you are like me (fat chance) your market-oriented libertarian instincts kick in: the obvious choice is simply to charge more for takeoffs and landings during peak periods. Yet Smith rejects this obvious solution:
This can't be right. Basic economics tells us that if the price goes up, the amount demanded will go down. You cannot have pricier tickets and no reduction at all in the commodity being priced. At the margin, some travelers will shift to less-popular times. "Pricier tickets, same delays" is simply not a possible outcome.
Now, if they set the price for peak hour departure too low, then it won't have much of an impact, and so we will have pricier tickets and only slightly reduced delays. But if the congestion fee is that modest, well, ticket prices won't go up that much, either.
Besides, having government set the fee for a particular time is a clumsy and stupid way of going about implementing a congestion-fee system. The obvious solution is to figure out how many takeoffs and landings an airport can accomodate during a particular period and then auction off the rights to prime slots. Instead, Smith prefers a command-and-control solution:
I'm quite certain this man knows more than I do about flying an airplane, or even about the mechanics of how airports work, but it's goofy to think that government-imposed caps will work better than a price system. If nothing else, he claims that government won't set the price high enough because of the strength of airlines and weakness of regulators. Then why, pray tell, does he imagine that government will set the cap correctly? And if he bans planes with fewer than 100 seats, doesn't he just create an incentive to produce airplanes with exactly 101 seats?
For the life of me, I just don't understand the appeal of command-and-control regulations, when market-based solutions are obviously superior.
UPDATE: Reading the comments, I must say, great minds think alike:
Alas, this insightful commenter was anonymous, but whoever it was, he or she got it exactly right.
It's an airline scheduling issue, plain and simple. Carriers have created this mess through a self-defeating insistence that frequency of flights is the ultimate key to success. Over the past several years, they have portioned capacity onto smaller and smaller planes making more and more departures. The results of this strategy can be seen on any afternoon at airports such as JFK, Newark, LaGuardia and Washington National, where small regional jets (RJs) account for up to half of all takeoffs and landings. It is not the total volume of passengers slowing things down, it's the inefficient way they are divvied up. In some places, 50 percent of the traffic is carrying a quarter of the people.
How bad does it get? Two weeks ago I was working a flight from Europe to JFK. We landed shortly after 5 p.m. -- several minutes ahead of schedule, ironically -- only to spend the next two hours -- two hours -- taxiing from the end of the runway to our parking position. Our assigned gate was open and available the entire time, but the airport had become a spaghetti snarl of planes. Taxiways were blocked; aprons, clogged. It was literally gridlock -- with scores of 50- and 70-seat RJs jockeying for space with A340s and 747s.
Fair enough -- he's a pilot, and he can see and make sense out of what he sees outside his own window.
If you are like me (fat chance) your market-oriented libertarian instincts kick in: the obvious choice is simply to charge more for takeoffs and landings during peak periods. Yet Smith rejects this obvious solution:
So-called peak-period pricing is a popular and controversial idea, akin to levying heavy tolls on automobile drivers as a way of reducing downtown traffic jams. In cities like London, apparently, such disincentives have met with success. But jetliners are not cars, and airlines are not private motorists. The result would be higher fares with a minimal effect on congestion. Speaking last week to the Senate Subcommittee on Aviation Operations, Safety, and Security, Zane Rowe, a vice president at Continental, said that peak-period pricing "will do nothing more than reduce service to small communities, reduce job growth and raise fares for commercial passengers." Rowe is partly right. The bit about small communities is certainly an eyebrow-raiser, now that RJs operate on mainline trunk routes as much as they fly to minor cities. (Out of New York, they service such "small communities" as Chicago, Miami and Dallas.) He's correct, however, about costs being passed along to fliers. With average ticket prices as low as they are, it'd be relatively easy for airlines to pass along a modest rise to customers. You already pay extra to fly at the choicest times (even if your flights don't actually leave or arrive when they're supposed to). You'd probably pay more. For the scheme to encourage any measurable consolidation, fees would need to be fairly radical, which is to say very expensive, and I don't foresee that happening. The airlines are too strong, regulators too timid. Instead, the probable result: pricier tickets, same delays.
This can't be right. Basic economics tells us that if the price goes up, the amount demanded will go down. You cannot have pricier tickets and no reduction at all in the commodity being priced. At the margin, some travelers will shift to less-popular times. "Pricier tickets, same delays" is simply not a possible outcome.
Now, if they set the price for peak hour departure too low, then it won't have much of an impact, and so we will have pricier tickets and only slightly reduced delays. But if the congestion fee is that modest, well, ticket prices won't go up that much, either.
Besides, having government set the fee for a particular time is a clumsy and stupid way of going about implementing a congestion-fee system. The obvious solution is to figure out how many takeoffs and landings an airport can accomodate during a particular period and then auction off the rights to prime slots. Instead, Smith prefers a command-and-control solution:
If you ask me, the only hope is for carriers to consolidate departures and wean themselves away from their berserk obsession with regional jets. They can do this voluntarily, or the government can force them to by imposing caps. For example: At Kennedy, no aircraft with fewer than 100 seats shall be allowed to take off or land between 5 p.m. and 10 p.m. Or, during that same time frame, each carrier serving the airport must reduce its schedule by a certain prorated percentage that reflects its share of total passengers.
I'm quite certain this man knows more than I do about flying an airplane, or even about the mechanics of how airports work, but it's goofy to think that government-imposed caps will work better than a price system. If nothing else, he claims that government won't set the price high enough because of the strength of airlines and weakness of regulators. Then why, pray tell, does he imagine that government will set the cap correctly? And if he bans planes with fewer than 100 seats, doesn't he just create an incentive to produce airplanes with exactly 101 seats?
For the life of me, I just don't understand the appeal of command-and-control regulations, when market-based solutions are obviously superior.
UPDATE: Reading the comments, I must say, great minds think alike:
Surely the simplest and market friendly solution would be to cap the number of slots at the most congested airports and conduct an open auction for the right to use the slot. This would give the larger airliners an advantage in that their per seat slot cost would be lower than commuter and executive jets and would have the extra advantage of raising funds for the upgrade of traffic control systems.
Alas, this insightful commenter was anonymous, but whoever it was, he or she got it exactly right.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Reputation in the Internet Era
Back during the height of the internet boom, lots of folks were talking about how much the internet changes things. That's been tamped down a bit, but it really has been an important innovation, in a lot of ways. Small stuff: I no longer own a phone book, for example. When I want to look up a phone number, I go on the Web to do it.
One area where, I think, businesses may still be behind the curve is in the way that their reputation can take big hits when they do a bad job with customers. It's not just word-of-mouth any more -- it's word-of-mouth plus word-of-blog, review site, etc. I still get hits on my U.S. Airways Customer Service -- SUCKS post, for example. Google "Dell Hell," and Jeff Jarvis's page will be one of your top hits. My view that Charlie Palmer Steak has good food and lousy service is available for viewing.
It used to be that a restaurant could feel pretty safe in serving rotten food, and then making inadequate recompense to the disgruntled diner. Oh, it could be a secret shopper or incognito restaurant critic, but the chances are it's just some guy. You might lose one customer, or get bad word-of-mouth -- and word-of-mouth is important to restaurants. But the scope of the damage will be limited. Now, however, there's a lot more room damage.
Witness this post back in May, by Stephen Dubner at the Freakonomics blog (via Ian Ayres at Balkanization and then this more recent post at Dubner's blog). Sure, Dubner is a real, live journalist, but he's also a blogger. And, like bloggers, he has the freedom to write about what he feels like. In this case, a restaurant called French Roast served him rotten chicken. When he sent it back, they fought him on it. And then they gave him little recompense -- a few measly bucks off. The manager though she'd gotten him out of there, meek and mild-mannered. And she was right -- he didn't put up a fight.
He wrote about it on his blog. And now it's there, fore all to find, whether through search engine or just following some random links, as I did. And the worst part is, most of the other reviews I've read online look pretty positive. It was probably just a fluke, albeit one that really shouldn't have happened. But fixing it right would probably have been less damaging than incurring the reputational cost associated with getting hammered by a reasonably well-read blogger.
One area where, I think, businesses may still be behind the curve is in the way that their reputation can take big hits when they do a bad job with customers. It's not just word-of-mouth any more -- it's word-of-mouth plus word-of-blog, review site, etc. I still get hits on my U.S. Airways Customer Service -- SUCKS post, for example. Google "Dell Hell," and Jeff Jarvis's page will be one of your top hits. My view that Charlie Palmer Steak has good food and lousy service is available for viewing.
It used to be that a restaurant could feel pretty safe in serving rotten food, and then making inadequate recompense to the disgruntled diner. Oh, it could be a secret shopper or incognito restaurant critic, but the chances are it's just some guy. You might lose one customer, or get bad word-of-mouth -- and word-of-mouth is important to restaurants. But the scope of the damage will be limited. Now, however, there's a lot more room damage.
Witness this post back in May, by Stephen Dubner at the Freakonomics blog (via Ian Ayres at Balkanization and then this more recent post at Dubner's blog). Sure, Dubner is a real, live journalist, but he's also a blogger. And, like bloggers, he has the freedom to write about what he feels like. In this case, a restaurant called French Roast served him rotten chicken. When he sent it back, they fought him on it. And then they gave him little recompense -- a few measly bucks off. The manager though she'd gotten him out of there, meek and mild-mannered. And she was right -- he didn't put up a fight.
He wrote about it on his blog. And now it's there, fore all to find, whether through search engine or just following some random links, as I did. And the worst part is, most of the other reviews I've read online look pretty positive. It was probably just a fluke, albeit one that really shouldn't have happened. But fixing it right would probably have been less damaging than incurring the reputational cost associated with getting hammered by a reasonably well-read blogger.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
"Receipt, Please" at Circuit City
Radley Balko links to this first-person account of a fellow named Michael Amor Righi, who was arrested at Circuit City. By all means read his account for yourself, but the short version is that he went to Circuit City, picked up a few items, paid for them, and left the store. The fellow at the door asked to see his receipt. Instead of complying, he said "no, thank you" and left the store. He was pursued outside the store, had a verbal confrontation with the manager, who blocked him from exiting. Righi ended up calling the cops (because the manager was blocking his exit) and the cop arrested him after he refused to a) show the receipt, and b) show his identification. He was charged with the nebulous charge of "Obstructing Official Business," which really doesn't seem to fit the facts. At least if you believe his account, he didn't do anything to, well, obstruct the police officer, other than refuse to submit to search or hand over his identification.
His account is detailed, and I have to say I vacillated between thinking he was a jerk and admiring his spunk. But he leaves out one key fact: did the Circuit City have a sign, prominently displayed in the front, which indicated that bags were subject to search? If so, then he agreed to enter private property under certain terms, and he should be bound by those terms. I think that Balko gets it exactly right:
Precisely.
Now, I do happen to agree with Righi when he suggests that meek compliance with such demands is not exactly a good sign:
Absolutely. Likewise the degrading and largely pointless rituals at aiport security and other places. But instead of welching on the deal he made with Circuit City when he entered this store, Righi has an alternative way to protest their policy: he can refuse to shop there. And with this internet thing, he can even organize he fellow search-objectors to refrain from shopping at stores like Circuit City and Best Buy en masse.
Nor is it likely that these stores implement such policies because they want to condition us to life ground beneath the heel of our corporate overlords. Rather, I'm guessing they pay somebody to sit outside the door and ask for receipts because such stores are prime targets for shoplifters. And I am guessing that they have a policy of asking everybody because their lawyers have told them that a more focused approach, where they ask some people but not others, will leave them open to discrimination claims by those who do get asked to their receipts.
I do think it was reasonable for the cop to ask to see his receipt, but once it became clear that the goods were not stolen, I don't see why it was necssary to take him into custody.
His account is detailed, and I have to say I vacillated between thinking he was a jerk and admiring his spunk. But he leaves out one key fact: did the Circuit City have a sign, prominently displayed in the front, which indicated that bags were subject to search? If so, then he agreed to enter private property under certain terms, and he should be bound by those terms. I think that Balko gets it exactly right:
If stores like Circuit City make clear that when you step onto their property, you agree to have your bags searched when you leave, then those are the conditions you agree to when you enter. Don't like it? Then shop elsewhere.
Precisely.
Now, I do happen to agree with Righi when he suggests that meek compliance with such demands is not exactly a good sign:
I am interested in living my life on strong principles and standing up for my rights as a consumer, a U.S. citizen and a human being. Allowing stores to inspect our bags at will might seem like a trivial matter, but it creates an atmosphere of obedience which is a dangerous thing.
Absolutely. Likewise the degrading and largely pointless rituals at aiport security and other places. But instead of welching on the deal he made with Circuit City when he entered this store, Righi has an alternative way to protest their policy: he can refuse to shop there. And with this internet thing, he can even organize he fellow search-objectors to refrain from shopping at stores like Circuit City and Best Buy en masse.
Nor is it likely that these stores implement such policies because they want to condition us to life ground beneath the heel of our corporate overlords. Rather, I'm guessing they pay somebody to sit outside the door and ask for receipts because such stores are prime targets for shoplifters. And I am guessing that they have a policy of asking everybody because their lawyers have told them that a more focused approach, where they ask some people but not others, will leave them open to discrimination claims by those who do get asked to their receipts.
I do think it was reasonable for the cop to ask to see his receipt, but once it became clear that the goods were not stolen, I don't see why it was necssary to take him into custody.
Friday, August 31, 2007
US Airways -- I Suspect the Customer Service Still Sucks
This is very funny. Earlier today, somebody accessed this post of mine on my lousy customer service experience with US Airways. They got it through a google search for "US Airways Sucks."
The IP address is from the Philadelphia Airport.
Whatever you are going through, buddy, I feel for you. Best of luck. You will need it.
Have I mentioned that US Airways sucks? Particularly the customer service?
The IP address is from the Philadelphia Airport.
Whatever you are going through, buddy, I feel for you. Best of luck. You will need it.
Have I mentioned that US Airways sucks? Particularly the customer service?
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
US Airways Customer Service -- SUCKS!
Instapundit links to this post by Dean Barnett complaining of his bad experience with Delta. (Insty's bad Delta experience can be found here.)
I have my own recent Bad Airline Customer Service tale of woe to report, and while I've had bad experiences with Delta in the past, the most recent involves a close competitor for Worst Airline Ever -- US Airways. That's right Google, US Airways may well be the Worst Airline Ever. I never got a chance to fly Aeroflot during the bad old days of the Soviet Union, though, so maybe they were worse. US Airways consistently ranks last in customer service. Even Doug Parker, their CEO, knows they have a problem -- he said at the May shareholders meeting "If we don't start running a good airline, we will drive customers away." Wow, he's smart. No wonder he's a CEO!
In any case, or story begins last April -- the Main Squeeze and I are in Vegas for a short trip. Alas, the most convenient routes are former America West routes, now US Airways. On the way back from Vegas, our flight is massively overbooked, and we are in lousy seats -- two middle seats, back of a full plane. So we generously volunteer to take another flight, in exchange for two travel vouchers for $200 each or two round-trip tickets anywhere in the continental United States. Great Deal, right?
Well, not so fast. Last month, in June, we had another trip to Vegas. We figured what the heck -- let's use those vouchers. So we go online to look for a flight. And we find a flight -- but as it turns out, there is no way to use one of their vouchers when booking online. So we call the airline. I don't know where the woman on the other end of the phone was from -- it didn't sound like India, but she certainly didn't speak any form of English that I'm familiar with. I'm sure that after my recent posts on immigration, some folks have marked me down as an intolerant boob, and I know this ain't PC, but I'm sorry -- somebody whose job is to talk to Americans on the phone ought to be able to speak understandable English.
It is a good thing that we had looked for the flight online, because, in addition to being barely able to speak English, she was barely able to do her job. We had to spell out exactly what flight and route we wanted to take, because she couldn't get us there without help. We were able to reserve the seats, at least.
But as for redeeming the vouchers -- no such luck. At least according to her, we had to go to the airport ticket counter and redeem the vouchers in person. So to the airport we go! Well, we get there and make our way to the US Airways ticket counter. As it happens, it's fairly late at night, and it's not particularly crowded. There are two people working behind the counter, both "serving" customers, and two people in line ahead of us. That is right -- a grand total of four people. How long will this take?
Well, we get in line and we wait. And wait. And wait. Finally, one of the people at the ticket counter finishes his customer. Great! But instead of summoning another customer, that agent dissapears behind a door, and is never heard from again. So that leaves one agent for three customers. Finally she finishes the person in front of her, and she summons the next customer. Another interminable wait. And another for the next person.
Finally we make it to the desk. I swear, for a while I thought the ticket agent was mute, because she didn't say a word to us. No "hello, how may I help you?" Certainly not a 'sorry about the long wait in a short line." She simply stood there. We explained what we wanted to do, and she just stared at us. It wasn't clear that she understood what we wanted, or even that she wasn't a zombie. She made no acknowledgment of us at all.
She tries to call somebody on her phone. No answer. Then, still not saying a word, she wanders into the back for a minute. She returns and tries the phone again. When there's no answer, again, she fiddles with her computer for a while. Then it's the back again. It goes like this for about fifteen minutes -- and she makes no effort to tell us what, if anything, is going on. Soon it is fairly obvious that she doesn't have the faintest idea how to redeem the voucher. In fact, she clerly has no idea what to do, and neither the desire nor the ability to tell us what the problem is or make anythng more than a desultory effort to fix it. Finally, we just give up and pay for the tickets. We were in the airport for over an hour, and of course had to pay for parking. An hour! To wait on five customers, and not very well at that. (One of the people ahead of us was another voucher-carrier, and that person left frustrated, voucher still in hand.)
US Airways offers these travel vouchers whenever their planes are overbooked. Which, these days, is "nearly every flight." I mean, I've seen the gate people give these away like candy on Halloween. Then US Airways make it virtually impossible to cash them in. Can't do it online, can't do it over the phone. And apparently they don't instruct the agents at the ticket counter in how to do it.
That goes beyond really bad customer service at US Airways. To me, that's tantamount to fraud. They're giving away "vouchers" that are worthless because US Airways makes it well-nigh impossible to actually cash them in. What a rip-off!
Oh, I should linke to Christopher Penn, who has a similar tale of woe at US Airways. You know, a story about how US Airways customer service sucks.
UPDATE: More US Airways horror stories here! I feel lucky in comparison!
I have my own recent Bad Airline Customer Service tale of woe to report, and while I've had bad experiences with Delta in the past, the most recent involves a close competitor for Worst Airline Ever -- US Airways. That's right Google, US Airways may well be the Worst Airline Ever. I never got a chance to fly Aeroflot during the bad old days of the Soviet Union, though, so maybe they were worse. US Airways consistently ranks last in customer service. Even Doug Parker, their CEO, knows they have a problem -- he said at the May shareholders meeting "If we don't start running a good airline, we will drive customers away." Wow, he's smart. No wonder he's a CEO!
In any case, or story begins last April -- the Main Squeeze and I are in Vegas for a short trip. Alas, the most convenient routes are former America West routes, now US Airways. On the way back from Vegas, our flight is massively overbooked, and we are in lousy seats -- two middle seats, back of a full plane. So we generously volunteer to take another flight, in exchange for two travel vouchers for $200 each or two round-trip tickets anywhere in the continental United States. Great Deal, right?
Well, not so fast. Last month, in June, we had another trip to Vegas. We figured what the heck -- let's use those vouchers. So we go online to look for a flight. And we find a flight -- but as it turns out, there is no way to use one of their vouchers when booking online. So we call the airline. I don't know where the woman on the other end of the phone was from -- it didn't sound like India, but she certainly didn't speak any form of English that I'm familiar with. I'm sure that after my recent posts on immigration, some folks have marked me down as an intolerant boob, and I know this ain't PC, but I'm sorry -- somebody whose job is to talk to Americans on the phone ought to be able to speak understandable English.
It is a good thing that we had looked for the flight online, because, in addition to being barely able to speak English, she was barely able to do her job. We had to spell out exactly what flight and route we wanted to take, because she couldn't get us there without help. We were able to reserve the seats, at least.
But as for redeeming the vouchers -- no such luck. At least according to her, we had to go to the airport ticket counter and redeem the vouchers in person. So to the airport we go! Well, we get there and make our way to the US Airways ticket counter. As it happens, it's fairly late at night, and it's not particularly crowded. There are two people working behind the counter, both "serving" customers, and two people in line ahead of us. That is right -- a grand total of four people. How long will this take?
Well, we get in line and we wait. And wait. And wait. Finally, one of the people at the ticket counter finishes his customer. Great! But instead of summoning another customer, that agent dissapears behind a door, and is never heard from again. So that leaves one agent for three customers. Finally she finishes the person in front of her, and she summons the next customer. Another interminable wait. And another for the next person.
Finally we make it to the desk. I swear, for a while I thought the ticket agent was mute, because she didn't say a word to us. No "hello, how may I help you?" Certainly not a 'sorry about the long wait in a short line." She simply stood there. We explained what we wanted to do, and she just stared at us. It wasn't clear that she understood what we wanted, or even that she wasn't a zombie. She made no acknowledgment of us at all.
She tries to call somebody on her phone. No answer. Then, still not saying a word, she wanders into the back for a minute. She returns and tries the phone again. When there's no answer, again, she fiddles with her computer for a while. Then it's the back again. It goes like this for about fifteen minutes -- and she makes no effort to tell us what, if anything, is going on. Soon it is fairly obvious that she doesn't have the faintest idea how to redeem the voucher. In fact, she clerly has no idea what to do, and neither the desire nor the ability to tell us what the problem is or make anythng more than a desultory effort to fix it. Finally, we just give up and pay for the tickets. We were in the airport for over an hour, and of course had to pay for parking. An hour! To wait on five customers, and not very well at that. (One of the people ahead of us was another voucher-carrier, and that person left frustrated, voucher still in hand.)
US Airways offers these travel vouchers whenever their planes are overbooked. Which, these days, is "nearly every flight." I mean, I've seen the gate people give these away like candy on Halloween. Then US Airways make it virtually impossible to cash them in. Can't do it online, can't do it over the phone. And apparently they don't instruct the agents at the ticket counter in how to do it.
That goes beyond really bad customer service at US Airways. To me, that's tantamount to fraud. They're giving away "vouchers" that are worthless because US Airways makes it well-nigh impossible to actually cash them in. What a rip-off!
Oh, I should linke to Christopher Penn, who has a similar tale of woe at US Airways. You know, a story about how US Airways customer service sucks.
UPDATE: More US Airways horror stories here! I feel lucky in comparison!
Megan's Sony Agonies
Megan McCardle recounts recent difficulties in getting Sony to deliver good customer service. She ends with the pledge to never leave Dell again. Her assessment: "They're surly, but when something breaks, they send someone out with a new part the next day." Well, maybe. A quick Google for "Dell Hell" will turn up horror stories galore. Although, at least if Jeff Jarvis is to be believed, they are trying to get better. One problem with evaluating customer service is that it can be really variable -- one customer will get great service, while another gets the run-around. Looks like Megan is in "Sony hell" right now.
For what it's worth, I've had pretty good luck with Apple's customer service -- although of course Apple products cost more. In any case, I wish Megan luck in getting her computer fixed.
For what it's worth, I've had pretty good luck with Apple's customer service -- although of course Apple products cost more. In any case, I wish Megan luck in getting her computer fixed.
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