No customer service phone line?

By Jim Swoboda, President & Chief Change Nut

Over and over again, the major airlines miss the mark when it comes to customer service. This past week on February 12, 2009, the following was shared in the WSJ:

United Airlines is dropping an Indian customer call center that took compliments or complaints after a flight, telling customers to send a letter or e-mail instead. The nation's third largest airline told workers on Tuesday it would stop publishing its customer relations phone number, which will be turned off all together at the end of April. United spokeswoman Robin Urbanski said the airline is able to respond better to customers who write, since they often include more detail, making it possible to provide a more specific response. "We did a lot of research, we looked into it, and people who email or write us are more satisfied with our responses," she said. United is a unit of UAL Corp. Phone-reservation agents in Chicago and Honolulu will be cross-trained to respond to written customer feedback, too. That will keep 165 jobs in those two centers, she said. No changes are planned at United's third reservation center, in Detroit, which will continue to take phone calls (including after-flight responses) from United's largest customers. Ms. Urbanski said the rise of Internet booking means it now makes sense to have reservation agents also handle after-flight calls from customers. She said the new arrangement would be "cost-neutral" versus having the calls answered in India.

A couple things come to mind to us at CultureMD.

First, when was the last time you had an opportunity to actually call because you had a compliment you wanted to share with United?

Second, the continued pressure on the industry clearly has United looking at their people as dollar and cent signs to be managed as such, reduced to commodity status, easily cut or replaceable, is it much of a stretch to think that those who are treated that way would treat others the same? If companies simply let their people know how valuable they really are to their company, that regardless of how many planes they have, or cities they fly to, without people, none of it would work.

The truly differentiating factor and ONLY competitive advantage is people, PERIOD.

Date: Mon, 16 Feb 2009 09:16:05 EST