Tuesday, December 28, 2010

A tale of two customer service approaches.

In today's Business Day section of the New York Times, there's one story about how Disney is able to reduce the frustration level of people who are waiting in lines at the parks (here) and another story about how difficult it is for the airlines to cope with all of the headaches about having to cancel flights during bad weather (here).

Disney has incentives to keep its guests happy.  Happy guests buy more souvenirs, come back to the parks, and tell their friends about their experiences there.

Airlines, on the other hand, have that new legislation -- the law that requires them to pay fines for staying on the tarmac for too many hours -- and their thin profit margins, which combine to reduce their ability (or desire?) to figure out how to reroute stranded customers when all flights are already filled to capacity.

Maybe it's a combination of company culture and outside incentives, but the juxtaposition of the two approaches is telling.  Disney wants to make people enjoy their time in its parks; airlines want to keep their costs low.

2 comments:

Joseph C. McDaniel said...

Nancy, I love your blog. I'm going to try to figure out how to keep my bankruptcy clients relatively happy while they're on the tarmac waiting to pass the Means Test or waiting to get their tax refund before filing. Do I have a clue how to do that? Nope. But I'll find a way! And thank you again for your insights. I would never have thought about comparing Disney to Airlines. But that's why I read your blog!

Unknown said...

Thanks so much--and now that I've found YOUR blog (http://www.arizonabankruptcyblog.info/), I'm putting it on my Google home page!