MilesBuzz! - What's your reaction to this????

I just returned to my office from the NWA ticket office in downtown Minneapolis. I usually don't go there, but I had a coupon I had to give to them to get the discount.

What upset me was this:

Behind the main counter, the ticket agents have a clear plastic cover over their counter. Beneath this, they place reminders of certian codes, etc. These are all clearly in view of customers. All of these things were facing the agent, not the customer, because they were for the agent to read. That is, except one thing...

This one thing was a letter to the editor clipping from USA today. It had no date, but the Letter's Title was this:

"Air Travelers are the Worst".

The letter was written by a former CS agent for a major airline. It savaged airline passengers, particularly business travellers. The letter reminded business travellers not to forget the "upgrades and free tickets they are frequently given at no cost" and how well they are treated.

The general message and tone of the letter was something like this:

"All airline passengers, particularly business travelers, are monsters.
Customer Service agents and Airlines are always right. Be happy with whatever you get, you spoiled brat."

The clipping was facing the customer, so you couldn't miss it. I felt saddened, like my business wasn't wanted, and that there was a presumption that I was a jerk. I can't imagine what the agent who put that there's motivation was, other than to basically tell the customers to F*** off before they said anything at all.

I respect the right of the airport employee who wrote the letter to express their views. I just feel that it is WHOLLY INAPPROPRIATE to display this letter to customers as if it is a statement of policy.

Oh yeah, and the agent was really mean to me, even though I asked for nothing out of the ordinary. She harassed me about my signature, becuase it didn't "exactly match" the one on my credit card. I offered her a photo ID, but she wouldn't have that.

Impressions???

I am thinking of writing NWA and asking them to have this letter removed. Is that the message they want to send to people who walk into their non-airport ticker office?

And for those of you in MSP, this is on display in the Northstar Center in Downtown Minneapolis, right next to "Take a number" thing.


[This message has been edited by BoSoxFan45 (edited 08-21-2000).]

For my part, I think the employee's freedom of speech ends at the point where the employee speaks for the organization.

When an employee is in uniform, she should adhere to the employer's policy with respect to communication.

I think the airline should be made aware of this. This type of behaviour is unacceptable from any front-line employee of any organization.

Agreed I would most certainly send a letter with the location, agents name, supervisor etc. I would sure thing that agent is in the wrong business. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif


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Cheers Scott

By all means, tell the airline as quick as you can. As far as you, the customer, are concerned, anything on display in the office is an official company statement. I wouldn't want to do business with a company that has such an attitude towards their customers.

/Pete

Sorry, BoSoxFan45, but you most likely are mistaken, IMHO.

This could NOT possibly have happened at NWA! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

-YankeeFan1

BTW- MSP is sooo nice! What do they have posted at places like DTW? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

I would send a written letter to NWA HQ, copy to the office supervisor, right away. There is no excuse for this in front of the customers - whao are the only reason they have a job. This really speaks of poor leadership at the office and I'm sure Doc would add overall as well http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif Although I must say that I have never had a problem with NWA in 5 years...well there was that one time...

BoSoxFan: I wonder if I should head downtown on Monday, "discover" it, and mention something to them-- did you mention anything to the agent? What did he/she say?

There's nothing like the "hometown" airline-- although after a CVG nightmare on DL last week, I felt especially at home on NW in FC without pre-departure drinks on Wednesday..... :P

As an executive responsible for customer service delivery among other things, my advice is to write VP Operations, VP Marketing, and VP Investor Relations, copying local newspaper and the airline's frequent flier program chief... This is absolutely, unequivocably inexcusable!

But first, go back with a camera. Seriously.

Elektrik

As an airline employee I have to admit that even the best of us get upset and vent at times. You wouldn't believe some of the things that are said to us and about us when we can hear it. However, there is no excuse for this and IMHO you should have asked immediately for a supervisor and asked if this is how they encourage passenger loyalty. In the business today, as in most businesses, the only thing we have to offer to offset the competition is customer service. When I am at my job, as far as I am concerned, I AM American Airlines, and it behooves me to treat my customer with all the skill and courtesy I can muster. I am sorry this happened and I agree it should be reported to management right away.

my reactions (I hope) would be
1) photo (I probably would have my spy Minox with me)
2) I would tell the employee about my feelings right away - face to face, eye to eye
3) depending on the employee's reaction then ...

Very poor customer relations if the letter faced the customers. Can't imagine why the supervisor of that station has allowed it.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

Wouldn't it be VERY interesting to spend a day behind the counter listening to the passengers?????

RDURES1 - You are one of a kind. It's agents like you that make us want to fly. I find that 80 percent of all airline personell except SouthWest Airline agents are control freaks hiding behind the phone and or computer. All NorthWest is doing is bitting the hand which feeds them.

[This message has been edited by Sydneyjb (edited 08-19-2000).]

In the eyes of the airline employee, apparently the customer is the enemy. True, some travelers can be pretty tough, but this attitude that upgrades and awards are FREE is baloney. You don't get them without having bought plenty of tickets. It's a marketing cost for the airline. Hey guys, no matter how you account for them, we PAID for those in one form or another, and by the way, anything you give us is only left after you first tried to sell it.

[This message has been edited by deelmakur (edited 08-19-2000).]

RDURES1,

Great comments... could not agree more. I can certainly understand how trying it can be to work with customers... but no excuse for that behavior.

William

I agree that this is unacceptable, but I always find it difficult to draw that line on when you actually complain and when you don't.

Personally, for something like this I would consider that it didn't actually 'damage' me and therefore I would not complain - but the next time the airline came to me for comments (a questionnaire, survey etc. I would point it out as an example of bad service).

To as large an extent as possible, I always vote with my feet, if the service is poor I try not to fly with the airline - I do not believe that the customer should be the quality control for a company.


Nick

Unfortunately I think this attitude pervades NW airlines. I doubt you'll get any meaningful response from management, but my fingers are crossed...

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Get my trip reports mailed to you! http://www.egroups.com/subscribe/liontales

It's unbelieveable, but I won't be too surprised if you get a reply from NWA management that tells you the posted letter is company policy. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Don't do anything and let the airline continue demonstrating its true colors! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Seriously - this is about as unprofessional as it gets short of opening mocking you to your face.

Complaining at the local level gets you the satisfaction of getting a personal apology and probably little else.

Complaining at the corporate level may get you some minor perq as well as to send a little shock wave through the office.

If it were another airline, I'd even supect it could cost someone their job. Since it's NW, they'll probably only reprimand the office manager for not having it on NW letterhead.

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"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own."

A letter has been drafted and will be sent tomorrow. I'm not the letter-writing type, but this is absurd and hurtful. It makes me never want to fly NWA again.

So it's a "thank you" letter then?

James: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

Also see:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum35/HTML/000615.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum35/HTML/000596.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum35/HTML/000574.html

[This message has been edited by doc (edited 08-20-2000).]

That situation is totally unacceptable. If it happened to me, I would have made an issue of it immediately. I hope you have included the agents name in your letter.

By the way, did the posted letter have the former CS Agent's for employer's name in the article?

Please keep us updated.
(BTW - James: that was very funny!! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif )

-RKG

No-
Although I suspect it was a particular agent, they don't all use the same desk location each time, and I'd hate to get the wrong person in trouble. But it should come down. No question about that.

If any MSP people want to meet me and some other frequent MSP flyers to go down there en masse and raise a stink about it face to face, I'm all in favor of that. It could be a little FT get-together.

Alert the press! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

I suprised you controled yourself. I would have asked about the clipping on the spot. You should definatly follow up on it though.

Freefaller12k

Deeeesgusting!

As another airline employee please accept my blanket apology that creatures like this are allow out in public and worse, allowed to "serve" the public. Unfortunately, through their thoughtless or rude behaviour, they rapidly undo all the good and professional PR many of the rest of us strive to deliver. We move 1 step forward providing customer satisfaction and contributing to customer loyalty and they knock us back 5.

I would definitely write and as pointed out, I am surprised that you didn't make a comment on the spot but the shock probably held your tongue hostage.

For most computer transactions an agent's ID number is logged although I cannot speak for NWA's system. Do you have a paper record from your visit to the ticket office that would assist in tracking down the correct employee?

I was sorry to read of your treatment and the blatant display of this article. It should be addressed and the clipping yanked pronto.

Proving once again why Northwest has earned reputation of Northworst! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/eek.gif

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" Lambert International, St. Louis --- the Bermuda Triangle of the Midwest."

I sent an e-mail to NW Customer service describing the article clipping, along with another customer service matter at the Mpls. City Ticket Office. A supervisor replied that my comments would be forwarded to the manager of MN ticket offices.

However, on a visit to the ticket office on Friday, I found the newspaper article was still in the same noticable spot. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

I mentioned that this had been a discussion topic on-line among NW flyers-- I wonder what response steps may be taken now.

As an airline employee I am taking another stance. The place for that article was not in front of the customers but perhaps in a back room. I agree it was in poor taste but I think many on this post are being way too sensitive. And for those other airline employees - you have never done ANYTHING wrong ??? You are perfect and have never gotten any complaints about your "service" with a customer? Living in an imperfect world I would find that extremely hard to believe, not to mention millions of other employees who deal with the public other than airline employees. In other words, you think that employees of Macys, McDonald's, Hertz, movie theaters, restaurants, toll booths, etc., etc., couldn't or shouldn't have anything negative to say about the customer (out of earshot of course).
Get real, being politically correct 100% of the time is not possible in an imperfect world. Wake up and slap that cemented phoney smile off your face. I may not be rude to a customer but if I want to call him/her an a--hole after they walk away when they have been rude,dumb and nasty to me, I am not going to worry about some holier than thou, "sinless" coworker who actually believes that people like this don't exist. I keep an eye out for those like you who are ready to rat out/write letters in an instant with no real facts.

I also work in a service industry. Anyone who has read "House of God" knows that dealing with people can be difficult, and often times we service providers develop "abnormal" or "insensitive" defense mechanisms.

The problem is not with these defenses - else we'd go crazy - but in blatantly flaunting them before those being served. This crosses the line from a method of dealing with stress to significantly damaging the relationships we count on for our jobs.

I would get a photo, and then write a letter. Those responsible should held accountable.

I must say that what surprises me even more than this event itself, are some of the posts from people in the airline industry. I cannot understand how you can possibly justify this... (good grief!!) Lets not forget that biting the hand that feeds us is not exactly in our interest.


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Gaucho100K

Originally posted by misstree:
The place for that article was not in front of the customers but perhaps in a back room.

In other words, you think that employees of Macys, McDonald's, Hertz, movie theaters, restaurants, toll booths, etc., etc., couldn't or shouldn't have anything negative to say about the customer (out of earshot of course).

Out of earshot, and in a back room, OK. But this has been visible to every passenger helped at that particular terminal daily for the past months. It is VERY MUCH in view, as I was able to spot it when BoSoxFan first wrote about it.

I keep an eye out for those like you who are ready to rat out/write letters in an instant with no real facts.

I waited for 3 months after BoSoxFan's August letter before mentioning the article-- and my letter mentioned the article as reflective of a worse experience in the office. I am frankly surprised that for 3 months, the article has remained in the same visible place.

For what it's worth, this is one of 2 customer service letters I've written to NWA in the past 3 years-- the other letter opposed not giving frequent flyer credit for CyberSavers. I am very "Minnesotan" in many respects, including not complaining, but voting with my feet, as Merry mentioned above. However, I did decide to write the letter on the other customer service matter after a month of consideration.

[This message has been edited by Viajero Joven (edited 11-14-2000).]

After I wrote about the first e-mail about 2 weeks ago, I later replied to tell the Customer Service rep that I would be in Mpls again this weekend, and I would check the city ticket office to see if the article is still there. It was, so I sent a follow up letter. Here is NWA's reply:


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Dear <Viajero Joven>,

Thank you for your additional comments. I am glad that your trip to Minneapolis went fine.

I am sorry that the email that the City Ticket Office in Downtown Minneapolis did not take down the newspaper clipping. I appreciate you taking the time to let me know that the newspaper clipping was still up.

I contacted the City Ticket Office myself and advised them to take down the news clippings right away if it has not already been taken down.

The supervisor I spoke did not see the newspaper clipping that you described. She placed me on hold and checked numerous times. I also provided her with YYYY name and asked her to speak with YYYY to see
if it was her article. She advised that she would do this.

Please let me know if you encounter this again. I will escalate this concern to a higher executive to ensure that the newspaper clipping is removed.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact Northwest Airlines. I hope that we have an early opportunity to serve your travel needs.

Sincerely,

ZZZZZ
Supervisor, Customer Relations
Northwest/KLM Airlines


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I won't be in Mpls for... oh wait, next Friday... but could someone else (BoSoxFan?) check and see if it's still there? It's at the closest terminal to the "Take a Number" machine, facing Marquette.

I guess we all have to deal with a disagreeable passenger (customer) occasionally and we all vent off the phones or at home. However, the subject of this thread is the fact that this is blatantly put where the flying/buying public can read it. Why don't we just put up signs saying, "Sorry we don't want your business, go away. But before you go let me slap you across the face."
Now I am not prissy, but to the best of my knowledge, I've never had a complaint lodged against me in this job. I try really really hard to understand where my passenger is coming from if they are upset or angry and we never know what is happening in that person's life that we don't know about. Maybe they lost the last sale, maybe they just came from a meeting where they have been chewed out, maybe they're missing a big family do at home and maybe their spouse is having a fit because they're always gone. Possibly it has been one too many flight delays or one two many CSR's having a bad day. My job is to help that person to the best of my ability and represent my airline the best way I know how. If this is wrong or if this somehow makes me a bad person then so be it. But I believe that 99 9/10 of the flying public are nice people and I will continue to act that way. If they're not nice, I'll still be nice, maybe I can turn their day around.
I sincerely hope that none of my passengers ever end a call to me feeling that I didn't do my absolute best to try and assist them. These people don't sign my paycheck but without them I wouldn't have a paycheck, or medical benefits, retirement, profit sharing and on and on. My job is Customer Service and I hope I always deserve to be called a Customer Service Professional.

[This message has been edited by RDURES1 (edited 11-15-2000).]

Wow...I wish I had seen this thread earlier.

The article was located and removed yesterday. On behalf of NWA, I
apologize to all customers who were offended by this situation.

My understanding is that the article was given to one of the
agents by a customer. Very funny and all that, but someone
showed extremely poor judgement in deciding to post it for all
to "enjoy". At any rate, once the Manager of the MSP area CTOs was
made aware (simultaneously by me and a customer's email) he
made sure it was removed. We will also make sure it's made clear to
the CTO staff that they can't do this...it should be obvious, I know.
We also need to follow up with Customer Relations about why the CTO
Manager didn't hear about this when the first complaint was made.

Thanks for posting this, BoSoxFan. Sorry I did not see it sooner.

On my job, I'm very careful about putting articles and other stuff up. There are people who can get very and easily offended (there was a big issue raised by a woman over a website for the adult sitcome "Married with Children." Seems something printed off the site ended up in her hands and it was war!)

(I also hated the show IMHO.)

SO I guess the best advice is watch what you post. I probably would not have even noticed the article in my rush. But nice eyes BoSoxFan.

Great postings RDULES. AND you too MJW, nice response as always. It's good to see you here again.

(OMNI: Could you e-mail privately. I have an issue that needs to be taken care of. Promise e-mail will stay confidential.)


[This message has been edited by Catman (edited 11-15-2000).]

I am glad this story ended well. I think it is all too easy to interpret the anger or disgruntlement of one employee as the policy of an entire airline. Northwest's response, finally, showed that is not.

One other comment: it is a dangerous thing to defend this kind of offensive material as "venting", or even to say it's o.k. "in the back room." Wherever it is, it creates a corporate culture of customer-as-enemy, and that culture is in neither our-the passengers'- interest, or the airline's.

That was outrageous!!! I hope that agent got fired. Sadly, this is not the first nor last time this type of attitude is displayed at NW. Couple of weeks ago my sister who happens to be an "experienced frequent flyer" went into the SFO ticket office to purchase her reservation. She requested paper ticket for this particular transaction and the lady at the counter replied: "YOU DON'T WANT A PAPER TKT BECAUSE THEY GET LOST AND YOU WILL BE CHARGED AGAIN" and proceeded to just give her a receipt for an electronic ticket without her consent. She was insulted by such unprofessional behavior.

Thank you very much MJW! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

With apologies for my being "difficult" in the past,

-Mark

I missed this thread until now. As a CS fanatic I'm apalled by this whole issue. That it was allowed by the office mgr. is even worse.

And to MJW...as always you are 'on the case'. You are a class act. Sure wish DL had you ... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

"Smithers, fire that man!"

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Time..... is on my side.

Release the hounds! This is exactly the type of thing the airlines WANT to hear about. I am absolutly sure NWA is unaware of, and would be appalled to discover. Any customer service sensitive business would be. Hopefully they will thank you for "reporting" the situation to them.

From the latest person who actually did report it to Customer Service:

The correspondence was:
Letter 1: informed NWA of situation
Letter 2: Form letter response: "we will get on this"
Letter 3: Replied I would look for article during a trip 2 weeks later; informed that I had learned of the article through an online frequent flyer forum"
Letter 4: "Thank you for your additional comments. They were forwarded to to the CTO supervisor"
Letter 5: I saw the article again at the CTO. There is ongoing discussion about it on the online forum at www..... (http://www.....) link to this thread. I recommend NWA address the situation.
Letter 6: "I contacted the ticket office directly and 'advised them to remove it right away'. They couldn't find the clipping right away but I told the supervisor to take care of it. 'Please let me know if you encounter this again. I will escalate this concern to a higher executive to ensure that the newspaper clipping is
removed.'"

I think the CS agent took notice when I replied that the article was there.

Frankly, I don't want anyone fired over this, and I say this as the person who brought the issue forward recently. However, I agree that it sends a very negative message to customers. Maybe this is the Minnesotan in me: I see it as NW being a little too casual in their confidence that they have the MSP market so locked up that they don't need to worry about pleasing the customers. I don't think that article would have stayed in, say, an LA ticket office where NWA has to compete hard, and where customer service is more crucial in winning passengers.


[This message has been edited by Viajero Joven (edited 11-20-2000).]

Thank you for taking care of this.

I think everyone who saw it deserves an apology from the staff at the office.
The right thing to do would be to post a personal apology to all customers where the offensive article used to be.

I don't think anyone should be fired, but this is NOT at all the way to make people happy to be doing business with you.

I am going to go down there in a little while to see for myself that it is gone.



[This message has been edited by BoSoxFan45 (edited 11-20-2000).]