Originally Posted by
vasantn
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I was composing a response but you said it better than I could. AA should thank its stars that the other legacy airlines are even more clueless about customer service.
This is the 21st century. The customer is not an impediment. This incident is a classic example of how to take an opportunity and turn it into a problem. Forget about whether AA was entitled to charge the fee or not; that's entirely irrelevant to the customer satisfaction issue.
Totally agree. Just started reading a book by Fred Reichheld called "The Ultimate Question- Driving Good Profits and True Growth", which clearly articulates the importance of rooting out "bad", short-term "profits", i.e. the $150 change fee, and focusing like crazy on building loyalty and thus creating "Net Promoters" of the company. AA should want to have a core group of customers be avid promoters (recommending AA to friends, family and business acquaintances) but being backed by top notch customer friendly behavior by AA in ALL instances. The good profits will follow...