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United Airlines - Customer Service & Technology Incompetence (not guitars but lost bags)

Here's my tale of United Airlines technical incompetence and lack of customer service.  While it doesn't have the visual attraction or word of mouth potency of the "United Breaks Guitars" YouTube video, it reflects an equally frustrating experience with the airline. 

We made plans to travel to Porto Portugal for a 10 day vacation earlier this month.  When we arrived at O'Hare (ORD) for our flight from ORD -  Newark (EWR) with a connection in Newark (EWR) on TAP to Porto (OPO), we were told that the United flight to Newark had been canceled for mechanical reasons and that even though we were there two hours before the flight departure time and had an hour and a half transfer time in Newark that there were no possible flight connections to Newark on any airline that would match up with the TAP flight schedule. 

We assumed that United and their code share partner TAP (Portuguese Airlines) would have automatically re-booked us on flights to Porto, but this wasn't the case.  In fact, initially United International Check-In personnel said that since TAP wasn't a Star Alliance partner, that our only recourse was to take a flight the next day to Newark connecting to the daily TAP flight from EWR to OPO (if they had any seats available).  We corrected the harried agent and told him that TAP was a Star Alliance partner and after much work on the computer they finally re-booked us on a United flight from ORD to Frankfurt, connecting with a code share Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt to OPO arriving 10 hours after our scheduled arrival time.  We finally arrived and had a great time in Porto.  United had other flights that would have left earlier, but was unable to get us on them.

Our return flight was on TAP from OPO - EWR, connecting with United Airlines on a flight from EWR - ORD.  All went relatively smoothly on the return, or so we thought.  We arrived in Newark about 45 minutes late, but still had plenty of time for our connecting flight to Chicago.  We made it through customs and took our bags with their TAP baggage tags with our United Flight 651 final destination of ORD still attached to the interline domestic transfer station, assuming there would be no problems with our bags.  Little did we know how wrong this assumption was to be.

When we got to ORD, we looked on the announcement board for what carousel had our bags, but couldn't find any mention of the flight.  Finally after looking at the screens at individual carousels we found the appropriate one with our Flight 651 from Newark.  We waited and waited for our baggage to show up, but nothing showed up. 

United Airlines apparently has decided to not only charge you for bags, but to eliminate people in its baggage services area, so now requires you to go to a baggage service kiosk to report missing or delayed bags.  I proceeded to the kiosk to fill out all my information on the three missing bags - a blue duffel bag, black garment bag and gray mid-size roller bag.  I assumed that I would be shown a confirming screen about my claim information or would be given a print out of my claim, but this was not the way United had programmed its kiosks.  I did receive a single short print-out with a United claim number that I could enter at United.com/bagtrack,  Needless to say I've been trying to locate my 3 lost bags since Monday with greater and greater frustration mounting all week long. 

The United Airlines bagtrack system stated:

"At this time, we have not received confirmation that your baggage has been located. We assure you we are doing all possible to search for your property and will provide an updated status as soon as we receive it. Meanwhile, please know most of our delayed bags are located and returned within the first 24 hours.

Once your baggage arrives and is available, we will contact you to arrange a convenient delivery time. If the address provided is a hotel, we will instead arrange to leave the bag(s) with the hotel front desk. It would be helpful to notify the front desk you are expecting a baggage delivery.

We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience." (emphasis added)

Given this statement of 24 hours being typical, I decided to try talking to a real person on day 2.  After getting through the Interactive Voice Response system, I finally located a real person, who told me that they would put a track on the bags at Newark and would call me back when they were found.  Needless to say United never called back.

I continued to check the United Airlines Bagtrack Baggage Claim Tracking website for updates and it still didn't say anything differently.  I called again and got the same answer after going through the IVR tree.  Meantime on Thursday night, someone from Newark Baggage Handling (not United mind you), called me to say they had found one of the bags, the blue duffel bag.  I explained the whole itinerary routing and gave him the United Baggage report number, but was told that they used numeric numbers not alpha-numeric like United.  He did say that he would deliver the bag to United in Newark. 

I assumed that my trusty little Baggage Claim Tracking System would show that United now had this bag and it was en route to its final destination in Madison, but obviously my assumptions were wrong.

Friday afternoon, we received a call from Lufthansa at Newark telling us that they had found our bags at Lufthansa, but didn't know where to send them since there were no airline claim tags on them.  We explained the whole story to the very helpful Anita at Lufthansa and she said she'd call us back and would get them to United.  She called us back later that afternoon and said she was transferring them to United for delivery to us.

One would assume that once United received these bags that the Baggage Claim Tracking System would be updated with the new information, but obviously my assumptions were wrong.

I continued to log on to the Baggage Claim Tracking System with no new information found on the system, so I decided to call United Airlines yet again.  I got to their call center which I assume is in India given the language skills of the agent.  I told him the story yet again and he still had no records of the 3 suitcases that have been found at Newark and at Lufthansa at Newark.  He put me on hold and did some further searching and finally found that two bags had flown out on United to O'Hare, but didn't know anything about the third bag.  He also couldn't tell me which of the three distinctly different bags in both form and color (blue duffel, black garment or grey roller)  were supposedly en route to O'Hare. 

Once again, I assumed that the United Baggage Claim Tracking System would be updated, but obviously my assumptions were wrong, since I still don't have any further information and am not any closer to knowing when or if these bags will be delivered here in Madison.

Not only have I now written this lengthy blog posting about my experience with United Airlines, I've tweeted about this incident multiple times @thewebchef all week long.  I would have assumed that United Airlines would have some sort of social media monitoring team to track and respond to these tweets, but obviously I'm wrong given that no feedback has been received.

I also would assume that their baggage claim tracking system would be continuously updated as new information was found but obviously I'm wrong about this too.

Now at 11:21, I got a call from the local delivery service confirming they were delivering two bags to my home and yet the baggage claim tracking system still hasn't been updated!  Needless to say, I still don't know where the 3rd bag is or when it will be delivered.

New Article published on Wisconsin Technology Network - "Nowhere to hide"

I've written another article for Wisconsin Technology Network in the ongoing series in the Buzz Networks series of columns.  The article "Nowhere to hide: buyer behavior in a connected world" discusses the impact of the Internet on buyer behavior.

Paul Gibler

Where the Guys and Gals are...

Richard Florida, author of "The Rise of the Creative Class" and "Who's Your City?" has posted some very interesting demographic information profiling cities by their balance of men to women.  The map is intriguing in that it shows a pronounced east west divide with more single women east of that line and more single men west of that mythical line.  Data is for singles ages 20 - 64.   

I'd love to see an overlay of other geodemographic information about women-owned businesses, patent filings etc. to see how this correlates with other business information.

The data has some interesting implications for consumer marketers targeting singles of either gender.

New Article in Wisconsin Technology Network - Big Brother is Watching

I've written a new article in the ongoing series of Buzz Network articles in Wisconsin Technology Network.  The article "Big Brother is Watching; Privacy Barriers are Falling Down" examines some of the recent government and industry intrusions into consumer privacy along with providing suggestions for ways that businesses can avoid problems with their customer's privacy. 

New Column in Wisconsin Technology Network - 5 Fearless Technology forecasts for 2008

I've written a new column in the ongoing series of Buzz Network columns for Wisconsin Technology Network.  The new column "5 fearless technology forecasts for 2008" looks at 5 key trends or forecasts that will be impacting e-business and marketing in 2008. 

1. Niches
2. Multi-channel content delivery
3. High design and hybrid technology enhancements
4. Web 2.0 implementation
5. Changing consumer behavior

Paul Gibler
the Web Chef
ConnectingDots

Bacn Management - e-mail infoglut management strategies

According to The Wall Street Journal, the Radicati Group reports that "the average corporate e-mail user received 126 messages a day, up 55% from 2003".  This infoglut is the result not only of continuing problems with spam, but with the growth of what is now being called "bacn" or "e-mail you want, but not right now". While spam filters, white lists, black lists, trusted senders and other tools have been and continue to make inroads against spam; "bacn" both from external and internal sources is clogging e-mail inboxes.  This infoglut is creating major headaches for recipients and corporations alike.  The importance of this problem is clear with The Wall Street Journal article stating "Email overload is now considered a much bigger workplace problem than traditional email spam."

Companies are approaching the "bacn" growth with a number of strategies.  According to a recent article in Computerworld, one strategy being pursued is the introduction of enterprise RSS feeds.  These RSS feeds, much like those consumers are latching on to, allow workers to subscribe or be subscribed to content feeds that are relevant or critical to their work.  This narrowcasting can reduce the infoglut of e-mail.  I know that when given a choice between e-mail and RSS, I'll subscribe to an RSS feed, however if it is what I call "crispy bacn" (mmmm, my favorite) or messages that I really want to see, I like to receive these via e-mail.  The reason for this is that I subscribe to so many feeds (I know a glutton for punishment) that it can often be weeks or days to get to the feeds that I'm less interested in.  Among the enterprise RSS feed companies that are referenced in the article are Attensa, KnowNow and NewsGator,

In a different strategy for e-mail infoglut management, The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) on the growth of start-ups that are helping users manage their e-mail by tagging, sorting or re-directing it to different users.  The sorting takes place based on algorithms rather than user supplied factors.  For ClearContext, one of the companies cited in the article they reportedly look at your inbox and the speed in which you normally respond to that sender to determine how to tag the e-mail content. Other companies that are referenced in this article are Seriosity and Xobni (inbox spelled backwards - cute!).

As a professional with a background in corporate and marketing communications, efforts to improve internal communications like these will prove popular and useful in improving team productivity.

--------------------------------------------------------ADVERTISEMENT-----------------------------------------------------

Need help with your internal communications strategies? 

Drop me an e-mail or give me a call (608) 255 4092, I'd be happy to work with you to develop strategies for your Intranet, RSS feeds, internal e-mail, wikis or other tools that could be of use for improving worker productivity.

Paul Gibler
the Web Chef

Consumer Behvior - Retail Showrooms, Online Purchases and the Rise of Disintermediation

The Internet Changes Everything! 

We heard this cry for a number of years since the launch of a commercial Internet over ten years ago. 

How true is this when it comes to purchases of big ticket items? 

Are consumers ditching the local, regional or big box retailer for purchases online through channel participants with lower costs and hence lower total prices for acquisition?  If this is the case, the brick and mortar retailers will increasingly become the "free showrooms" where consumers armed with online review information can go and check out the plasma or LCD HDTV they are coveting.  This process is what academics and others call disintermediation or cutting players out of the supply chain when making your purchase.

For example we're in the market for an HDTV this year.  Thanks to a generous retirement gift, my partner can select a television within a certain dollar range.

So what has the purchase process entailed so far?  Like many consumers the purchase follows a range of steps. 

Step 1 - Research HDTVs on Consumer Reports, CNET and through word-of-mouth discussions with current owners

Step 2 - With the selection narrowed down to plasma's in our case, the second step was to go to the regional and big box retail showrooms to see the models that seemed to meet our viewing and budget criteria.  In our market, this meant visits to the the big box stores, Best Buy and Circuit City, along with regional chain American TV. 

Step 3 - We wanted to hear what the sales people had to say about the televisions.  In and of itself this was interesting, given the range of performance, knowledge and selling styles that we encountered.  Our first stop was American TV, a company I've blogged about before.  The first sales rep we encountered there appeared to be knowledgeable telling us that the model we were looking for, a Panasonic Plasma 50, had been replaced by a newer one that they had available.  He knew that the Panasonic we came in to see was a Consumer Reports best buy, so appeared to know his stuff,  He wasn't pushy, condescending or difficult to talk to.  The second stop was Best Buy where we found a nice sales guy in home electronics, who said "let me turn you over to the expert sales person for plasma televisions".  He did so and the guy was very knowledgeable and was even willing to offer us a deal on the television we had decided on.  The television was the original one we had looked for at American TV.  Best Buy had both models and said they were both available, making us question the American TV sales rep's knowledge or "truthiness".  Next stop was a visit to Circuit City.  The store had a noticeable lack of customers compared to either of the other two stores we had visited.  (Maybe their firing of all their top earning sales people is having repercusions after all!)  We found ourselves wandering among the televisions trying to find the Panasonic model we now knew existed without any help.  For a potential puchase of almost $3,000, you'd think there'd be some attention.  We finally found a sales rep, who took us over to the television we were interested and said "here you go, I have to go do some other things" and left us there.  If we had wanted to make a purchase it would have been difficult.  The price was $100 more then the deal Best Buy was willing to give us.  The way the unit was displayed allowed us to compare it to a Hitachi, Toshiba and LG units that were next to it and below it.  This led us to feel confident that the model was a good one that had a more life like color rendition to that of the competitive offerings.  A good thing, since the unit has a price premium.  We decided to return to American TV to see if the model was there and if a different sales rep would take us to it.  We thought this could be a way to support a regional chain that had started in Madison, WI our hometown and had done pretty well for itself.  We ended up with a real jerk of a sales person, who proceeded to demean us by saying that Consumer Reports and CNET reviews are useless and that only audiophile publications are worth following.  He said that the Consumer Report reviews were biased because the reviewers got to keep the televisions at the end, a fact we know to be false given the number of years we've subscribed to Consumer Reports.  His style and approach were extremely off-putting and offensive.  If I had been a secret shopper, I'd have put him on notice with his management team. 

Step 4 - This step actually happened between store visits.  I went online to the Panasonic web site to find the specifications for the model we were considering.  The set was there and was available directly from Panasonic for their list price of $2999.  The specifications confirmed that the unit had the features we wanted and that it would fit in the new piece of furniture we were buying to house it (another shopping tale in itself).

Step 5 - Although the television is a gift and the final price was within the acceptable range, it was at the high end of the range and I wasn't convinced that Best Buy or Circuit City were offering anything more for the money then I could get by shopping online.  I proceeded to three of my favorite shopping comparison sites (PriceGrabber, Mysimon, Shopping) with the model name and number at hand to see what the online retailers had to offer.  Not too surprisingly I was able to find a range of prices for the television including significantly better prices from sites where we had previously made and been happy with big purchases - Buy.com and NewEgg.  The prices ranged from a low of $2209 to a high of $3200.  The Best Buy price would have been $2749, plus tax.  Some online prices included free shipping, some from the national online retailers with brick and mortar locations included the state sales tax.

Step 6 - The purchase decision.  This hasn't been made yet, but for the retail showrooms there is a big red flag, if their business model doesn'f offer some sort of advantage to the online retailers.  If all they are going to do is go to their warehouse load up the tv and drop it in our family room, why should we pay them more than for an online retailer that loads up the television in a remote warehouse, delivers it to our family room and leaves?  The brief conversation with the sales rep isn't enough of a value added differentiator to make the product purchase swing their way. 

My Recommendations
What the local, regional or big box brick and mortar retailers need to do to clench the sale is offer some sort of added incentive to swing the deal their way.  They could offer something like the following:

• Free in home service for a year
• Removal of your old television for free (you now pay for this in Madison)
• Installation for free
• Customer workshops - getting the most out of your HDTV, understanding the home theater
• Purchase from us, we'll donate $xxx to a local charity of your choice    

Needless to say, the process has been interesting and one that offers a lesson for both shopper and retailer as they think through the best ways to connect with their target market.

How to Lose Customers Without Really Trying - American TV and Kennedy Hahn

Dishwashers. We can't live without them (at least some of us who hate to wash dishes can't).

In fact, when we first purchased our home 24+ years ago we prioritized improvements and #1 on the list was a dishwasher.  At the time, the budget and the available kitchen space dictated that the dishwasher for us would be a portable one that you connected up to the sink when you wanted to use it.  Since then we've expanded our house twice, including our most recent expansion (now about 9 years ago) that included a larger kitchen with the must have appliances available at that time - SubZero Refrigerator/freezer, Gaggenau oven, Bosch dishwasher, etc.  Needless to say we spent over $10,000 for sharp, "cool" and trendy appliances.  We purchased all of our appliances from Kennedy Hahn, at that time an independent dealer in Waunakee.  Since then they expanded with additional outlets and as of this week announced that they've been acquired by American TV and Appliance.  American TV and Appliance will be closing the four stores and consolidating their operations into their existing outlets. 

In the midst of this acquisition, American TV and Kennedy Hahn seem to have lost track of their customer databases and the basics of customer service.  I bring this up following my experience with them earlier today when I called to request service on our Bosch dishwasher.  When I called up Kennedy Hahn, a member of their customer service staff asked for the address and let me know they didn't have any record of any of their appliances being installed here.  She then asked for the serial number and repeated the same mantra, she then asked for our names and told me the same.  I let her know that we had purchased $10,000+ in appliances, purchased supplies and replacement parts and had received service from them in the recent past, so there should be a record.  She asked me whether I had any service records.  As a matter of fact I did, for the Sub-Zero refrigerator to the tune of $308 performed on 2/17/2006. After all this she grudgingly agreed to try and scheudule service only to let me know that the soonest available date was October 5th.  I wasn't happy with the interaction or with the final outcome and let her know this both on the phone and now through this posting. 

I was quite frankly amazed that I was given this run around and let her know in no uncertain terms that it would be highly unlikely that any vestiges of Kennedy Hahn or American TV amd Appliances would be receiving our new purchase or service business in the future.

So how should this have been handled?  First of all their database and customer relationship managment system should have reflected us as their customer and should have had a record of the original purchase, albeit it several years ago along with repair histories for any appliances along the way.  Second of all, if a customer tells you they purchased from you and they aren't asking for warranty service, they just want post-purchase after warranty service, you should believe them and ask how can we help you.  Third, you should have a large enough service staff at your disposal to provide service within a reasonable period of time.

The moral of the story for American TV and Appliance, is that if you are going to make what is reportedly your first acquisition of a premium appliance retailer, you need to have the customer information, processes and staff in place to serve customers as they interact with you during the acquisition. 

It seems that in the acquisition, American TV and Appliance has dropped the ball.

One Potato Two Potato... Couch to Web Potato

Couch potatoes are being joined by web potatoes and intermixing in the media consumption fields.  I'm more of a web and print potato myself, so was interested to read a recent posting in Business Week's Blogspotting on how offline is driving search according to research by iProspect. 

Their research found the following:

• 37% of searches result from television
• 30% of searches are generated from print ads
• 36% of searches are generated by word-of-mouth

Given that the Online Publishers Association says that only 4.6% of our Internet activity is search-related this isn't necessarily the biggest win for offline content providers.  They'd be better off looking at the growing percentage of time spent with content online.  This has grown from 39.6% of all consumer Internet Activitiy in July 2006 to 50.9% in July 2007, a startling shift away from communications and search among the four major items that the OPA tracks in their bucket of activities (communications, search, content and commerce). 

If I were a print publisher, I'd be ramping up my online content to an even greater extent.