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Delta Air Lines apologizes again for its customer service, this time about a porter who called the police against a black woman who asked to speak to a damage manager at her suitcase at Boston Logan International Airport. "I think the situation was racial," said Yahoo News passenger who did not want his full name in history.
Delta apologized, saying, "We apologize to this customer for her experience in the Boston Baggage Department and Delta is in touch with her to better understand what happened."
This is not the first Delta incident of this type. Several years ago, Delta (dal) had to apologize to an African American doctor for ignoring and questioning her qualifications when she offered to help another passenger in need.
The police incident resembles that of a Starbucks, where two black men were arrested by Philadelphia police while waiting for a friend. This incident led the company to set up training on racial prejudice at the chain level. But airlines have fewer reasons than coffee chains to change. While coffee drinkers can choose from thousands of cafes, the air travel market is different.
Air transport and customer service
Airlines are one of those institutions that customers like to hate. They rank in the bottom third of the sectors measured by the US customer satisfaction index.
Part of the problem lies in the fact that long before the online behavior tracking or social networks that plunged into your bank records, the airlines had a pretty good idea of the type of customer that you were through their programs. mileage. They knew if you were a valuable business traveler, charging champagne to the customer or a thirsty family carrying toddlers on your lap and preparing a picnic.
The airlines treat the passengers accordingly by freely choosing to refuse boarding on oversold flights based on issues such as fare class and status of the frequent flyer program. how much are they worth. The most famous recent case of a passenger unintentionally refused to travel was David Dao, the doctor who was dragged out of his seat on a United flight after being restrained and bloodied by law enforcement.
And it rubs passengers in the wrong way. Even corporate customers asked United (ual) to do something about its service after the passenger withdrawal incident.
"Stealing is not an individual experience, it's common," says Sarah Steimer for the American Marketing Association. "While it's important to make the experiences as valuable as possible, airlines must use the data to boost the morale of all customers. rather than a few privileged ones.
But US airlines have little reason to worry about the experience of their customers. The US government has allowed domestic airlines to form an oligopoly, with quasi-monopolies on certain routes, and protects them from foreign competition. Air travel regulations make it difficult for disruptive startups to improve the industry from bottom to top.
"Compared to other sectors, the financial performance of passenger satisfaction is not very encouraging," said Claes Fornell, president of ACSI in a statement last year. "The exception is in the few airports where they treat passengers spectacularly in public. "
The embarrassment is that, despite all this protection, airlines are not always profitable.
Delta can learn the hard way that customer processing is more important than baggage handling.
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