Doc Searls relays a story about an interaction with an airline, but it's a common problem with companies - the standard theory of operation is to "maximize revenue":

And I'm not here to argue with you either, American. In fact, I'm not here to fly with you, defend you, or support you. Not only have I lost interested in maintaining our quasi-relationship, I'll now actively work to find alternatives to using you. (Hard to do when you live in Dallas, but absolutely not impossible). I'll encourage others to think twice about using you. All because you were more interested in potentially getting an extra $359.

Here's the problem - actually two:

• "It's just policy" - in a lot of outfits, line employees have no ability to customize policy based on specific conditions. This is "fair", but it results in crappy service. It's also why it's often impossible to actually buy anything if the computers go down.
• The tendency for sales to want to maximize their particular commissions, because that's how they get compensated

Both problems lead to less than satisfactory outcomes. The former comes from stodgy, "by the book" companies with top-down management theories. In these outfits, the staff isn't trusted, and everything has to be approved "from on high". This is never pleasant to deal with, and customers will avoid dealing with it unless they have no choice.

The latter is more tricky, because the problem is relative goals: the company's differ from those of sales, but it may not be obvious. These situations tend to lead to angry customers who have to move up the food chain to get anything done. This tends to be exhausting (does anyone like the "let me check with my manager" response?).

Both are fixable problems, but they require a level of introspection that many companies lack. Not fixing them is dangerous though; there are simply too many options and too many sources of information around to assume that you "have the customer by the short hairs". What you'll actually end up with is air...

Technorati Tags: customer care, responsiveness, marketing, PR