Legal Commentary

United Breaks Guitars. A Classic Lesson In Client Service

By Patrick J. Lamb

Sometimes, you see something that is just a wonderful poignant reminder that you cannot win a battle with a customer, whether the customer flies your airline or purchases services from you.  Here's the story:

A musician named Dave Carroll recently had difficulty with United Airlines. United apparently damaged his treasured Taylor guitar ($3500) during a flight. Dave spent over 9 months trying to get United to pay for damages caused by baggage handlers to his custom Taylor guitar. During his final exchange with the United Customer Relations Manager, he stated that he was left with no choice other than to create a music video for youtube exposing their lack of cooperation. The Manager responded : "Good luck with that one, pal."

So Dave Carroll posted a retaliatory video on youtube. The video has since received over 6.1 million hits.   Six million!  Plus the story has been told on several national network shows.  How much does United have to pay to reach that many eyeballs with a positive message?

United Airlines contacted the musician and attempted settlement in exchange for pulling the video. Naturally his response was: "Good luck with that one, pal".  Taylor Guitars sent the musician 2 new custom guitars in appreciation for the product recognition from the video that has lead to a sharp increase in orders.
 

Can anyone think of a circumstance where a service provider wins a fight with a customer?  Perhaps we should consider a case study about United's lack of customer service.  Then again, United may well be thinking that their service is so dreadful to begin with that no song, no lampooning of them, could make the public perception of the airline worse.  If so, "good luck with that one, pal."

Full post as published by In Search of Perfect Client Service on November 23, 2009 (boomark / email).