Unit VI Journal & Case Study

Name of student

Name of institution

Name of instructor

Journal and case study

United airline has in the past years had problems that have dragged some of its top officials to provide explanations on how they conduct their business. The company that is mainly tasked with the duty of offering flights from different regions o another one has had problems with the quality of customer service it provides to the clients. There have been many instances when clients have felt that they were not treated in the right way while others even went to court. Some clients felt that the best thing they could to save other clients of such an occurrence is by blackmailing the company. The company has been ranking poorly in terms of service deliveries. Lately, it has been appearing in the list of companies with the worst customer service. This implies that the company has not been taking any precautionary measures to solve the situation or maybe they have just decided to ignore it. The industry is highly competitive and the act by United Airlines can easily lead to its downfall.

According to me, there are strategies that the company could have used to avoid such embarrassments in the industry. In such an industry, the image of the company plays an important role in determining whether it will have many clients or not. The company should always be focused on ensuring that their image is good within the public so that most of the clients can like their services. Most of the clients make use of the self-perception theory to decide on the company that they would like to be using for the flight services. To avoid such situations, the company could have ensured that they do not overbook flights so that they are forced to remove some clients for the crew. They should also ensure that the staffs they employ are people who value their clients and ensure that the clients are treated well. Other competitors are doing this and that is why they are performing well in the industry.

Case study

In each of the cases, the company was largely affected by the reaction that the clients gave. In the first instance, a $3500 guitar was destroyed during the travel and the owner had a lot of issue with the company. Definitely the damage was caused by the manner in which the crew handled the guitar. The company must always have provisions for how they can handle such fragile goods without any problem. The client informed that the company that the guitar was destroyed during the journey. The company did not refuse the claims but nine months after the occurrence, the company stated that there was nothing that they could do to help in such a situation. The client felt that this was not fair on his part and promised to release three songs talked about the experience. He wanted to inform every client that had intention of using the company for their flights that they should change and get better companies that would offer them better services. After the incident, the stakeholders made a loss as a result of the negative image that the company had. The client went ahead to make videos that would tell everyone about the incident that happened and how the company was not even willing to help in such a situation. The clients developed negative attitude towards the company and stopped flying with them. The interpretations of the clients really affected the buying of tickets from the company. Many clients moved to buy the tickets from other companies (Perreault et al, 2014).

In another case, the company had overbooked a flight and in the process they realized that they needed space for crew that would be on shift later. To correct this, they decided to offer compensation of $800 to find people who would volunteer so that the crew could find space. No client was willing to give up their space and the crew decided to randomly choose people who would wait for the next flight. One client refused to get off the plan and the security crew decided to drag the client off the plane. This caused a lot of uproar among the citizens of the country as many people went ahead to condemn the incident. Consequently, stock prices went down and stakeholders made losses. In this case, there was a lot of media involved and the information reached many clients which is the major factor that led to low stock prices that contributed to many stockholders making losses. The interpretation of the clients was that the company did not care about their clients. Most of the clients decided to shift attention to the competitors so that they could get better services. It forced the company management to address the issue and assure clients that they would never again get involved in such an incident. The interpretation of the case really affected the buying of the stock (Snyder & Cunningham, 1975).

I disagree with the company’s popular opinion on customer service. The first instance clearly shows that the company has not interest in providing compensation yet it is as a result of the company that Caroll got his guitar damaged. The company acted unethically. The first way in which they acted is that they said that there is no way that could compensate the owner of the instrument. The other way in which they acted unethically is by the fact that they took nine months to tell the client that they could not pay for the guitar (Goldstein & Cialdini, 2007).

The series of events will definitely affect the decision by a client either to use the company for future flights or not. Self-perception provides a way in which one makes decisions by looking at the behavior of other people and seeing the best way that could behave if it was them that got involved in such a scenario. The client would look at how the events have occurred in the past, the measures that the company taken into pace to be able to solve the problem and whether the situation has improved or not. The fact that the company has added entertainment package for the clients during the flight can make many clients to decide and fly with the company. Most clients would want to use those companies that guarantee them the best services as well extra services that they get for choosing to travel with the company. Depending on their own behavior, they would opt to go for the company as a result of the good entertainment or decide to go for other companies as a result to the poor customer services. The choice will depend on whether the client has focus on entertainment or customer services (Haberstroh et al, 2017).

If I was a client, I would not purchase tickets from the company. The company has not changed any of their rules regarding customer service and none of the clients that had problems with the company has been compensated. I believe that the move by the company to come up with an entertainment package is to convince more clients that they will have the best experience when it comes to entertainment. On the other hand, the major issue that they should be dealing with as a company is customer service which is yet to improve. My major concern when travelling will be how the crew will treat me as a client. In the recent ratings, the company has not improved the manner in which it serves and this for me still makes the company a bad company the clients that wish to travel (Schouten et al, 1995).

References

 Goldstein, N. J., & Cialdini, R. B. (2007). The spyglass self: A model of vicarious self-perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(3), 402-417.

Snyder, M., & Cunningham, M. R. (1975). To comply or not comply: testing the self-perception explanation of the foot-in-the-door phenomenon. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 64–67.

Perreault, W. D., Cannon, J. P., & McCarthy, E. J. (2014). Basic marketing: A marketing strategy planning approach (19th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Haberstroh, K., Orth, U. R., Hoffmann, S., & Brunk, B. (2017). Consumer response to unethical corporate behavior: A re-examination and extension of the moral decoupling model. Journal of Business Ethics, 140(1), 161–173. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/abicomplete/docview/1859049941 /5313F6356640416CPQ/36?accountid=33337

Schouten, J. W., & McAlexander, J. H. (1995). Subcultures of consumption: An ethnography of the new bikers. Journal of Consumer Research, 22(1), 43–61. Retrieved from https://libraryresources.columbiasouthern.edu/login?auth=CAS&url=http://search.ebscohost.com/logi n.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9507113978&site=ehost-live&scope=site