Tales From the Ticket Counter…a Sucker for Good Customer Service
When I first went to Dallas for six weeks of training with American Eagle, my instructor, Sandy, walked in the classroom and announced, ” Welcome to AMR. You have just given up your right to have a bad day.” What?! Her point was that if you have emotional baggage from home, leave it at the door. If your last passenger was horrible to you, let it roll off. Each passenger deserves the best service you have to offer. That really is the basis for good customer service in any industry and while it’s an easy thing to say, it’s a miserably difficult thing to do.
You might say that I’ve been in customer service since I worked the concession stand at the city pool in Brookhaven when I was ten. I’ve worked in food service, retail, aviation, and car repair. Over the years, I have conducted customer service training in my various fields and when the trainees arrive, I welcome them by handing them a Charms Blow-pop. My belief is that customers are similar regardless of the product offered – some are intractable, but most are wonderful - the Charms Blow-pops.
Pilots overnighting at the Golden Triangle Regional Airport in Columbus, MS, stayed in a hotel that had a charity collection box selling Blow-pops at the front desk. We agents regularly asked pilots to bring us one, but they never did. As was often the case, one evening I was working the closing shift when the office phone rang. The caller wanted to know if the flight from Nashville was expected to arrive on time. As it happened, the captain, whom I was dating, had just called in-range (radioed to let us know that they were near) and said that they would be on the ground in 15 to 20 minutes. I had directed him to bring me Charms Blow-pops; so, when he called in, I asked if he had candy for me. “Nope,” said he. “Then you’d better be here in 15,” said I. Now, for whatever reason (youth, vanity, stupidity, whatever) I related the gist of this conversation to this unknown caller, hung up the phone and promptly forgot the whole thing. The flight arrived; passengers deplaned; bags unloaded; aircraft cleaned and put to bed. Just before walking out the door, I stopped by the ticket counter to make certain that I had secured everything. Lying on top of one of the printers, was a Charms Blow-pop. The only person who would have left that there was the caller whose name I didn’t know and who, to my knowledge, I never met. That stranger made my evening.
Working at the ticket counter and gate, I’ve had credit cards, keys and even some luggage thrown at me. I’ve been screamed at and been called everything but a child of God over issues that were completely beyond my control. Once, a man spoke to me in such a profane manner that, before I even realized that the words were forming in my mind, I asked him if his mother knew he acted like that. (Thankfully, he was a decent, though frustrated, man who apologized and we moved on. Phew!) However, for every passenger who was having a bad day or a bad life and intent on taking it out on me, there were a hundred who were really fantastic. To remind me of the fantastic customers, I always kept a Charms Blow-pop with me at the counter. Even now, I keep them around to help me remain focused on the positive. And, as crutches go, it’s pretty, um, sweet.
