Dave Carrol made it very clear to the American people that United Airlines has gaping holes in their customer service policies. He was treated less courteously by staff than he wished after finding his $3,500 Taylor guitar had been broken during his flight. American Airlines, in Carrol’s eyes, gave him the run-around; refusing to replace his damaged item because he did not file a complaint within 24-hours. After hassling the airline for nine months, he released the infamous You-Tube video “United Breaks Guitars”, which instantly went viral. The song lyrics convey Carrol’s frustration, and he implies that many other passengers have been and will be in his frustratingdebacle. American Airlines immediately swapped their “nothing we can do” for “please let us compensate you”. The corporation’s public relations department went into crisis management mode. A spokesperson called Carrol’s song “excellent” to media. They asked if the song could be used forinternal training videos, and made donations to the charity of Carrol’s choosing.
American Airlines never anticipated that one of what is assuredly hundreds of broken item claims they receive every day would affect them so greatly. It is hard to imagine a large scale corporation accommodating and reimbursing every claim made, but in hindsight this pay out would have been worth it. Would things have worked out from the beginning is Carrol had filed his complaint in the “proper” 24-hour time frame? Maybe, maybe not. The policy is obviously flawed and it should have been the responsibility of PR professionals and other management to anticipate dissatisfaction if not full blown disaster.
Derogatory treatment of customers is awful publicity in and of itself. Perhaps Carrol would have withheld his singing missile if he had felt he was treated well and employees were trying to help. Public relations should have fed off previous complaints of staff and worked comtinually to edify their image.
