Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School



AOHT Delivering Great Customer ServiceLesson 2Trends in Customer ServiceStudent ResourcesResourceDescriptionStudent Resource 2.1Sequencing: Trends Over TimeStudent Resource 2.2Reading: Trends in Customer Service in Hospitality and Tourism since 1930Student Resource 2.3Survey: Customer Service ExperiencesStudent Resource 2.4Assignment: Survey Results AnalysisStudent Resource 2.1Sequencing: Trends Over TimeStudent Name:_______________________________________________ Date:___________Directions: Put your pictures in order from oldest to newest. If you know the names of these items, write them down as well. Otherwise, write them down when you discuss the clues in class. You might have to change the order based on the class discussion.TYPINGMUSICPHONEStudent Resource 2.2If you think about the trend sorting activity we did, you can see how dramatically things have changed in the last 80 years. In the same way, major changes have happened in the hospitality and tourism industry. You know what customer service is like now; can you guess what it might have been like 80 years ago?Air transportation really “took off” when the US Postal Service started delivering mail to cities by plane. These airplanes started taking passengers in the late 1920s, but very few people flew then. In the 1950s, planes got bigger and more comfortable, and more people started to fly. They also started to fly across the ocean to Europe and other parts of the world.In the 1960s there were only seven major airlines operating in the United States. Now there are over 100 different airlines, and that number doesn’t count airlines in other countries.Synchronization is when something is done at the same time or according to a standard time frame. In the early years, flight service was synchronized. Everybody showed up at a certain time to buy their ticket and board the plane. Planes often made several stops on their way to the final destination. If a plane had mechanical difficulty and couldn’t continue on its route, the flight attendant would distribute local train schedules so that the passengers could reach their final destinations.Today, most people buy tickets from the airline’s website, from a travel site like Expedia or Travelocity, or from a travel agent. And if a plane has mechanical problems, the passengers will be transferred onto other flights, because most major destinations have several flights per day.Photo credit: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Passengers boarding a Trans World Airline Constellation, 1946, LC-USZ62-97826 In 1930, Steve Stimpson worked for the airline that would become United. He was on a tiny plane that held 10 passengers. It was the middle of winter and the plane was really late because it had to fly into strong winds that pushed against it. The passengers were getting nervous. Steve tried to make the passengers more comfortable by turning up the heat in the cabin. This got Steve thinking about what passengers needed on a long flight. They needed to be taken care of! He finally convinced the president of the airline, and the very first stewardesses were hired. The job of these stewardesses was to keep passengers comfortable and the plane clean and safe. Each stewardess had just a few passengers to take care of; she was told to “keep the respectful reserve of a well-trained servant.” They passed out cigars, cigarettes, and gum. They served fancy meals on fine china with cloth napkins and silverware.Today there is a lot less “service” in the in-flight service. Flying has become a lot more casual and commonplace. So no one expects the flight attendant to be a personal servant. Flight attendants go over the safety procedures; serve drinks and meals, if meals are offered; and distribute earphones, blankets, pillows, and so forth.Photo Credit: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Farm Security Administration Office of War Information Black and White Negatives, “Serving dinner aboard American airliner,” John Collier, LC-USF34-081928-EThe largest airplane today can carry 840 passengers, and there may be only one flight attendant to take care of 50 people!People who work in the airline industry today have to focus on taking care of lots of people very efficiently because so many more people fly now. So flight attendants and airport staff have to manage as many people as possible while still providing good customer service. One of the ways they do that is by depending on technology.Flight attendants have personal DVD and game systems for passengers to rent. Passengers can also watch movies. They can buy meals during the flight, but a passenger has to use a credit or debit card, not cash. Why? Because it takes less time for a flight attendant to swipe a card than to make change with cash. The focus is on serving lots of customers quickly, rather than on spending a lot of time on each individual customer.That same pattern, or trend, can be seen in the airport before you get on the plane (or after you get off). Airport security has to keep passengers safe while still providing good customer service. Airport security has signs to help passengers understand security procedures, and they have more people working during busy hours. They are working to come up with new security screening devices to help people move through the security lines more quickly. Airports compete for customers, so they need to make sure their customer service is good!The hotel industry has changed just as much as the airline industry since 1950. In 1950, families started opening up motels along highways because more people had cars and more people were traveling, so they needed places to stay along the way. Do you remember the different classifications of properties from the Principles of Hospitality and Tourism course? What’s the difference between a motel and a hotel? What does it mean to be “independently owned”? What is a “chain”?Motels are small and they are often one story. Travelers can usually park right across from their rooms. In the past, the person at the front desk who rented out the room was often the owner of the motel. A chain is a large company that owns a lot of hotels and motels, not just one. Can you name some hotel or motel chains that exist today? There were hardly any motel chains like Motel 6 back then, and even fewer big hotels. As more people began to travel, motels and hotels grew in size. More chains were established. Also, with more types of people traveling—businesspeople, families, retired people, couples—hotels and motels began to offer a wide variety of services to meet different needs. They were not standardized in terms of offerings. Instead, they were customized to meet the needs of their target market. For example, hotels around Disneyland and Disneyworld cater to children with special meals, play areas, and cribs for babies. Hotels in Las Vegas include several restaurants, spas, swimming pools, and casinos to meet the needs of couples on vacation. Many are also family-friendly and offer special services like babysitting. Most also serve businesspeople with large meeting rooms and halls for conventions.The Internet has brought major changes. A potential guest can book reservations online—but first he or she can read reviews, guest comments, complaints, and responses. Other technologies have also changed the way hotels operate, which, in turn, has affected how hotels deliver customer service. For example, computerized guest accounting does much more than make billing efficient. It allows hotels to know more about their customers: how often they book, what days of the week they’re most likely to book, and more—all of which helps them to provide personalized customer service.Many larger hotels use remote kiosks around the lobby for arrivals and departures as well as computerized energy management systems to control heat and air-conditioning. Automated checkout has become the norm for many hotels. It’s more efficient and it appeals to millennials, who are comfortable with doing things online and are less attached to conducting transactions in person.Electronic key cards have replaced regular door keys in an attempt to provide better security for hotel guests and their belongings.If you wanted to eat out in the 1950s, there probably wasn’t a lot of choice. Even if you lived in a big city, there may have been a handful of places to choose from in the neighborhood. Many restaurant employees knew their customers by name. Diners were popular, especially with young people. They were known for their fun atmosphere, complete with a jukebox for music and a menu of hamburgers, fried foods, and milk shakes. In general, the menus of the 1950s were not nearly as varied as they are today. Ethnic foods—foods eaten by people from other countries—were not common. The ingredients were hard to get and expensive, and in many places in the United States, there wasn’t enough diversity of people to introduce these foods. Also, in many restaurants, “substitutions” were not allowed. So, if you wanted a salad instead of french fries with your meal combo, you were out of luck!Today, there is an incredible amount of choice. There are more options of places to eat and there are more options of what to eat. Gone are the days when there were only one or two restaurants in town and the customers knew their servers (unless the customer service is superb and a diner eats at a restaurant regularly). The increase of travel and tourism directly impacts the restaurant industry. More travelers mean more restaurant customers! Eating out for someone who is not traveling is also much more common today. It’s no longer considered a special occasion for a lot of people. Like the hotel industry, technology has affected the restaurant industry. For example, billing is all done on computer rather than a “cash register.” You can even purchase a $2 coffee with a debit or credit card. The Internet has allowed people to make reservations online and, in some cases, even order ahead online for pickup.The Internet enables customers to check out restaurants online, read reviews, and make reservations. These days some people won’t even go to a restaurant unless it has a website.If you didn’t have the Internet, how do you think you would book a flight? An all-inclusive vacation?Some 30–40 years ago, most people used travel agents to book travel. There were many small, family-owned travel agencies/stores where you could get help making all your travel arrangements. Some people called airlines and hotels directly for reservations, but this was not an easy task. Just finding the phone numbers that you wanted to call would take a lot of time. It would also be difficult to know your hotel options in a place you’ve never been before. Comparing prices would only add to this process! And you had to book well in advance because you had to wait for your paper airline tickets to arrive in the mail.Travel agents took care of every aspect of your trip, from booking to billing. Now travelers work with different companies to piece together their trip. Each one has its own customer service representatives and booking and billing procedures. Today’s travelers are much more in control of their travel arrangements. They can use the Internet to research destinations, compare prices, read reviews, and book their travel. Even if you still use the telephone to book a flight, for example, you’ll be asked for an email address, because 98% of airline tickets today are paperless or “e-tickets.”Across all industries, technology such as the Internet has allowed customers to obtain information and conduct business without interacting with another person at all. Almost every process has been streamlined by technology: checking in, checking out, paying bills, booking reservations, finding information. Technology has also made every employee able to accomplish a great deal more every day. For example, employees can generate an e-ticket in moments; they don’t even need to speak to people who call with ordinary questions. A central phone system takes care of that (e.g., “Press 1 for reservations, press 2 for flight status…”). But technology cannot take care of everything for a business. You still need good customer service.It seems as though the more planes, restaurants, and hotels we have, and the more technology we use to make life easier, the less face-to-face customer service we experience. But customers will always need to talk with people rather than computers or prerecorded phone messages when they have questions to ask and problems to solve. The quality and availability of customer service makes the difference between a customer choosing one company over another. Good technology can mean great customer service. Bad technology—poorly laid out websites, apps that don’t work, email addresses that lead nowhere—can mean nothing but frustration. A customer service representative can’t resolve these problems either.The need for good customer service may be the only thing about hospitality and tourism that will never change! Student Resource 2.3Survey: Customer Service ExperiencesDirections: Use this form to gather information from at least two people of different ages and/or genders.Personal InformationName (can leave blank):Age Range: Under 1818-2525-4041-5555 and olderGender:MaleFemaleExperiencesCircle any of the experiences listed below that you have had at least once:Stayed overnight in a motelStayed overnight in a fancy hotel or resortFlown in an airplane (economy class)Flown in an airplane (first class)Eaten at a sit-down restaurant Eaten at a restaurant where you needwhere you don’t need to dress upreservations and should dress upRented a carQuestionsOf the experiences you circled, which ones provided great customer service? Please describe what about the customer service made them so great.Which ones provided poor customer service? Please describe what made the customer service feel inadequate to you.If you look at the whole list, including those experiences you haven’t had, which three would you expect to have the best customer service? Why? If you look at the whole list, including those experiences you haven’t had, which three would you expect to have customer service that isn’t so great? Why?Personal InformationName (can leave blank):Age Range: Under 1818-2525-4041-5555 and olderGender:MaleFemaleExperiencesCircle any of the experiences listed below that you have had at least once:Stayed overnight in a motelStayed overnight in a fancy hotel or resortFlown in an airplane economy classFlown in an airplane first classEaten at a sit-down restaurant Eaten at a restaurant where you needwhere you don’t need to dress upreservations and should dress upRented a carQuestionsOf the experiences you circled, which ones provided great customer service? Please describe what made them so great.Which ones provided poor customer service? Please describe why.If you look at the whole list, including those experiences you haven’t had, which three would you expect to have the best customer service? Why? If you look at the whole list, including those experiences you haven’t had, which three would you expect to have customer service that isn’t so great? Why?Student Resource 2.4Assignment: Survey Results AnalysisStudent Name:_______________________________________________________ Date:___________Directions: Use this resource to work with your group and learn more about people’s experiences with and expectations of customer service in the hospitality industry. Although you are working as a group, your own analysis will be assessed individually. Make sure you read the assessment criteria at the end of this resource so that you understand how your work will be assessed.Basic DataUse this chart to help you get the big picture of your survey results.Total number of surveys completed by your groupNumber of respondents who are maleNumber of respondents who are femaleRespondents under 18Respondents age 18-24Respondents age 25-40Respondents 41-55Respondents over age 55Respondents who stayed in a motelRespondents who stayed in a fancy hotel/resortRespondents who flew economy classRespondents who flew first classRespondents who ate at a casual sit-down restaurantRespondents who ate at a fancy restaurantRespondents who rented a carQuestion ResponsesWhich experiences were listed as providing great customer service?List any common factors about why people said the experiences were great.Which experiences were listed as providing poor service?List any factors in common about why people said the service was poor.Which experiences were expected to have the best service? List the 3-5 most common responses.Which experiences had the lowest expectations for customer service? List the 3-4 most common responses.Based on these responses, do you notice any patterns about when people expect great customer service or what they think great customer service looks like? Describe them below.Make sure your assignment meets or exceeds the following assessment criteria:The analysis is based on at least two surveys per group member.The survey respondents included a variety of age ranges and genders. The analysis shows careful thought about finding any patterns in people’s responses.The completed assignment is neat and uses proper spelling and grammar. ................
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