PR Case Study

Unfortunately for United Airlines, their lack of PR skill and commitment to their customers caused much more chaos than they probably had ever anticipated.

Dave Carroll, an unhappy customer, posted numerous songs on YouTube about his discontent with the airline and how the employees had mishandled his luggage breaking his Taylor Guitar.

Carroll is a great example of how one person can have a tremendous impact on a company when something goes wrong.

            After posting the first song for the world to hear his story, United realized they had a major crisis to deal with when the song hit the news. They also saw how many views it had received on YouTube. Carroll most likely had no idea how much television media attention his story was going to receive by posting a simple music video on the YouTube website.

Instead of dealing with the problem when it arose, it became much worse turning it into a major crisis for the company. The first big incident, besides the mishandling of the guitar, was how the employees on the plane reacted to the issue. Carroll’s emotions excelled from that moment.

As Carroll explains, the customer service people that he spoke with all wanted to pass blame and make excuses to him as to why they would not reimburse him for the damaged guitar. At this point, United should have accepted responsibility and found an honest way to resolve the problem.

Carroll does not go into detail in the song though as to what the time frame was that United was avoiding his complaints and requests. In defense for United, he did not tell the specifics of what they were requesting from him in order to fix the problem.

Carroll also posted a statement on YouTube exclaiming that the last customer service representative that he conversed with was only doing her job and following the airlines policies. The statement was positive on behalf of Carroll because he does notice that it is policies and procedures that need to be re-evaluated for the employees to be able to properly solve the problem.

After two days of the first song on YouTube, United made a statement that they will make it right with Carroll and claimed that it was a unique learning opportunity. They spokesperson said that they would use the video internally to improve the customer service.

This was a fairly weak statement on behalf of United. There should have been a public apology along with and explanation of why it happened and what exactly they are going to improve and change within their company’s customer service. They not only need to make changes in the customer service, but also should have explained what they are going to change within policies concerning damaged items.

United should have also pointed out the positive aspects of their company concerning luggage to help reassure the current customers. They do not do this until a later statement that claims to have a 99.95 percent success rate with no lost luggage and undamaged items.

Deidra Quire