The next decade....what's in store?

Service Recovery at its best

As you know, I was just in Antigua (am now in Bimshire).

The check in at the hotel was great, but then it went downhill after that. The hotel had apparently been closed for a month for upgrade and had just reopened that day.

My air conditioning unit stopped working and that happened twice. So they changed me. The mini bar fridge didn't work (still isn't). But I was willing to overlook that, especially with my experience in hotel renovations.

However, the evening of the event I went to cover, I wanted to file my story. There is a dial up connection you can set up, however it was not working.

On my computer are several connections from my travels around the islands. I had one from St Kitts which I tried and it worked. Bingo. But lo and behold, a call to a neighbouring island was billed at US$1.00 per minute! Ludicrous!

Time to test this hotel's service recovery policy. You know what service recovery is? It's what a company does when a customer expresses dissatisfaction.

The night before departure, I filled out a guest comment card and wrote a separate note to the GM to say this cost was ridiculous and as a working journalist (that sounds nice doesn't it) I would appreciate anything he could do to reduce the cost, which having been to Antigua several times I knew to be not anywhere near US$1.00 per minute.

That night, I also filled out my form for room service breakfast and left it at Reception as instructed.

Well, the morning of my departure, 7:30am comes and no breakfast. I wait 15 minutes (as they indicate that that is the time within they will deliver orders). I call the restaurant only to hear that they have not received an order for me. I eventually get it at about 8:15am. Note that the driver was to have picked me up at 8:30am for the airport trip. Had to ask him to come at 9:00am.

Naturally, I wrote another note to the GM and when the tray was delivered I asked the server to take it to the GM. On the envelope was the fact that I was leaving at 9:00am.

So I go to check out. The telephone calls are on it as is. So I comment "oh, the GM isn't doing anything about the calls huh". The lady said that he wanted to see me before I left.

After waiting a few minutes on him, he came and was extremely apologetic about all the problems. Then he bowled me over by saying he was quite happy to take off all the telephone charges! I told him I would be quite happy with a 50% reduction but he insisted. Who was I to protest?

So from a point of me thinking that I would write very travel website and tell them about these faults, this hotel's service recovery method ensured that I will always recommend that hotel in Antigua....highly!

Moral of the story....

As a customer, you have the right to express your dissatisfaction. Please do not be afraid to use that right. As a hotel person myself, I would rather hearing that a guest has a problem, than having them checkout and not know. That could be very detrimental to the hotel's reputation.

Posted by yamfoot at October 5, 2005 06:22 PM