Whither Customer Service?????

I was relating this week's tale of woe to a coworker and she asked, "Is customer service dead or what?" and I thought, it is definitely in its death throes. Once upon a time, if a company screwed up, the customer got an apology and some kind of compensation. These days an apology is all too rare, and compensation... what's that? Customer service is about maintaining a business relationship.

Companies figure they aren't going to lose your business so why bother trying to make things right. Or if they do lose your business, who cares, there's always another customer to take your place. Case in point: the airline industry. Ryanair boggles the mind with its fees and lack of customer service; complaints cannot be emailed but must be faxed. yet for every declaration I've seen or heard that "I'll never fly them again" there must be two passengers lining up to pay ultra-low fares to an airport near their destination. After all, as along as it's cheap, it must be a deal.

All in all it's rather depressing. I can complain about poor service all I want to a faceless phone agent who is filing her nails and reading People while occasionally saying "mmmhmm." It's not going to achieve anything 99% of the time and actually makes me MORE frustrated. The sad truth is that when a customer service representative expresses a little sympathy, I'm mollified. On the rare occasions when I get something to make up for poor service, I do a victory dance. My standards have taken a nosedive in order to match that of the business world today.