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Comment by pytrin | Hacker News Reader

I think you missed the point of the post - it's not about losing a bag, it's about the customer service failure that ensued. I had bags lost on a couple of occasions, and usually they are delivered on the same day or the next to the address I stay at. If I'd had such an experience, I wouldn't be flying the same airline either.

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Nope ... when I read the post, I read that he'd declared himself to be an enemy of a large group of minimum-wage, overworked employees of a company who's executives are simply maximizing profit. I'd be willing to bet they calculate how many people will be angry enough to quit flying and account for this churn in their projections.

These people have a high turn-over rate and absolutely no incentive to go beyond the company policy. My point was that "the best way to win is to not play the game".

EDIT: As I thought about this, I realized we're a bit insulated from the problem, but consider this scenario:

"I tried to call SnapChat the other day to have them delete an embarrassing photo before it got to the recipient - Can you believe there's a company without a phone number? THEY'RE MY NUMBER ONE ENEMY!"

Airlines depend on loyalty, that's why they have significant loyalty programs.

Also that is a crazy comparison, an airline is responsible for getting you to your destination alive and with your bags, it's not acceptable for them to have ineffective customer service. Even if what they offered wasn't so important the fact is you pay money for their services, the deal has to be two sided.

I agree that it's a crazy comparison ... but I've heard non-technical people say very similar things. I was trying to point out that our perception of our industry's practices may not be the way others perceive us. Other misunderstandings are:

"I can't believe they just shut down my favorite application for doing X" - spoken by people without paid accounts.

"That company has so much money you think they'd do X" - (most commonly this one is "add my requested but obscure feature) - spoken by someone who doesn't realize that a company can be well-funded but "burning through cash" unprofitable.

Well this chap won't be joining their loyalty program now will he?

Umm.. When I pay 1200$ for a plane ticket, I expect a minimum of customer service, and that's how those companies differentiate. The comparison to a free web service is not really relevant.

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