A representative from an independent research firm telephoned a few minutes ago on behalf of Amtrak. I had been randomly selected for polling having been a passenger on the City of New Orleans on March 28th.
The questions all concerned the Cross-Country Cafe car experience. Essentially I rated it a 5 out of 10 saying I liked the table arrangement for casual dining service but that I didn't think the concept permitted adequate lounge space and that I missed the big windows in the sightseer lounge. Also noted that I found the service slow and the food poor. That's the trip where I waited two hours on a medium-well steak that arrived still pink and cold in the middle. I ate it because by that time (10:00pm or so) I would have eaten cardboard!
Posted by Gilbert B Norman (Member # 1541) on :
I realize everybody wants "feedback'; it is a great ego-lifter since most of it somehow is postiive.
It gets annoying; I take my auto into the dealer for servicing; I pay my $500; it runs and hopefully will do so without incident for another 5000 miles. What more need be said?
How will the outcome be different if I respond to their "Customer Satisfaction Surveys".
Marriott is another one; stay at any of their hotels and pay for your room, you will also get an e-survey which if you don't respond, you will get nagged. Hey folks, I vote with my $$$ and Marriott (save that bummer last April in Marion IL) is a chain of brands with which I'm happy. What more need be said; my $$$ will do the talkin'.
I guess it is no surprise that Amtrak is also playing the game. I guess though with Amtrak, there are people such as myself who haven't used them in a while, but have no problems with them (haven't I consistently reported at the forum my journeys have more positives than negatives?). In my case, at such time they are convenient to my travel needs (joyrides belonged to the pre-A-Day era), I'll use 'em again - maybe for the wedding in NY (which now sounds like it has been transplanted in Greenwich) come Sept.
Posted by palmland (Member # 4344) on :
Well I guess I'm a believer in surveys. Somewhere in my career I was involved in a customer service function. We tried very hard to get customer feedback and always got surprises - good and bad.
The key of course is having the ability to do something with that information. In Amtrak's case, I'm not so sure. They may issues directives or make changes, but seem to have limited ability to follow through.
Posted by sojourner (Member # 3134) on :
I think they are wasting too much money on market research and consultants. They need to spend more money on equipment! This is hardly a problem particular to Amtrak, however; it seems to be typical of current American business practices.
Posted by notelvis (Member # 3071) on :
quote:Originally posted by sojourner: I think they are wasting too much money on market research and consultants. They need to spend more money on equipment! This is hardly a problem particular to Amtrak, however; it seems to be typical of current American business practices.
I am hoping that the fact they are surveying passengers regarding the Cross Country Cafe means that this particular experiment will be....um......stopped dead in it's tracks and won't expand beyond the City of New Orleans and the Texas Eagle. Next candidates for conversion would probably be the Sunset and Capitol