I think it is sort of egg/chicken argument. Guests pay more, come and see cuts and not everyone can close their eyes on it. So they act demanding and they are rude and mean to others and CMs.
CMs on the other hand, experience worse working conditions and have to deal with angry guests. Considering they do not have proper training, not all of them can handle situations properly.
And round we go...
Yup, absolutely what I referred to - both sides harm the other, and thus the cycle begins, and continues...you are definitely correct on that.
I think that many factors contribute to the slip in customer service. Unfortunately I've been working in that area for a while now and believe me, when you deal with rude people day in day out and you are overworked and you work for a company that doesn't seem to care - it can get to you. I pride myself on how nice I am to people but I'm working hard to escape from the job I'm in because I'm burned out. I work very hard and yes, I'm tired of being criticized by both Management and the public and I'm tired of doing all of this for way too little compensation. I guess that I can probably relate to the feelings of some of these CM's.
Of course, you will have those CM's that never did care and those that still do care too. They aren't all the same.
I agree to a point...DH and I are both service professionals: he is a bank manager and I'm a highschool teacher. We both worked in retail in university, and that is how we met. We never treated our customers wrongely at all, and again we were both in supervisory positions - despite dealing with a huge Canadian corporation that was difficult to deal with, as well as harsh customers. In our current careers, we deal with 'customer 'service' issues all day long, so to speak. We cannot as senior team members, treat our 'clients' as we call them, rudely, just because we get rude from them. And believe me...teenagers and bank customers can be very rude at times! We cannot work this way, or the rudeness will never end...I think for Disney CMs, it's probably a lot of the way management and the corporation treat them, as well as guests.
I hope you are able to find a new job soon! Best of luck!
Just wanted to add...customer service is not limited to or only about attitudes of staff. It also includes product quality and overall experience.
100% correct. If Disney valued their guests as much as they claim to, then they would offer better quality merchandise, food, etc. They value their profits more, and that will inevitably make customer service suffer.
I am a Walt Disney World fan for life. That being said, I cannot completely disagree. Walt's dream was affordable fun for all people. With all of the changes with the board over the years, it is treated much more like big business than I can believe Walt ever intended. I love going to Disney over the holidays, Christmas and Halloween are my favorites. Any other time it is just too crowded. If you are in the wrong place during the evening fireworks display, it can take over an hour to depart the park. It was not always like this. They have increased the number of individuals allowed into the parks at any given time. However, they have some of the most stingent fire codes in the state. (Okay, off topic)
Back to affordability. Florida residents receive a tremendous price break. I know, I lived in Florida for 7 years and you can bet I took full advantage.
I miss the good old days when you could buy a 10 day pass and use it overtime instead of all at once. Disney didnt like that people were reselling as it was effecting their sales. I am lost again.. Oh, renovation timeframes have increased. They used to not want to interupt the "Magic" for too long, now, it seems to matter less
I won't stop going but I do hope that we can go back to the good old days!
I think it's naive to assume or to expect that in 2011, the Disney Company is going to run things like Walt wanted. All expenses have increased tenfold since Walt's days, plus guest expectations and how the guests treat the product, which in this case is the parks, has also drastically changed.
As someone who understands economics and corporations, I don't expect Disney to treat me as a family member in 2011; it's simply not possible nor realistic, given the change in economics that have happened over the years. I do expect for them to provide me with a good quality product, and when that product slips in various areas, I expect to be able to work out a positive solution, and I expect to see changes in place so the next guest doesn't experience the same issue.
Disney used to be good in this area, but no so much anymore, and that is their fault. Although I have to say, whenever I contact Disney, which is usually at least 1x after every trip, for both postive praise or customer service issues we have had, they always contact me back by email and phone. Anyway, providing cheap merchandise, subpar food and inconsistent quality on Disney's end, now costs them big customer service money as they have to compensate guests all of the time, and these are usually the areas that I have to contact them about. Everytime I have a faulty product, they pay to ship me a new product. This costs big money, and the other difference is that the corporation's profit margins are astrononimcal - they aren't happy when they make 1 billion dollars in profit, so they increase that to make more next quarter. Pretty much the only way to do that is to cut somewhere, and it seems to always be where guests and low level CMs, who work the hardest, are going to feel it, and this is where the downhill spiral comes from. Disney's own expecatations are out of hand these days, and this is where the cuts come from.
Tiger
This is exactly it!
And the scary thing is... it's only getting worse. I've been a public school teacher for 13 years, and each year I see more and more of this attitude.
