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S T O P

 Everywhere I turn these days for product or service I am dreading the type of response I might get.  This dread is not hard to explain.  I am sure the readership has encountered this too.

A subpar service or product experience from airlines to hotels to food distribution or purveyors including grocers and QSRs to banks and phone companies and the like.

Using Covid as a crutch there seems to be a new easy out for anything that does not meet the contractual or implied guidance on what a customer should be getting for parting with their time and cash.

Sorry it is due to covid.  Even getting on work related zoom calls and dreading the rabid dog barking uncontrollably in some schmo's background like some sort of new age music is crazy.

From a recent experience where we had a scheduled Rapid Test for this dreaded virus that got canceled an hour before the test itself - sorry due to covid we are in a shortage of the tests.  Really?  And you with your millions of investments in 'state of the art' inventory management found out now?

At the nth hour?

Then you have the restaurant that does a show of hustling to bring food to your table.  Hiring servers who seemed hassled and woken from their beauty sleep to show up and park platter of slop in front of you and expecting additional tips (some even have suggestion of 25% in 'state of the art' payment terminals).

With covid we are operating with minimal staff.  You don't say?

To all these airlines that cancel last minute and leave people stranded regardless of what the contract of carriage might say or the banks that take your calls from humans sitting who knows where in a remote location and drop that call after holding for 47 minutes listening to mindless music - I say - STOP!

Please read your guidebook on what makes your business worthwhile.  If you find you still feel an obligation or joy or perhaps making genuine profit by being there for your customer - ooh novel idea -- then and only then continue to do what is necessary and operate the business to serve the primary goal for which it exists in the first place.

If not quit and just go lie down and we will understand.

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