No adult in the world with an internet connection would have missed David Dao’s humiliation on board a United Express aircraft.
Grainy, moving images showing the 69-year-old being grabbed off his seat and dragged down the aisle — with horrified reactions from fellow passengers and global viewers — stormed their way through everyone's news feed.
Thanks to smartphones, Dr Dao didn't have to file a complaint. He didn't have to produce evidence.
The hours that followed assembled a compelling story: Dr Dao had told the officers who broke his teeth that he couldn't skip the flight from Chicago to Louisville as he had patients waiting for him. We know how the story panned out.
That's thanks to fellow passengers, armed with smartphones, who documented the horrible scenes from different angles.
The event unleashed a torrest of public indignation against United that the airline's CEO, who initial justified the roughing up of an old man, was forced to apologise. He did so profusely, and promised the incident will never be repeated under his watch.
I am guessing Dr Dao would be staring at a seven-digit compensation. Some say it would be in six digits. Regardless, he has to be compensated.
He deserves it, along with a proper apology.
Another case
Dr Dao's case brought back to life another case with the same airline that took place in 2008.
That time a singer-song writer Dave Carroll was flying from Halifax to Omaha, Nebraska. He and his two-member band team watched their guitars being thrown by baggage handlers — and one of them actually broke. It was worth $3,500 (Dh12,855).
For nine months, Carroll tried to no avail to get a claim processed with the airline. But because he was submitting it after 24 hours of the incident, he was told “no”.
He wrote a song and gave United Airlines’ 10,772,839 negative views on YouTube.
When Dao’s incident happened, Carroll recorded a message saying, “people create the value and make the profits,” and “branding today is nothing more than the sum of conversations … anybody you interact with is a storyteller”.
Not only that. How about a storyteller with a camera?
United, which in just a span of few hours after the “release” of the video of dragging the doctor and its spreading, lost nearly $1 billion in market value before regaining part of it back.
Today, it seems customers and clients do not need customer relations desk to vent their anger and dismay with a certain business. The cyber space can do it for them, for free and on the spot.
Several studies have been conducted on the dramatic impact of social media on a brand’s reputation. One-third post their views on products and brands on blogs or other social media; 70 per cent visit social media sites to get information; 49 per cent make buying decision on what they read on social media. And 60 per cent said they were likely to use social medial to pass along information and 45 per cent of those who searched for information via social media engaged in word of mouth.
Does social media keep businesses honest?
Internet and social media can break or make a business’s profitability. If there is a threat to businesses, owners should pay more attention to what is being said about them online.
Social media and online content can also be vehicles of free ads — or costly criticism.
Websites for tourist destinations and hotels can give you an idea of how word of the mouth can influence other customers' decision. This had been proven empirically.
I find it interesting to listen to Carroll comparing the reaction of officials of United and Disney’s resorts when something goes wrong. Disney will make sure their customers are smiling and free of concerns. United left its customers in shock and dismay.
Small gadgets and social media made it possible for customers of both to show the world how they feel.
Passenger in latest viral airline video has a lawyer
DALLAS: The woman seen sobbing in a viral video after an American Airlines flight attendant took away her stroller now has a lawyer — the same attorney representing a man dragged off a United Express flight earlier this month.
The Chicago lawyer, Thomas Demetrio, says the flight attendant was "out of control" and nearly hit one of the woman's two young children with the stroller.
An American Airlines spokesman said Monday that the company has been in contact with the woman and refunded her tickets and upgraded her to first class for the rest of her trip to Argentina.
The airline says the woman's double-wide stroller was tagged to be checked as cargo at the door to the plane, but instead she took it into the cabin, leading to the confrontation with the flight attendant.
The airline spokesman said American is still investigating the incident and has grounded the flight attendant.
American said in a statement Friday that the scene captured on video "does not reflect our values or how we care for our customers."
The incident before a flight from San Francisco to Dallas came two weeks after airport police in Chicago dragged a passenger off a plane after he refused to give up his seat to make room for an airline employee.
Demetrio said the passenger, a 69-year-old Kentucky physician, plans to file a lawsuit. He said it was too soon to know whether the woman on the American Airlines plane would sue.
Video of both events has put airlines on the defensive in the court of public opinion.
"We live in the age of cellphone video, so corporations have to take heed," Demetrio told NBC-TV. — AP
