United Airlines

Briefing document

CASE STUDY

Table of Contents
TASK 1- Overview of United Airlines............................................................................................1
Overview and history of Airlines................................................................................................1
Examination of demographic profile of United Airlines Customers...........................................1
Examination of global consumer trends that United Airlines leverage.......................................2
Likely expectations of a typical United Airline Customers.........................................................3
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
Examine Dr David service journey..............................................................................................4
Describe physical evidence of journey........................................................................................4
Identify on stage interaction with team members........................................................................5
Identify back stage interaction.....................................................................................................5
Support Processes........................................................................................................................6
Application of Knowledge to Service Blueprint Diagram..........................................................6
Identify that where service failure occurred................................................................................7
Outline consequence of service failure and make recommendation on how to recover service. 8
REREFENCES................................................................................................................................9

TASK 1- Overview of United Airlines
Overview and history of Airlines
United Airlines is one of the major American Airline organization that was founded on
April 6, 1926 whose headquarter is in Chicago, Illinois but commenced their operations on
march 28, 1931. Currently Oscar Munoz is the chief executive officer of the Airlines and founder
of this organization is Walter Varney (Benoit, 2018). They have more than 86.6 million
employees working for them. As per recent reports of United Airlines they have approximately
1,340 aircrafts. United Airlines operates on both domestic and international route network
spanning in small and large cities across all the cities of United States and other six continents.
As per the estimate and measures by fleet size and number of routes, it is the third largest airlines
present in the world. It is a founding member of the Star Alliance which is currently world's
largest airline alliance that has overall a total of 28 airlines member. All the regional services are
basically operated by separate independent carriers as United Express brand name. United
Airlines has eight hubs that are: Denver, Guam, Houston- Intercontinental, Los Angeles,
Washington- Dulles, Newark, San Francisco and Chicago- O’Hare. Out of all the eight hubs
Chicago- O’Hare is the largest hub in terms of number of departures and passengers that are
carried. When roots of United Airlines are traced then it can be said that its roots arise from
Varney Air Lines (Blocker and et. al., 2019). Walter Varney was the main founder who founded
this Airlines. In 2006, Continental Airlines and United had preliminary merger discussion and in
May 2, 2010 they combined all of their operations, contingent upon regulatory and shareholder
approvals.
Examination of demographic profile of United Airlines Customers
Demographic profile can be defined as a kind of statistical data about overall
characteristics of population. It is a kind of analysis which is carried out by marketers so that
they can advertise their products and services in an effective and efficient manner and any kind
of possible gaps within their marketing strategy can be identified. United Airlines have divided
their whole market so that they can bring development within their products and services in an
appropriate manner in order to fulfil needs and requirement of their customers. United Airlines
have categorized their customers on the basis of their demographic profile that focuses on
various kinds of factors. In the basis of customer’s attitude, social class, their frequency of
travelling, lifestyle and many more they have segregated their customers. United Airlines have
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categorized their customers in few segments, such as: first are global executives, they are the
high class frequently travelling business class customers who require high quality of service and
are ready to pay any amount for excellent services (Callahan and Miller, 2017). Another is
scheduled optimizers who are middle class people who schedule their travel and only want to
reach their desired destination. Such kind of people only travel if their travel is economic and
cost friendly. Next are corporate troopers who travel as per the requirement of their employers.
Another kind of customers are reluctant travellers, they are the one who enjoy travelling and
always seek additional services while travelling. Another type of customers are frugal flyers who
want to travel in as cheap as possible cost but want to get good service. On the basis of these
customer categories they have segregated and developed a demographic profile of their
customers. they have income segmentation – people in this category are mostly who choose in
economic and business class services and are mostly upper class and middle- class people.
Another profile is of occupational profile in which people are categorized as working class and
business class.
Examination of global consumer trends that United Airlines leverage
Consumer trends can be defined as behaviour or habit of customers that are currently
prevailing among consumers of goods and services. Customer trends helps in tracking what
customers buy and how much they are ready to spend (Greer, 2016). It mostly focuses on factors
or information such as products or services used by customers and ways in which they
communicate with their social network and the brand. Global consumer trends that have
leveraged United airlines are: frictionless mobility that says that customers choose transportation
method based upon their preferences for an easy travel journey. Another is inclusive for all that
focuses on diversity and accessibility for each and every customer. United Airlines need to focus
on providing their services with similar quality and quantity to all of their services so that they
all feel included and do not feel discriminated or cheated while buying airline products and
services, therefore they warmly welcome all of their customers whoever chooses to travel with
them. Increasing focus on route standardization and regulations (Kim, Kim and Hyun, 2016).
United Airlines need to focus on following all kinds of regulations strictly and standardize their
routes as it helps them to attract a greater number of customers.
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Likely expectations of a typical United Airline Customers
United Airline customers have various kinds of expectations from the airline and
products and services provided by them. It is one of the main and primary responsibility of
United Airline to fulfil these expectations of their customers. convenient boarding is one of the
main expectations of united Airlines customers they want proper picking up and dropping
facility if they want to walk till ticket or luggage country (Spooner and et. al., 2019). minimum
waiting time, regardless of any waiting condition they do not want to wait for their flight. They
expect that their flights will boarding on time and their departure will also be on time. They
expect that they will be treated well and all the services and products they have purchased will be
provided to them in an excellent manner without any discrimination or any other issue. Even if
the flight is over booked, they will be provided with equivalent products or services if they are
required to participate within resolving the issue. Customers of United Airlines expect that they
will be charged reasonably for the products and services they want to avail or are choosing. No
additional or unwanted changes will be charged from them.
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TASK 2
Examine Dr David service journey
It can be analyzed from case study that Dr David service journey was not so good. It is
stated that the airplane was already over booked and no passenger was voluntary giving up their
seats for the airline employee who were working in shifts and going to Louisville. Also, in image
it is clearly seen that dr David is been dragged down into the airplane by its staff. Thus, this
shows experience of Dr David journey is awful and bad. He has gone through process of ticket
booking, security checkpoint and luggage on boarding. So, he expected that his seat was confirm
in that airplane. Other than this, no staff communicated with him that already airplane was over
booked. He might have suffered more due to it. Besides that, he might not have been treated well
by staff of United airlines. In addition, the ticket bought by him is not confirmed and reserved
and still Dr David is allowed to travel in that airplane. It is said that he came in contact with
employee and completed overall check in and security process in effective way. But during
journey his experience got changed and he did not got a seat on airplane. Alongside, the cabin
crew staff behaved in very harsh to Dr David and dragged them into airplane. They did not
offered them food nor treated with respect and dignity. Therefore, during entire journey Dr
David experience was poor. He was not expecting this kind of treatment or behavior from the
staff of United airlines towards him.
Describe physical evidence of journey
In every service or product delivered there are several evidence which creates a link of
interaction between customer and organization. It differ from service to service. Usually, it is an
environment in which service is delivered and customer interact with firm through a tangible
communication. With help of this it becomes easy to identify whether customer has came in
contact with organization or not. Besides that, the point of contact is find out and it is shown how
customer followed the overall process. Any change in interaction process results in physical
evidence as well. However, in airline services there are various physical evidence which act as
interaction point. Here, they are categorized into two that is from airline view and customer point
of view. Now, in united airline point of view aircraft, its interior, airplane seats, gates etc are
physical evidence of journey. Along with it, from customer point of view they are ticket, food,
uniform of staff, etc so, these all are physical evidence of journey. Thus, Dr David case shows
that it is having evidence of airplane seats, interior, ticket etc he has gone through entire process
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and these all are clearly visible. this clearly shows that he has taken the journey and completed it.
Furthermore, he must be having ticket with him and also interacted with airline staff. Hence, it
enables in showing evidence that he has avail services of United airlines
Identify on stage interaction with team members
In every service delivery, there are basically 3 stages where a customer comes in contact
with organization. They are on stage, back stage and support services. This reflect the way in
which he communicated with staff and followed a process. The service blueprint shows entire
framework of it and points of contact of customer. In service blueprint there are various on stage
interaction with which a passenger comes in contact with. These services are visible by them
either at airport or till they reach destination in airline sector. Likewise, in case of Dr David he
also came to interact with on stage service. They were checking greeting customers and security
checkpoint. Along with it, he came into contact of staff where he was send off. Moreover, he
came in interaction with those staff who provided various types of customer service such as
checking of seats, support services like confirm of reservation, etc so, in all these interaction
point he should have interacted with team members where they could have inform him of over
load of seats in aircraft. The on stage interaction is continuous process where one by one
passenger comes in contact with several team members. Dr David would have also gone through
this process. He might have contacted to staff at help desk and other. Moreover, Dr David must
have gone through security and luggage check.
Identify back stage interaction
They are those process which is run at background of any services. Its main purpose is to
provide support to on stage service and they are known as secondary service. Generally, back
end process are not visible and customer rarely interact with it. Basically, customer does not
come in direct contact to those process and also they are not visible to them. It has to be change
in things related to it. In airline services, the back stage interaction point are loading and
unloading of luggage of plane, checking of plane, pilot, etc it is called as line of internal
interaction where passenger does not come in direct contact with staff. These services are same
in all airline. In this customer does not go through it but has to follow during access of services.
They are not able to interact as well. In present case as well Dr David should also have gone
through same process. He should have submitted luggage and collected it. This process runs at
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back stage. The united airline appoint pilot for it and do proper checking of airplane. They uses
various machine for performing this service.
Support Processes
There are different support processes are used by the organization to provide effective
services to the customer in effective ways. Some of the main support processes that are used by
the airlines can be explained as the services that are offered by the airlines in order to provide
better transportation services to the passenger to make their journey more easy and comfortable.
The main services that are need to be provided to the passengers are related to offer comfortable
space to the passenger to improve their experience in journey time (Rajaguru, 2016). Some of the
major services that are provided to the passengers in the flights are related to passenger handling
services. The services that are offered to the passengers are about their safety, security and
comfort. Airlines selects the most dedicated employees to provide services to the passengers in
the flight. Their first priority is of make passengers comfortable in the journey. This process
starts from the booking of ticket of specific service provider. Then in each stage proper protocols
and processes are specifically developed by the airline service. This is series of operations and
support actions that are performed by the employees of airlines to make the passengers feel
better with they are using services of the specific service provider. This is how various support
processes are used by the airline services to keep the value of their product and services higher in
market place. For this process they also use to conduct various training and development
sessions of the customer to make their employees effective enough to support passengers in the
journey time.
Application of Knowledge to Service Blueprint Diagram
There are different processes are performed by the airline services provider in order to
make customer feel comfortable during taking services of the airline. Some of the major services
that are planned by the organization to provide support to the customer starts with the booking of
ticket. As per the blue print diagram, with the arrival of customer on airport they have to go
through different counter in sequence. The counters that are need to be attended by the
passengers are- check in counter, security area, shopping area. These are also considered as
physical evidence of airline services (Mitchell, 2016). Customer enter the airport with bags. On
the check in counter their bags are taken by the service providers. The next counter is known as
boarding counter where passengers receives the boarding pass from the counter as confirmation
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of the journey. Then passenger’s passes through the security check to ensure the security of the
journey.
Later the security check passengers are allowed in the shopping areas. With the
announcement of the flight the passengers with boarding pass are allowed to board in the flight
to complete their journey. The luggage that is taken from customer on check in counter is later
loaded in the aircraft and returned to the passengers after the completion of the journey. This is
how complete journey of services is provided to the passengers by the airline services.
Identify that where service failure occurred
As per given scenario, it has been identified that every service or product delivered to the
customer on the basis of their demand, preference. Sometimes, there are several evidence which
creates a link of interaction between customer and firm. It may differ from one service to
another. Usually, it depend on the certain aspects such as environment in which service is
delivered to the customer and interact with them by using tangible communication. Airline that
are offered to better service of passengers. Service involves safety, security and comfort. As per
analysis, it has identified that Service failed during ticket booking because Dr David the issue or
problem. Airline have not concerned about the passenger (Rajaguru, 2016). When airplane was
already over booked and no passenger was voluntary giving up their seats for the airline. At that
time David is been dragged down into the airplane by its staff. In this way, it has shown the
service failure situation occurred when no one concern about their health, safety. In order to
show experience of Dr David journey. He has gone through process of ticket booking, security
checkpoint and luggage on boarding but they would not provide the confirm seat in airplane. In
this way, it can show as poor service whereas staff not properly communicated with him that
already airplane was over booked (Spooner and et. al., 2019). Therefore, David has suffered and
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might not have been treated well by staff member during whole journey. United airline have
focused on the confirmed and reserved booking services. Therefore, it become greatest service
failure occurred..
Outline consequence of service failure and make recommendation on how to recover service.
Service failure have been recognised as failure of core enterprise booking process. United
airline is not properly record information about passenger if it will require to know about the
vacant seat and provide right information of passenger (Rajaguru, 2016). But it has failed the
service. Furthermore, it also understands consequence of service failure such as negative
behaviour, customer dissatisfaction, client defection, loss of revenue, decrease staff morale,
performance (Spooner and et. al., 2019). In this way, it require to recover service which helps for
future growth and development otherwise, it will create negative impression in front of
passenger. In order to reduce the demand, reputation in global world. Service recovery is mainly
referred to action which undertaken by service provider. It attempt to resolve any problem and
issues.
Recommendation
 It has suggested to united airline where they can establish communication with customer
to provide the accurate information related travelling (Rajaguru, 2016).
 United Airline has planned to adapt an effective strategy which always support for
identifying demand of customer.
 It has recommend that use modern software to keep track or record right information of
every passenger (Spooner and et. al., 2019).
 It has required to interact with client and identify their compliant regarding service and
facilities. It help for organization to find out the particular poor quality of services.
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REREFENCES
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study of full service and low cost airlines. Journal of Air Transport Management. 53.
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