The Merrill Dubrow Blog

The contest is now closed. You can still take the survey to see how you fare, but there will be no prize. Click here to see the winners and check the right answers.

I just returned from an Omnicom meeting and there was a very interesting presentation. The speaker was Craig Storti, Director of Communications Across Cultures and he delivered a presentation on Developing Cultural Competence For the Global Workplace. During his very creative presentation, he had a few quizzes that I thought I would share with you.

Click on the link and fill out the twelve-question survey. The entire process will take less than two minutes and I will post the answers in a week.

Click here to take the survey

The highest possible score is 12. 

There will be a prize for the person who gets the most answers correct.  If there is a tie, we will come up with a tie-breaker.

We will close this contest at 12:00 PM on Monday, June 16.

For me the questions were amazing about how little I knew about people and cultures outside the United States.

I look forward to hearing your comments and seeing if the same is true for you.

We all know that the airline industry has tremendous challenges. With the rising fuel costs issue (anyone see an end in sight?) being dealt with every day, airlines are looking for additional revenue streams to stay afloat.

In the past few years airlines have charged for lots of different things. Have any really made a huge difference? Not sure, but last week’s announcement that American Airlines is charging $15.00 for every bag you check is concerning from where I sit. Before I expand on my thoughts, let me say that I like the airline a lot and have exceeded one million miles with them earlier this year.

Here are a few thoughts:

• In the past few years, customers have gone from increasing their carry-on luggage to decreasing what they bring on the plane because of the liquid restrictions and now EVERYONE will race to bring whatever they can carry on the plane not to be charged the $15.00. When that happens isn’t it a race to get on the plane first and what happens when you have a connecting flight and you show up a few minutes late and now because your flight may have been delayed, you walk on the plane and now have to check your luggage for the cool price of $15.00? How upset are people going to be?
   
• Since we are charged $2.00 at the airport now at DFW, I assume the new fee is $17.00 with the original $2.00 going to the airport. I would love someone to clarify this to see if I am right.
   
• I flew earlier in the week and discussed this issue with two different flight attendants. I asked them what happens when the last eight people show up on the plane with luggage that now has to be checked. Their response (consistent with each other) was that they will pull out a credit card system and charge you right there!
   
• How long will that take?
   
• Won’t that create more delays?
   
• What happens when you lose my bag? Do I get a refund?
   
• Are more people going to "stiff" the folks that help you at curbside check in?

Yes this bothers me for a few reasons and one has nothing to do with MONEY. If you have platinum or gold status you won’t be charged a thing. So in reality I won’t be charged. However this decision will create more issues with other passengers and ultimately create delays and frankly make the job of the flight attendant harder each and every day and possibly put all of the porters at the airport out of business.

I am not sure who came up with this recommendation at American Airlines. Maybe it was the Chief Strategy Officer or Chief Revenue Officer. Regardless…from where I sit they have missed the boat on this one.

• What do you think?
   
• What should they have done?
   
• Will other airlines begin charging as well?

I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

A few weeks ago, I was reviewing a credit card bill online and noticed a number of consecutive charges that looked a little odd. After checking with Trish she mentioned that they were a little strange and agreed to look into them. Basically they were charges for six different magazines totaling over $200.00. After reviewing all of the charges and finding out what magazines they were for she cancelled four of them and kept the remaining two. This month was a little bit déjà vu. We got another charge on our bill that appeared to be another magazine. I guess we really like to read a lot in our house. This magazine appeared to be a duplicate of one of the others, so my wife tried to cancel it. The key word is "tried"! Not really understanding what that meant, I asked her to expand on that and basically the number she had to dial was all computer automated and you could only hit a key for canceling the subscription but that a credit "COULDN’T" be issued.

For me this was very strange and frankly unacceptable.

They automatically charged our credit card for auto billing–which WE NEVER SIGNED UP FOR–and now have NO way for us to cancel the magazine and get a credit…or so they thought. Yes it was an extra step but by calling the credit card company direct, they took it off our card right away.

I am not really comfortable with this entire process.

• Shouldn’t there be a way to cancel the magazine and get a credit?
   
• Shouldn’t that process be very easy for the customer?
   
• Since neither of us remembers signing up for magazines with auto renewal, is auto renewal an opt-out?
   
• Has this happened to you?

What are your thoughts?

I look forward to your comments.