Columnist Melissa Schorr: Customer service? You’re kidding, aren’t you?

Melissa Schorr

Monday, March 8, 1999 | 10:34 a.m.

The customer is always wrong.

Sometimes, I suspect that's the prevailing attitude in this town.

If you're not a high roller getting your fanny smooched at the new Four Seasons hotel or the Bellagio, service with a smile is often a lost cause.

Shocking, for a city so dependent on the tourism dollar and goodwill. After all, it takes so little to make a guest happy -- and even less to make them completely irate.

Case in point: a recent visit to the Flamingo Hilton's "Forever Plaid." My boyfriend and I arrived early, were seated in a cozy booth, and placed our drink orders with a cocktail waitress. When she returned, we handed her cash and a "2-for-1" drink coupon.

To our chagrin, she pointed to the voucher's fine print, which stated it had to be presented at the "time of ordering" -- not the time of purchase.

Despite our pleas for leniency, she was as hardhearted as a Singapore judge -- despite the fact that we knew free drinks were being served with a vengeance right outside the lounge.

Oh, we got our puny revenge: We stiffed her with glee.

Flashback: a promotion at Palace Station. Table players were being awarded free six-packs and 12-can cases of Pepsi. After some skilled blackjack play, we won three six-packs, then asked to "color up," or trade two of them for a case, to make carrying the cans to the car less onerous.

Again, our seemingly simple beverage requests were rebuffed.

Flash forward: the Riviera's late night comedy show. Calling ahead of time earlier that evening, we were told to just come down around 11. Arriving at that time, we were abruptly informed by the ticket clerk that the show had been mysteriously "cancelled."

"When did that happen?" we inquired. "Five minutes ago," he snapped. When asked why, he had no response, no apology -- and needless to say, no compensation for our long, fruitless trek down there.

The problem in all these cases, according to professor Andy Nazarechuk, a customer service expert and director of UNLV's Hospitality Research and Development Center, is a classic '90s buzzword: empowerment.

"Empowerment," he explains, "is if the employee can do something then and there to make you happy. In some cases, the employee is afraid to make a decision, because if they make the wrong decision, it could affect their employment."

In other words, catering to our out-of-bounds request would have thrown their system into a tizzy -- and could have gotten them fired (now I'm feeling just a twinge of guilt over that forgone nontip).

So why don't casinos let their employees tweak the system?

"It's an issue of trust," Nazarechuk says. "Some organizations don't like to give up that control, so they say, 'Don't vary from this policy.' But what's more important: service to guests -- or following The Procedure?"

And as competition revs up, lackluster service is no longer an option. "One blackjack table is the same as another blackjack table," he notes. "The difference is the way the dealer interacts with the customer.

"No longer can (you) get away with poor service, or you're going to lose customers," he says. "Employers have to decide: How much will it cost to provide good service -- and how much will it cost us if we don't?"

The obvious answer: more than this city can afford to lose.