Customer service is a subject that’s been mentioned a time or two in the nearly five years I’ve been writing this column. Circumstances lately have prompted me to revisit three of those.

We’ll start with the most recent first. Three weeks ago I wrote about how airlines will have nobody but themselves to blame if Congress passes a “Passenger’s Bill of Rights” measure as has been threatened.

E-mailers chided me for piling on over an Aug. 8 incident of a regional jet that stranded 50 passengers on board overnight after being diverted to Rochester, Minn., due to bad weather.

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Although I never mentioned it was a Continental Express flight operated by ExpressJet, a U.S. Department of Transportation investigation determined it wasn’t their fault. Instead, a representative from Mesaba Airlines, which is now owned by Delta, wrongly refused the Continental Express pilot’s repeated requests to let passengers go in the terminal. The reasoning was there were no Transportation Security Administration officials on duty, even though all the passengers had already been screened before they got on board in the first place.

I think the best response to that column came from an e-mailer who wrote: “You can go most places nowadays on an airliner for less than it would cost you to drive your own car. You get what you pay for, and right now the consumer doesn’t pay even the cost of providing the air transport. Airline employees deserve to get paid for their work. You’re getting ‘poor’ service? Tough (expletive).” 

Sounds like it could be from an airline employee, doesn’t it?

I agree though. My question is who decided my option had to be to take cheapskate airlines and be treated like dirt? Business travelers know this too well. Just try to get an upgrade on a full-fare ticket or buy a first class ticket? You can’t do it on four out of five flights a day from Tucson.

In a column in the Aug. 11, 2008, issue I wrote about the extraordinary customer service at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. Our family has continued to make regular visits there. They almost let us down this month when a representative called a day ahead of our most recent trip to say they wanted to cancel the appointment because the anesthesiologist couldn’t make it. I say almost dissappointed, because once we explained we were coming from Tucson and had planned for the trip, they found an anesthesiologist.

Finally, I’ll go back to a column that appeared in the July 18, 2005 issue about an extraordinary dining experience at Anthony’s in the Catalinas. It had come after an equally extraordinary experience of ineptness at another restaurant cappped off by a wait for the check that took so long my wife and I walked out before receiving it. (We returned and paid it but they were oblivious.)

Again, I didn’t name that restaurant but I never went back either. Now I couldn’t even if I wanted to. The restaurant is closed for good. Maybe if they had given customers the experience they were paying for the Ventana Room would still be open.

Contact David Hatfield at dhatfield@azbiz.com or

(520) 295-4237.