Travel & Leisure Industry Council Report – Summer 2022

I decided it was time for a new car a few weeks ago. This should be a moment and time of excitement and joyous anticipation, but nothing could be further removed. When did buying a car from a main dealership become such a soulless, dull, de-personalised transaction? And I say transaction deliberately, because that’s literally all it was, no sense of customer experience whatsoever, just a cold and joyless process. Or maybe this is just BMW.

Anthony Healds frustrations with Sainsbury’s Bank last week struck a chord with me. If you didn’t see it, here it is. “Four and a half minutes of IVR which screamed ‘GO ONLINE AND SERVE YOURSELF’. I tried that but as I wanted to cancel a card the website told me to call. ‘Due to Covid…’ followed by ‘due to severe weather…’, regularly interspersed with ‘YOU CAN DO MOST THINGS ONLINE’. This is a blue chip brand here that clearly did not want to talk to me, despite telling me to call.