Is the quality of your service going down as prices are going up?

Hello.

I was just curious to see if anyone has blogged on the quality of service and these times of higher prices. I remember seeing a blog on changing your prices, but I don't recall seeing one on the quality of service.

One example that I can give of where this is not true is when I accidently bounced a check and the grocer called to let me know and wanted to know when I would be in to take care if it. Usually when you bounce a check you get socked with a fee from the bank and a fee from whomever you wrote the check to. The manager said that his bank doesn't charge a fee and neither did he, so I just had to repay the check amount. I thought that was very nice and I never heard of anyone doing that .

I know in my contracts I put a statement in there saying that a bounced check will result in a $25 fee. It seems like maybe I should take this clause out of my contract and try to be a little nicer. How many of us have stood at a checkout line only not to be acknowledged by the checker. They don't say anything at all. Sometimes I say hi first and sometimes I wait until they do. I don't think this has anything to do with the quality of service going down as the prices climb.

I know that some businesses are really tightening their belts and some of the services they once offered are no longer present. Or some departments in stores are relegated to one person whereas there might have been 4 or 5 persons doing this job. I know they get hassled since they are the only ones working at that time. But it seems like today's home sellers want more in a home for as little money as possible and don't want to hire us stagers because of the up front payment. The quality of my services have not gone down.

I also know that the quality seems to go down on the phone rather than in person. You try and talk with some one only to play phone tag after having gone through all ten numbers on the phone. After going through all the numbers, the person you are tying to reach is out or on the other line. This is one instance where the quality of service is going down when the prices are shooting through the roof.

I suppose another example could be in busy restaurants. The staff gets busy and things are forgotten or rung up wrong. Still usually, they try really hard to do their job.

Has anyone run into this quality of service problem with higher prices? I certainly hope that the quality of service doesn't go down but it is nearly impossible with these trying times. There are however, exceptions to the rule.