In some ways I agree, the customer isn't always right. The groups on facebook are filled with women who go looking for a reason to be mad at a cashier/employee/store/company. They get on FB complain about how they were treated poorly at a store/by a service (which may or may not be true) and the first comment, followed by several others are "call corporate!" "get a gift card" "get that b- fired" They call or email customer service and their anger is assuaged with a $25 gift card (or what have you).....once someone is successful at it, it just breeds the same behavior...lather, rinse, repeat x potentially thousands of customers.
On the other hand, I've never known GB's customer service to be all that stellar to begin with, they're rather lackadaisical with their response times and usually have a "here pick a product to make you happy" approach to solve customer problems.
I think there is a happy medium that can resolve a customers problem without having to throw free product/gift cards or other merch at customers, I think the free product, credit or merch is just the cheapest and easiest way to appease angry customers while keeping the money. Refunds are probably the most effective way to get rid of abusive customers, just give them their money back and make them go away. But I don't see a lot of businesses thrilled with the idea of refunding customers. I know my own job, we hardly if ever offer refunds. But if someone is truly un-able to be satisfied, refunding their money and saying sorry we don't want you as a customer anymore maybe the only solution?
