AOL Settles With Spitzer
I stumbled across this article today and am not sure if it is recent as I can’t seem to find a date on the page. Whether my eyesight is worse than I thought or it is just a mistake is unclear but the article is pretty interesting and it talks about how AOL got into trouble with Eliot Spitzer who recently announced a 1.25 million dollar settlement with the company.

At the heart of the problem is AOL’s policy of incentivizing their workers for retaining customers who call to cancel.

This system, in which reps could earn tens of thousands of dollars, “had the effect of employees not honoring cancellations, or otherwise making cancellation unduly difficult for consumers,” according to Spitzer’s office.

AOL has 60 days to eliminate its program of rewarding bonuses based on minimum “save rates.” The company did not specify how bonuses will be allotted without the save rate, and adds that the program is “a work in progress.”

In addition the company has identified the employees who did not cancel orders at customer requests and has put a better monitoring system in place to ensure they do a better job of respecting customer’s wishes.