#%&*$ Scofflaws

American Scofflaw
The economy's in the tank. Corporate profits are down. Business owners are having just as hard a time getting loans as wannabe homeowners.So you'd think that businesses would be treating their patrons like royalty, right? That this would be exactly the right time for businesses to coddle their customers? Wrong. When the economic going gets tough, some companies apparently get tough-minded about customer service, squeezing out the last dime of profit by cutting back on critical customer-facing positions such as phone personnel.