Clark has long believed companies that romance their employees succeed in the marketplace because their workers in turn romance the customer. Now the latest quarterly results of the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) bear out his belief.

The ACSI people tracked companies that have done well in their survey data and determined that those stocks increased over time at about three times the rate of those companies who didn't score well.

This most recent ACSI took a look at the financial sector, among other industries. Their findings reveal that the bigger the bank, the worse the customer service.

The average bank gets a score of 75. Smaller banks, on average, get an 80. Bank of America has been singled out as the worst bank in America with a score of 67. Right behind Bank of America are Citibank and JPMorgan Chase.

One monster bank that did substantially better than others was Wells Fargo with a score of 73. Yet credit unions take the cake with an average score of 84. Of course, it's important to note that even credit unions can vary in quality.

In the arena of discount stock brokers, Charles Schwab get the highest marks, while Fidelity Investments was just a hair behind Chuck.

Netflix tops the world of Internet retailers. Clark wants to remind everyone that Netflix's limited plan starts at $4.99 a month and offers one DVD a month and two hours of on-demand content. Newegg and Amazon, meanwhile, are just slightly behind Netflix for e-retail in the ACSI.

In related news, $1 DVD rental company Red Box has reached a deal with Time Warner to make movies available with a 28-day delay after their initial DVD release. Meanwhile, a service called Vudu offers another pay-as-you-watch model where older releases start at $1.

Clark has some humble pie to eat. He had been opposed to Cash for Clunkers, calling it a thinly veiled subsidy for American automakers. It is a subsidy, but the big surprise is what people bought with their Clunkers money.

The American people really rose above the program's weak mpg requirements and bought ultra fuel-efficient vehicles such as the Ford Focus and the Toyota Corolla. However, one downside to Cash for Clunkers has been that used car prices have gone up. Dealers have reduced available supply as they crush the Clunkers trade-ins.

Whether you're talking foreign or domestic, the quality of cars today is fantastic. Need proof? Look at the University of Michigan's quarterly American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI), which rated auto manufacturers, computers and appliances this time out.

In the car business, the highest customer satisfaction rating goes to Cadillac in a tie with Lexus (the historical winner). Following closely behind are Buick, Honda, Lincoln Mercury, BMW and others.

JD Power, Consumer Reports and the ACSI all have slightly different takes on the auto industry. But there's some consistency with Lexus, Cadillac, Buick doing well in survey after survey. So you can be comfortable buying American. And while some Chrysler nameplates get horrible scores, Ford and GM are doing a much better job with quality.

On a related note, GM is readying a $4,000 automobile for the Asian market. Clark believes that by 2012 we should have several options for new reliable vehicles under $10,000 stateside. Fiat is also planning to make an affordable car in Mexico for export to the United States and throughout Latin America.

So we have the perfect situation: Great quality and great affordability coming in vehicles.

Finally, a word on the ACSI results for the computer industry. Apple stands head and shoulders above Dell, Compaq, Hewlett-Packard and Acer. Why? Apple offers customer care after your purchase and it doesn't operate on Vista!

Here's one from the "revenge can be sweet" department…

Clark has spoken in the past about sites where consumers can share their collective wisdom about businesses (Yelp.com) or the travel experience (TripAdvisor.com).

Well, what if a business wants to find online reviews of customers so they can avoid the bad ones? BusinessBeware.biz offers just such a service for a nominal fee of $5.

If customers can diss a business online, now business has its own website to diss customers! Of course, the idea is simply to help business owners vet out the "bad apple" customers and steer clear of them.

Meanwhile, ServiceLive.com is a related service that allows you to name your price for small home-repairs. You essentially put your small repairs up for bid online.

ServiceLive.com is free for consumers. They take a 10% cut of the price you pay the contractor. And a part of the money they collect is used to do background checks on contractors.

The new quarterly results from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) have been released.

This time around, the University of Michigan's ACSI honed in on the airline industry, the cell providers, the cable companies, fast food and the package delivery business.

Let's begin with the airlines. The full fare "Gang of 5" -- Continental, Delta, American, US Air and United -- all got failing grades. United was the worst with a score of 56 on a scale of 100.

In fact, United had the lowest score for three of the last four years in their category. This year, they scored even lower than the majority of the cable companies. Talk about really stinking it up!

The discount airlines fared much better. Most discounters were lumped together for a combined score of 77. Southwest Airlines was the sole standalone in the index and received its highest-ever score of 81. That's downright amazing compared to the rest of the industry!

In the hotel world, Hilton was named the top chain, followed by Marriott. The lowest score in this category went to Wyndham Worldwide.

The fast food chains offered a real shocker as Domino's pizza was named top dog. Domino's was followed by Starbucks tied with Wendy's in the second-place slot. In last place, Burger King tied with Kentucky Fried Chicken.

The best cable/satellite company was DirecTV with a score of 71. Charter really stunk it up at the bottom of the heap with a 51.

In package delivery, FedEx gets just about highest score of any business in any industry with an 84. UPS trails closely behind at 82, and the USPS checks in with a respectable 74.

Customer satisfaction from online shopping is slipping, according to a new tally from ForeSee Results.

But what's interesting is that some e-tailers are still doing a great job despite the overall negative trend. According to the Top 100 Online Retail Satisfaction Index, the business that provides the best online customer experience is NetFlix.com.

Wall Street analysts have long been bearish on NetFlix.com, but we've only had one single complaint about them on the show. They must be doing something right!

Amazon.com comes in as the No. 2 e-tailer. Meanwhile, Avon.com, DoctorsFosterandSmith.com, NewEgg.com and QVC.com are all in a four-way tie further on down the list.

On the flip side, the survey names Efollett, MarketAmerica, Etronics, UrbanOutfitters, ShopNBC, J. Crew and BlueNile, among others, as the worst e-tailers.

Interestingly, BlueNile is a site that Clark has in the past recommended as a place to buy diamonds!

A new report from Forrester Research speaks volumes about the value of a great customer service reputation.

One company that got a 58 -- an exceedingly low rating -- for the year of 2008 was Dell Computers. This is a company that had a great customer service reputation and threw it away. Poor Michael Dell retired at 38 and has had to come back and work tirelessly to restore the reputation of the company with his name on it.

Another company that scored low was Sprint. Theirs used be a respected name in the cell phone business. But now, Sprint is seeing customers leave in the millions because the company took its focus off the customer. They even rewarded managers for not helping customers.

Actually, it's important to note that the number of complaints we get about Sprint on the show has declined significantly in recent months. Clark thinks Sprint CEO Dan Hesse has returned a real customer focus to the company. But as the Forrester Research tally shows, the public perception of Sprint has not changed yet.

On the positive side of things, Apple continues to enjoy a good rating of 80. In fact, they're the only computer company that gets a good rating on the survey.

If you own a business, the reputation you establish makes or breaks you. It takes a long time to build a reputation, but only a short time to demolish it.

A CEO who communicates to employees that customers don't matter -- or that company honchos matter more than regular employees -- is the kiss of death.

Of course, hazard for a company may make opportunity for you. For example, Sprint and Dell both have to discount heavily to compensate for the customer exodus they've seen.

A new analysis of the March 2009 calls to our Consumer Action Center shows that the topics you're calling about have shifted dramatically.

If you go back to 2007, the No. 1 topic of calls was anything to do with cars -- buying, selling, maintenance, etc. The second-most popular topic was anything to do with housing -- buying, selling, renting, etc.

Today, however, the majority of the Consumer Action Center's calls are all about debt. In fact, calls about debt exceeded calls about cars by a ratio of 7:1!

Not surprisingly, our third most-frequent off-air call for the month of March was about collection agencies. That obviously dovetails very neatly with the questions about debt.

It's eye-opening, in fact, how abusive the collection agencies have become to prompt all the calls. Know that if you are contacted by a collector, you have rights. Never give them your checking account number over the phone. Never give them your credit card info over the phone.

A collection agency can not put you in jail. In fact, you have the right to tell them they're not allowed to call you anymore. Use our "drop dead letter" for that purpose.

By the way, the second most popular call topic in March had to do with fraudulent activities -- the rip-offs, the cons, the scams, etc.

Our show moves with you. You've told us the areas where you need guidance and advice and we'll meet that need. Of course, we'll still talk about cars too, along with other perennial problem areas likes banks, customer service, cell phones and investment questions!

Clark has long been a fan of Yelp.com and the collective wisdom of customers that it compiles on a variety of retail stores, restaurants and even doctors.

However, many business owners have been less than enthusiastic about the site. They've found that if a customer has a beef and posts it, there's no recourse once they've been maligned. In some instances, the poster could even represent a disgruntled competitor who's out to ruin their reputation.

But that one-sided dialogue is about to change. Yelp will now allow businesses to give a reply when they get trashed on the site.

The consumer champ loves all the collective wisdom sites, including TripAdvisor.com, Kudzu.com and others. By sharing your experience as a customer, you can help steer others toward a good experience too.

When Clark brought his staff to Shanghai, associate producer Joel was concerned that the hotel the consumer champ had booked was not optimally located near all the action. TripAdvisor, however, said it was the greatest hotel in Asia. In the end, Joel ate his words when he saw the accommodations and location.

Think about the old days. A bad review in The New York Times could kill a play. A restaurant reviewer for a city newspaper could dramatically boost business. In the travel business, it used to be that travel writers had enormous sway in the marketplace.

Yelp, TripAdvisor, Kudzu and others help democratize the review process.

One final thought: When you're considering online reviews, you may want to ignore those that are excessively negative or excessively positive. Look for the middle ground in opinion to get a real feel.

Clark wants to unveil the results of Consumer Reports' annual survey of the cell phone industry -- just in time for the flurry of activity in December and January when people switch carriers.

We get so many complaints about the nation's cell phone companies. It used to be that our complaints were all about cable, cable, cable. But recent customer satisfaction surveys from the University of Michigan find the cable and cell phone industries neck-in-neck at the bottom of the heap.

Cable providers are monopolies so it's natural for them to specialize in customer no service. But what gives in the cell phone world -- where you have multiple players competing for your business?

Sprint is again rated the lowest on customer satisfaction, dropped calls and customer service. Yet the new survey also finds that middle-of-the-pack AT&T has dropped to low Sprint-like levels for the first time when it comes to customer service.

In another surprise, Alltel has been singled out for great rates and customer service. However, Alltel is only available in certain areas for about 60 million Americans.

T-Mobile holds steady with good customer service and very competitive rates among the national players. And Verizon continues to be the best overall company, but they're very expensive.

Are you in a non-Alltel area and looking for a compromise? Clark suggests T-Mobile -- the only carrier that will work with the Google Phone.

Are you fed up with customer no service? One of the best ways to fight back is through the use of technology. YouTube, blogs, Twitter and message boards are being used to turn the tables on unfeeling companies. Those same companies now routinely monitor "new media" sites and respond to people who are complaining.

Meanwhile, Consumer Reports came up with HearUsNow.org exclusively for beefs with communications companies.

Clark thinks about Sprint's new CEO Dan Hesse who wanted to return a customer focus to the company. So he went on TV and gave out his e-mail address to customers. What a deluge he got!

As companies get larger, they get dumber. Employees kiss up to management, instead of kissing up to the customer.

Clark also believes more CEOs need to come down to earth and start eating with their employees (not in separate dining rooms); eliminating their own preferential parking; and losing the designer suits as status symbols.

People love their cell phones, but hate their cell phone providers. The Better Business Bureau now reports that the cell phone business has received more complaints than any other industry for 3 consecutive years. There are now 22 states with bills in various stages of consideration or adoption all seeking to establish a cell phone users' bill of rights. The response of the cell carriers has been to spend millions to fund lobbyists who are trying to get rules bent in the industry's favor. Why not just fix the bad business model instead? We're not talking about dropped calls here; we're talking about those rotten 2-year contracts. Clark is hard-pressed to find another country in the world that does these contracts.

For the longest time, the cell carriers argued that contracts were necessary because they helped subsidize the cost of cell phones. But this explanation turned out to be bogus; iPhone customers had to pay full market price for their phones, and then they were still forced into a contract! Clark has long thought consumers should be offered the choice to either buy a phone at market value with no carrier strings attached, or sign the 2-year contract with one carrier and get a free phone.

Meanwhile, all of the carriers are in cahoots with crooks. If you're not on an unlimited text messaging plan, they get paid every time you receive an unwanted spam text message. They're also ripping off teens (and their parents) by billing on behalf of third party carriers that offer ring tones and other premium services.

Why is there no movement in Washington, D.C., on the issue of a cell phone users' bill of rights? Simply put, the members of the U.S. House and Senate are in their Capitol Hill bubble. The cell industry is trying to get a preemption law that will make it illegal for any state to pass a rule governing the industry. Sounds like they're taking a cue from the airlines who managed to get New York's air passenger bill of rights overturned!

The Clark Stinks forum -- where you can vent if you take issue with something the penny-pinching guru says -- is one of the most popular parts of our website. Clark was motivated to launch this message board when he noticed people registered domain names with "colorful" words attached to his moniker.

He quickly realized that people shouldn't have to leave his website to tell him he's lousy.

The start of Clark Stinks was not without controversy in the world of radio. Why would a host want to invite negative views of what he does? Clark has always believed talk-radio hosts have inordinate power because they're able to silence critics at the push of a button. But there's really no reason why they should have the last word.

Now a variety of companies are catching on to Clark's idea. The Boston Globe reports that Bank of America has its own online review section. Other companies doing the same thing include Starbucks, Dell and Ford.

The culture of American business almost dictates that we should have a difficult time responding to criticism. Not so in Japan. Executives over there have been known to apologize to the Japanese people in very public and ceremonial ways when they make blunders.

So now that corporate America is going the Clark Stinks route, Christa thinks we may have to post Clark's cell phone number on the website to stay one step ahead of the pack. That'll be the day!

Verizon recently earned plaudits on Clark's show for hiring a "Customer Care Czar" named Tom Maguire. It's somewhat odd that there's a job such as Maguire's, but the reality is that as companies get bigger they sometimes lose their customer service skills.

Maguire is the man charged with reversing that trend at Verizon. In a rare interview on the show, Clark gave him some airtime today to tell his story.

The czar said he frequently helps employees deal with bureaucratic obstacles that stand in the way of good customer service. He also helps shepherd disgruntled customers through the escalation process when they call an executive directly.

Maguire points to the implementation of net promoter scores as one of the ways the company is putting the emphasis back on the customer. This is a fancy way of saying that Verizon hires a third-party group to call up customers after they've spoken to a rep and ask them to rate the service they received. The customer's feedback then goes to the rep responsible for helping that person. It's a way to build a "you touch it, you own it" mentality among employees, Maguire says.

Finally, he vowed the company will try to ensure that customers won't get sales pitches for other services when they call up to resolve an issue. He's also working to ensure that outsourced reps located overseas are well-trained and articulate.

Looking to the future, Maguire says he'd like to eliminate the multiple numbers you have to call if you have problems with several different Verizon services.

The new quarterly results from the University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) have been released.

While Clark usually comes out of the gate with news of who's stinking it up, he's decided to begin with one industry that's doing great -- the package delivery business. FedEx earns an 85 this quarter, while UPS is right behind them with an 83. Keep in mind that this is out of a scale of 100. Anything in the 70s is considered a passing grade. USPS scored a major coup, meanwhile, reversing several past failures with a score of 74.

Among the flunkees, we have Sprint in the cell phone business. The carrier earned a 56 while Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile were all in the low 70s.

The cell carriers all fiercely compete with each other. Not so in the monopoly-dominated world of cable and satellite TV. And the numbers don't lie, either; every last cable/satellite provider failed. Direct TV was the least of the worst, while Dish Network had a big decline. The worst score of the entire index was 54, earned by both Comcast and Charter.

In the airline sector, US Air also took home a 54 to make it the worst airline for customer satisfaction in the United States. The full-fares all failed, with American and Continental selected as the "best" because they earned 62 each. Among the discounters, Southwest scored an industry-wide high of 79. In fact, Southwest has been No. 1 for 14 years in a row. Other discounters were too small to note individually, but had a combined blended score of 75.

Is it any wonder that the industries you hear repeated complaints about on the show got the lousiest scores? Clark thinks not.

When you go to the store, you want to be respected and treated well as a customer. It's that simple. All the complex theories that MBAs learn in school really boil down to this: Treat the customer right. Yet the Wharton School of Business recently found that businesses aren't honoring this simple creed. Customers were treated down right rotten in 60% of the cases they examined.

The No. 1 complaint is that there are typically no employees around to help customers. The second peeve was long checkout lines. Finally, customers also get upset when there are employees present, but they don't offer any greeting, smile or eye contact.

In business, it's key that you focus on serving someone. For employers, it starts by wooing your employees with great treatment so they can romance the customer. Treat your employees with love and respect and they'll serve your customer. Everybody wins that way.

Here's one example of great customer service: When Clark's wife was in a car wreck, his insurer called twice after the accident just to see how she was feeling. How classy is that? The other driver's insurer -- who had to pay for the damage to Lane's vehicle -- never even called once. This kind of basic decency saves money in the long run because it makes customers less likely to think about litigation.

Clark recently told you how Wal-Mart ranked as the worst retailer and the worst grocer when it comes to customer satisfaction, according to the latest ACSI survey. The irony is that people still shop there in huge numbers despite all the complaints. But that may not always be the case.

Before Wal-Mart was the largest retailer in the world, that title was held by Sears and then by Kmart. Both Sears and Kmart are today owned by Sears Holdings, which has now reported that its profits are down by nearly 50%. Sears Holdings' sales are declining rapidly, while cash on hand has dropped from $4 billion a year ago to $1.5 billion now. The marketplace spoke and this is the result.

The Wal-Mart haters have to realize that the marketplace will speak again if Wal-Mart doesn't improve its customer experience. Look at any industry. In the car field, GM used to own this country. Today, they're struggling to survive because they had a tin ear to the customer. The message is clear: If somebody doesn't take care of you, you must use your feet and take care of yourself by taking your business elsewhere.

The new quarterly results from The University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) have been released. Among the brokerages, Fidelity is tops, followed by Schwab, TD Ameritrade and E*TRADE. When it comes to online retail, Amazon is tops, followed closely by NewEgg.com. In banking, Wachovia remains on top, while CitiGroup and Wells-Fargo come in at the bottom of the heap. The department/discounter store field was dominated by Nordstrom. Wal-Mart came in last! In the specialty retail category, Barnes & Noble was No. 1, Costco was No. 2 and in last place came Circuit City. The supermarket category was dominated by Publix, while Wal-Mart came in dead last. One clear trend emerges: Wal-Mart faces a real challenge when it comes to customer satisfaction.

Just as the ACSI results came out, Business Week ran a cover story about consumer vigilantes. People are setting up gripe sites like ComcastMustDie.com in the hopes that big corporations will change their ways. Comcast now has a team of staffers that spend all their time monitoring and responding to posts on this site! One customer who posted had 8 trucks show up at his house to restore his cable connection. Similar gripe sites include GetSatisfaction.com, Complaints.com and PlanetFeedback.com. The Business Week piece also told the story of a man stuck on the tarmac on a U.S. Airways flight. He figured out the e-mail addresses of the company's executives and e-mailed them from his seat on the plane. Nobody responded -- no wonder U.S. Airways has the worst ranking of any airline by far.

On a positive note, Business Week's tally of Customer Service Champs has been topped by USAA. So there actually are companies with CEOs who get up and think about ways to improve customer service. Take Sprint, for example. This is a company that has been bashed by Clark in the past. But now Sprint has a new CEO who has really shaken things up and apparently actually cares about customers.

Several weeks ago, Clark told you that Consumer Reports rated the best and worst credit cards in America. The single best card was the USAA Federal Savings Bank MasterCard, while all cards issued through credit unions came in at No. 2. Meanwhile, the big banks that issue the bulk of cards in America got stinky scores. Now there's a new survey out from J.D. Power and Associates that corroborates the findings of Consumer Reports. The J.D. Power tally focused on the big names only and is topped by American Express and Discover. On the bottom of the heap, J.D. Power says HSBC is the worst, followed by Bank of America and Capital One. That's very similar to what Consumer Reports said in ranking Capital One as the worst followed by Bank of America. Meanwhile, Citibank, Chase, Washington Mutual and Wells Fargo all got lousy scores from J.D. Power even though they came in near the top of the tally. So the important thing to note is that you should get your credit card through a credit union if you have access to it. Don't go through one of the giant monster mega-banks. Size does not equal quality in the world of credit cards.

Have you ever wondered about the best credit card in the country? The October issue of Consumer Reports turned its attention to a survey of this all-important industry. The single best card to have in your wallet is USAA Federal Savings Bank of San Antonio's MasterCard. This card is exclusively for members of the military, their families and in some cases certain retirees. This little piece of plastic was singled out because of its reasonable interest rates and cash back earnings. USAA also delivers the best focus on customers and problem resolution, according to the report. But what about a good card for those of us who aren't in the military? A card issued by Navy Federal Credit Union came in second, while cards issues by credit unions in general took third place. Credit unions offer their cardholders good problem resolution and better interest rates than a typical bank-issued card. Overall, the only big issuers who got decent scores were American Express and Discover. The other major companies, meanwhile, were in the toilet. Providian was named the single worst card issuer. Following right behind at the bottom were Capital One, Bank of America's MBNA division and JP Morgan Chase.

The latest American Customer Satisfaction Index from the University of Michigan has been released. This quarterly survey has been around since 1994 and keeps tabs on the good, the bad and the ugly in multiple industries. The big news this year is that American automakers did very well. While the top automaker was foreign (Toyota's Lexus division), homegrown companies like Cadillac, Buick and Lincoln-Mercury all tied for second place. Meanwhile, Toyota's namesake division fell way behind on the tally. Clark thinks the Japanese automaker has been taking its eye off the ball lately. The Toyota business model is now geared toward growth and quantity, not quality. That accounts for why they've been issuing more recalls than ever. Fortunately for Toyota, there are some corporate initiatives in Japan to raise the quality of their namesake line of vehicles. In the computer industry, Apple is tops in customer satisfaction; Clark's wife has an Apple Macintosh that she loves. In the PC world, Hewlett Packard's HP line makes a beloved machine, yet HP's Compaq division has been voted the worst company in the industry. Meanwhile, Whirlpool continues its dominance in the appliances field, racking up its largest lead yet over the competition.

When you buy something that turns out to be wrong, it's important to know how to return it. Clark prefers to deal with stores with unlimited return policies, but not all of them make it easy. And that matters to consumers. The Harris pollsters state that 91% of people choose whether or not to buy at a store based on its return policy. It's the most important thing people name in determining whether they'll buy in the first place. But retailers worry about fraud when items are returned, because it's become a big problem. It's a challenge for them to deal with fraud without treating the regular customer like dirt. Clark's advice to retailers: be friendly about returns, and make it easy for your customers. It will create real customer loyalty and good will, which means higher sales for your business.

Clark is constantly amazed that so many companies think that it's OK to treat their customers horribly, with what he calls Customer No-Service policies. "Customer care" employees are given almost no power these days to fix problems, and in some cases, are actually ordered to try to sell you new services and products when you're calling with a problem. Another stupid thing they do: they only offer good deals to new customers. Businesses should reward customers for their loyalty, but that's not the way it is. According to a survey in USA Today, Customer Service is the #1 reason people choose to stay with a company long-term. (Product quality is a distant second, and price a distant third.) It sometimes seems that these companies are following in the footsteps of the dinosaurs...the bigger they get, the smaller their brains get. And we know what happened to the dinosaurs!

The worst drivers live in DC, New York, and New Jersey. Idaho and Alaska are the states that house the best drivers. GMACinsurance.com is the website you can go to if you want to test yourself and see how you stack up against other drivers.

The customer satisfaction index distributed quarterly by the University of Michigan is out again. This quarter, the survey ranked airlines, cell phone companies, cable and others. The results are amusing. Would you believe that the typical American airline got a lower score than the IRS? We really dislike the airlines. As you might have guessed, Southwest ranked the highest in the airline survey while United ranked lowest. In fact, United received the second lowest score of any airline in the 14-year history of the survey. Only Northwest Airlines got a lower score in 1999. In chain restaurants, Olive Garden got the top rating. The top-rated hotel was Marriott, followed by Hyatt and Hilton. As for cable and television, DirecTV and Dish got the highest scores. Charter Communications and Comcast ranked lowest. In the cell phone industry, Sprint got the worst score. Verizon and T-Mobile were tops. As for package delivery, FedEx got the best score. UPS and the USPS got fairly high rankings, as well. But FedEx has been on top for 10 years.

Consumer Reports has come out with another restaurant issue and Clark wants to share the results. In the steak house category, the upscale restaurants were The Capital Grille, Ruth’s Chris and Morton’s. In the mid-price range, Longhorn got top honors. In traditional American category, Houston’s was No. 1 and J. Alexander’s was No. 2. The best Italian chain was Carrabba’s and McCormick & Schmick’s got top seafood honors. The restaurant also got the best overall score of any restaurant. In the “unusual dinner houses” category, Rainforest Café and P.F. Changs got high honors. The lowest score out of all 103 restaurants went to Friendly’s.

Would you rather do business with companies that treat you well or treat you like dirt? It’s a no-brainer. And, each quarter, the University of Michigan gives you that information on a silver platter. This quarter, UM rated the top customer service oriented companies in the airline, fast food and phone industries. In the cell phone industry, T-Mobile and Verizon were listed as the best. Cingular, Nextel and Sprint tied for dead last. In the traditional phone business, AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth and Quest all got lousy scores. The top company was Cox Communications, which provides cable and phone out West. In the pay TV industry, DirecTV got top honors, followed by Dish. The cable companies – Comcast and Charter – were ranked toward the end. What about the airline industry? The best airline without question was Southwest, and the other discounters fared pretty well. The worst by far was Northwest. The only full fare airline that got a half decent rating was Continental. As far as fast food, Papa John’s got the highest score for the second year in a row, and McDonald’s brought up the rear. Overall, the cable industry got the lowest score of any of them.

The quarterly University of Michigan customer satisfaction survey is out, and this time it’s all about computers, appliances and cars. One computer company stands out above the rest and that is Apple. People simply love the design and the ease of use with Apple computers. On the other hand, Dell has dropped significantly in the rankings. Dell seriously needs to do something about its ailing customer service. In the appliance industry, the three biggies all ranked high. That is Whirlpool, GM and Maytag. As for automobiles, Toyota was tops. Toyota is on its way to becoming the biggest automaker in the world because its cars are so reliable and affordable. The only downfall is the buying experience, according to customers. The lowest score in the survey went to Ford motor Company.

As a talk radio host, Clark is in a position to have the last word. But he doesn’t think that’s fair, so he’s created a message board specifically for people who want to voice their opinions about him and his show. That’s not the way some sites see things, however. According to the Wall Street Journal, some retail sites and complaint sites are editing the comments people post. They are so frightened of negative opinions affecting their businesses that they’re censoring posts. Newegg.com is editing people’s posts, according to the story, and amazon.com is making it hard for people to post negative postings. Overstock.com was censoring comments, but changed its policy because so many people were complaining about it. People, like Clark, rely on the honest feedback of customers when they are considering buying something. He hopes that these sites reconsider their policies.

If a company or person did a good job for you, Clark likes people to talk about it on our “Customer Yes Service” message board. But what do you do if you just keep running into that corporate brick wall and you can’t get any help from people. There are sites that allow you to vent about a company or rate the level of customer service. And people pay attention to what’s being said on these sites. Clark has chosen not to do business with a company because someone rated them poorly on epinions.com. Other sites out there are thesqueakywheel.com and complaints.com. If you’re traveling this summer, check out tripadvisor.com. People post about hotels and other places they’ve stayed and it can be extremely helpful.

The expression “you get what you pay for” is not always true. J.D. Power & Associates, which researches car quality and other industries, has released a survey about the nation’s airlines. J.D. Power rated airlines on things such as check-in, reservations, in-flight treatment and how well the plane performed and looked. There was one airline that came out way above the rest - JetBlue. No other airline was anywhere near JetBlue in customer service. The company is also adding aircraft faster than any other airline in the country. Typically, when a company grows, the less concerned with customers it gets. But that is not happening with JetBlue. In fact, the company has added more legroom in the back of the plane, giving passengers an incentive to sit there. In addition, each seatback comes equipped with satellite TV and the prices on this discount airline are great. SouthWest took 2nd place, and No. 3 was Delta, the only full-fare airline in the top five. Alaska Airlines was No. 4 and AirTran was No. 5. The bottom of the barrel was Northwest at #11. Northwest got the worst scores in all categories, and the company is evidently none too pleased. But apparently the less you pay, the better the service - sometimes.

What one service do people loathe more than any other? The cell phone industry. USA Today listed the results of several customer service surveys and it was almost unanimous. Consumer Reports, for example, noted that the cell phone industry ranked lower than any other industry ever. Only 45 percent of people who use cell phones don’t “hate” their phone. J.D. Power’s survey showed the cell phone industry as dead last after the airline and utility industries. Why do cell phone companies manage to do this? The same report showed that it’s because the companies cram contracts down customers’ throats. Theses companies are basically afraid of losing you because they treat customers so poorly, so they keep you tied to them with contracts. A site where you can rail on your company is escapecellhell.org. There are a small handful of companies that stand above the rest because they have simple plans and no contracts. They are Metro PCS, Cricket Communications and Virgin Mobile USA. Think of switching to one of these plans if you’re tire of being treated poorly.

The expression “you get what you pay for” is not always true. J.D. Power & Associates, which researches car quality and other industries, has released a survey about the nation’s airlines. J.D. Power rated airlines on things such as check-in, reservations, in-flight treatment and how well the plane performed and looked. There was one airline that came out way above the rest - JetBlue. No other airline was anywhere near JetBlue in customer service. The company is also adding aircraft faster than any other airline in the country. Typically, when a company grows, the less concerned with customers it gets. But that is not happening with JetBlue. In fact, the company has added more legroom in the back of the plane, giving passengers an incentive to sit there. In addition, each seatback comes equipped with satellite TV and the prices on this discount airline are great. SouthWest took 2nd place, and No. 3 was Delta, the only full-fare airline in the top five. Alaska Airlines was No. 4 and AirTran was No. 5. The bottom of the barrel was Northwest at #11. Northwest got the worst scores in all categories, and the company is evidently none too pleased. But apparently the less you pay, the better the service - sometimes.

Clark has always believed companies that treat their employees well also treat their customers well and do better over time. Now, he has actual proof. Each quarter, the University of Michigan releases research on industries and companies in those industries, detailing how consumers feel about them. Whenever a company’s customer satisfaction rating goes down in the Michigan survey, the company suffers down the road. It usually happens about two years after the statistics are released or after two companies merge. The supermarket industry, for example, has been in the survey for 10 years. And for 10 years, it has been named the best. That company is Publix. As a result, Publix is spreading from Florida and the Southeast to all over the nation. On the other hand, supermarkets that ranked at the bottom of the list are now all in financial trouble. In the retail biz, Costco and Kohl’s tied for first place. Wachovia ranked very high among the giant banks out there, while other mega banks did very poorly. If you want the best service, go to a credit union or smaller bank, according to the survey. But the industry with the lowest score of any on this survey was health care insurance. We simply loathe this industry, and something must change. For all of the results, click here.

Several new reports out today say AT&T is still a wounded duck in the wireless industry and is basically waiting for someone to bail them out. AT&T has had the worst problems porting people who want to switch companies and take their cell phone number with them. About half of the complaints about poor porting service were lodged against AT&T. That is due, in part, to the fact that AT&T refused to use the industry standard system for switching companies as all the other companies did. Number portability is supposed to happen in about two and a half hours, but that is just a guideline. The FCC made a terrible error in allowing the cell phone industry to regulate itself in this area. It’s more like 24 to 48 hours and sometimes longer. The good news is that there are some decent companies out there if you’re looking to switch companies. According to the Washington Post, Verizon Wireless has been consistently ranked as the best wireless company out there, although the plans are quite expensive. Verizon has had about a third of all the “porting” complaints, but you must consider that the company has 50 percent more customers than AT&T. T-Mobile has been adding huge numbers of subscribers because they’ve been dubbed as the bargain provider. The company has received complaints, but they are considered decent. Nextel is the company that people fire the least often, so that is a good sign too. This is the third time Clark has talked about AT&T in recent weeks for a reason. He doesn’t want you to be handcuffed to an unreliable company, especially if it’s a sinking ship. If you want help choosing a plan and learning more about cell phone portability, go to our Wireless Phone Kit.