You are the director of customer relations at Star Crest Airlines. Star Crest Airlines offers over 900 domestic flights daily and prides itself on its number one ranked customer service.
Star Crest Airlines has been transporting passengers across the nation for over 40 years. In that time, the airline has been awarded with several industry awards such as Best in Customer Service, Most On-time Arrivals and Best Value.
Star Crest Airlines has a company policy that allows trained service animals to travel with passengers with disabilities. The trained service animals allowed are those that have been specifically trained to perform life functions for individuals with visual impairments, deafness, seizures and mobility impairments. Passengers traveling with trained service animals must provide current vaccination documentation. The trained service animal must be either a dog or a cat, be well-behaved, and is limited to one per passenger.
In the last several years, Star Crest Airlines has seen an increase in the number of passengers traveling with emotional support animals. Currently, Star Crest Airlines has no company policy in place to navigate the definition or parameters of emotional support animals. Due to a significant increase in both customer and employee complaints, the company must now develop a policy.
Passengers onboard recent Star Crest Airlines flights have claimed that lizards, snakes, hamsters and even peacocks are emotional support animals. While the airline understands that some passengers do indeed require such animals, since there is no policy in place, all are currently welcome onboard. According to healthcare officials, a passenger that truly requires an emotional support animal will be able to provide written documentation by a medical heath professional.
The president of Star Crest Airlines wants you to create an emotional support animal policy for the airlines. The policy must include types of animals permitted, documentation needed, and any advance notice that needs to be given to the airlines.
The president also wants you to determine how to best communicate the new emotional support animal policy to customers, including those that have already purchased Star Crest Airlines tickets.
