Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) Chief Executive Steve Jobs has a funny of showing he's sorry. has limits on his generosity.

The $100 merchandise credit that Jobs offered last week to consumers outraged by the $200 iPhone price cut came with a catch: people can't use it on the popular iTunes service, according to Bloomberg News. (Update: After that initial report, Apple said that the information on its Web site was in error. Users won't be able to add the credit directly to their iTunes account, Bloomberg says.)

My guess is that Jobs wants people to use the credit for new Mac computers, iPods or to buy their friends a new, cheaper iPhone.

Now, despite what people wrote in response to my last Apple post, I actually am a fan of the company. The iPod is one of the greatest technological gizmos ever invented even though my particular one drives me bonkers from time to time. I'm even trying to convince my wife to buy a Mac.

Though Apple does have a right to place limits on its offer but prohibiting customers from using its most popular service is baffling. it's needs to make sure that a similar mixup doesn't happen again

Back in early July, there was a brouhaha over Sprint's (NYSE: S) decision to terminate roughly 1,000 subscribers because of persistent calls to customer service (the average was about 40 to 50 calls per month).

But isn't the customer king?

Maybe so, but there are some customers that can wreak havoc on your business. For example, there always seems to be some people who pay late (or not at all). At the same time, they keep demanding more services and changes. Such customers can eat up lots of resources and drag down the performance of your business.

True, with some customers it might be smart to put up with their bad behavior, even if you must take a loss on their business. This can be the case when you want to land a marquee name. In this situation, a troublesome customer can be worth the price if they provide a boost to your credibility and a reference for future business.

But this is the exception. Basically, to run a profitable business, it's critical to be rigorous on the return on each customer. Simply put, there are some customers that are not worth it.

Many years ago, one of my professors gave a design lecture which he titled I love hardware stores. In it, he presented various building elements that were off-the-shelf items that could be used to create (what he thought was) a particularly appealing aesthetic. He offered this theme as contemporary yet rustic, detailed yet simple, and very accessible to all.

After writing three stories on The Home Depot(NYSE: HD) recently, I feel that unlike many posts, a real dialog has been created between writer and reader, and people have brought up many issues that would be worthwhile for Home Depot to take note of -- not just offer up lip service, but really take to heart.

My BloggingStocks colleague Douglas McIntyre posted about the activation problems for the iPhone. There are also reports spreading across websites, blogs, and cable television.

The good news -- at least for Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and AT&T (NYSE: T) -- is that it looks like there is overwhelming demand. Yet, with all the hype, shouldn't they have been prepared for a mega surge?

A friend of mine, who is a gadget early adopter, bought an iPhone more than 20 hours ago and still can't get an activation.

According to my friend: "I'm still waiting even though my old phone has shut down. I'm an AT&T customer and
the number is porting. An AT&T rep I spoke to said there were some significant delays due to some systems being down since last night."

Well, as for Monday, it should be interesting to hear the spin from Apple and AT&T.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.

MSN Money has released its MSN Money-Zogby poll of the "Customer Service Hall of Shame," which ranks the top 10 companies with bad customer service. Here are how the results came in, with the name of the company and the percentage of respondents who rated the service as "poor:"

1. Sprint 40%
2. Bank of America 30%
3. Comcast 30%
4. Time Warner Cable 29%
5. AT&T 26%
6. CitiBank 24%
7. Wal-Mart 23%
8. Verizon 22%
9. Wells Fargo 21%
10. DirecTV 20%

As I saw the results, I was also reading a wonderful new book called The Best Investment Advice I Ever Received. Dr. Bob Froehlich of Deutsche Asset Management recounted this quote from James Walton, the son of Wal-Mart (which is, ironically, number 7 for poor customer service) founder Sam Walton, talking about the importance of customer service:

"You know what people don't get? They don't understand the fundamental relation between a profitable company and a company with great service. Most investors don't look at this correlation, even though it's the leading indicator of a profitable company. Instead, they are too busy looking at price/earnings ratios and balance sheets, but at the end of the day if you can find those companies and industries that are really focusing on service, you watch what happens five or six years later. Good service is the best indicator. It is a qualitative way to look at companies and investment opportunities unlike anything else you tend to see.

I think that James Walton's words may be a bit of an exaggeration -- some companies, possibly including Wal-Mart, are so strong in other areas, or so entrenched, that customer service may no longer be so important for them. But if Walton was right (I suspect in many cases he is), investors may want to avoid the Hall of Shame.

In a move that is down-right American, Sears stores (NYSE: SHLD) are going the extra mile for our men and women in the armed forces. It was reported to me that not only is Sears gladly meeting the legal requirements to hold open and available the jobs temporarily vacated by individuals who are called into active military service but they are proud to go above and beyond the call of duty. Sears is voluntarily paying the difference in salary and maintaining all benefits including medical insurance and bonus programs for a period of up to two years for their reservist employees who are called into service. I myself will happily drive ten miles beyond a Wal-Mart store (NYSE: WMT) and joyfully risk paying slightly higher prices to deal with a company that treats my soldiers like that.

JetBlue Airways Corp. (NASDAQ:JBLU) suffered yet another humiliation in the press.

BusinessWeek dropped the low-cost carrier from its first-ever ranking of "client pleasing brands" following the recent embarrassing revelations that it left passengers stranded on the runway for 10 hours during an ice storm. The magazine compares how Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE:LUV) handled a similar situation and finds that JetBlue's response fell way short.

The airline, of course, says the same thing. Chief Executive David Neeleman has apologized more than Mel Gibson, Michael Richards and Kevin Federline combined. Wait, Federline hasn't said he was sorry yet for his rap album but he should.

This reminds of a time when I was invited to a chemical plant for a safety demonstration. While I was on the site, there was an accident. Timing is everything.

Maybe BusinessWeek is being too harsh. Judging from the huge response to my last JetBlue post, there are plenty of people who think the airline's service is great. But as a great sage once said, actions speak louder than words.

It seems like there are so many reasons not to fly these days if you don't have to: security hassles, poor service, cramped and crowded planes, lost luggage. But when I saw that United Airlines had announced a new partnership with world-renowned restaurateur and legendary chef Charlie Trotter, it sounded like there might be one less reason to avoid it -- airline food.

Beginning this summer, Trotter's specially created cuisine will be available to United's first-class and business-class customers on flights to Europe, as well flights between New York's JFK and Los Angeles or San Francisco. United will be the only airline to offer Chef Trotter entrees.

"I look forward to creating unique, high-quality cuisine for United's customers," Trotter says. No doubt United customers will look forward to it as well.

Trotter has authored many cookbooks, is the subject of two management books, and hosts an award-winning PBS cooking series. His 20-year-old restaurant in Chicago, Charlie Trotter's, is considered one of the finest in the world, receiving many accolades, including Wine Spectator's Best Restaurant in the United States in 2000.

Could the prospect of improved airline food be responsible for recent analyst upgrades of UAL Corp. (NASDAQ:UAUA)? Well, no, probably not. But it could give some of us one less reason to avoid flying.

For years, I have bought tons of things online – from big places like Amazon.com to small outfits. For the most part, service has been fine, especially from Amazon.com.

About a month ago, though, things went haywire. In one week, I had three bad experiences with online merchants.

The good news is that two of them were resolved very quickly. In fact, in one case, I knew the CEO. His company, VistaPrint Ltd. (NASDAQ:VPRT), is a fast-growing online printer.

Hey, even those companies that are built-to-last get things wrong. The important thing is how they respond. And VistaPrint was flawless. Impressively, I talked to the CEO a couple hours before his earnings conference call (and, by the way, his company had a blow-out quarter).

But my experience was much different with another company, Network Solutions. The company sells web hosting and domain names. I'm sure I've spent thousands of dollars – over the years – with this company.

Home Depot got quite a lift yesterday in response to its second quarter earnings report. The stock rose $1.18, up 3.55%, to close at $34.44. The news from Atlanta was good, if modest. Q2 2006 net earnings were up 5.3% to $1.86 billion, versus $1.77 billion in Q2 2005. On the basis of Q2 2006 earnings, Home Depot has scaled back its full year sales growth figure to 14% and has reduced projected earnings per share growth to 10% -- both at the lower end of its range in January 2006.

Bowing to widespread customer complaints about a decline in customer service, Home Depot CEO Bob Nardelli outlined several new initiatives, including budgeting for 5.5 million associate work hours for the second half of 2006. There was no indication how many more hours this figure represents beyond current staffing levels. Home Depot will also introduce a 24-hour customer service hotline: 1-800-Home Depot. By year-end, all Home Depot stores will have one or more customer self-checkout lanes.

There were several flies in today's ointment, however. One was the announcement that Home Depot owes $69 million in retroactive taxes in Quebec due to a change in tax laws. Also, Home Depot is involved in an SEC investigation into its stock option procedures. The company is also named in at least one lawsuit pursuant to those stock option procedures. Home Depot stated that it does not believe these legal actions will have a material adverse impact.