The World’s Most Ethical Companies

            American Express is one of the most ethical companies in the world. It deals with providing goods and services to customers hence enabling them to improve their living standards and promote their businesses. It also promotes social responsibility among its workers and customers by ensuring fair transactions on all their products without using corruption to exploit their customers. They provide quality services to workers hence making them to have trust in their products. It has ensured use of innovative methods in production of their products and services hence ensuring success of the company. It also promotes good ethical environment which ensures understanding in all sectors and goodwill of the workers.

The Company’s Consumer Relations

            American Express ensures customer satisfaction in conducting its business. The Company provides options for return protection to its customers. This option allows customers a period of 90 days to test whether the products they obtained from the company are of good quality. However, if the customer is not satisfied with the quality of the product, he or she can return it to the company before the end of the ninety days.

It also offers extended warranties to their products. The extension period goes above one year over the period dictated by the manufacturer. This allows the customers to have an amble time to fully confirm the quality of the products. These services have enabled the Company to attract many customers since they are assured of getting good quality products which are returnable in case of dissatisfaction.

Environment Relations with the Company

            The company introduced an environment program was aimed at ensuring maximum production without impacting negatively to the environment. This program ensured conservation of energy which was achieved through installation of energy-efficient technology and controls to monitor power usage. The lighting systems were also modified to promote proper usage of power hence conserving the surplus energy.

It also incorporated waste reduction plans which were executed through encouraging workers to consider using of paperless mechanisms in presenting their statements. They also influenced employees in their cafeterias to consider offering organic foods and reusing fryer oils in order to ensure economical utilization of the environmental resources.

Employee Relations with the Company

American Express offers employees with guidance and counseling in order to improve their performance and overcome the challenges which they often face while at work. It also ensures that proper disciplinary actions are taken against the defiant workers in order to promote the overall performance of the Company.

The Company also conducts investigations into the complaints of the employees in order to determine the best actions to be undertaken to ensure satisfaction to all workers. The investigations help the Company to know why some sectors performed poorly hence giving the employees a chance to explain their setbacks. Therefore, it plans for the necessary changes which should be made to ensure improved in performance in all sectors.

Company Policies

The policies of the company ensure that every customer is comfortable after buying their products or services through promoting of privacy. They introduced a data security policy which protects the company and its customers from malicious activities which might be done by hackers. This policy is divided into five sections whereby the first section addresses protection of the data concerning cardholders and authentication of crucial information. It ensures that the data should only be stored to facilitate transactions with the company and not to expose the customers to potential harm. The second section deals with obligations of data incident management. It states that if any issues are noted concerning the data storage, the customer should notify the company within 24 hours. This is aimed at giving the company amble time to manage such situations before any consequences are experienced. The third part is about indemnity obligations during data incidents. It outlines the guidelines which would be used by the company to deals with such cases. The company declares its determination to deal with such matters without violating any of their regulations. The fourth section outlines the procedures which should be used to validate the American Express cards both annually and quarterly while the last section deals with disclaimer declaration which indicates all issuers of American Express cards are not third parties to the company.

There are also card acceptance policies which give the customer a chance to go through documentation of the features and the services which would be rendered through the cards. It then allows them to make decisions whether to acquire the cards or ignore the offer after analyzing their expectations concerning the card. The card involves security features which help the merchants to access to it in case it is altered. These policies ensure that all customers are conversant with the security details in order to help them to know any altered cards.

These policies are comprehensive to ensure that every crucial activity concerning the company and its publics is addressed. This has promoted understanding between all the members interacting with the company hence minimizing the possibility of conflicts. It has complied with the laid procedures of business operations by the government such as renewal of business licenses and disclosing the relevant information to its shareholders. This has ensured close monitoring of the company’s progress in order to make the proper decisions concerning how the business activities can be altered to increase its profits.

 However the company should employ more mechanisms in relation to environment in order to promote good relations with nature. Although the company has undertaken measures to reduce waste and to conserve energy, it should also take further steps to introduce ways of generating energy and providing water even to the neighboring society. These ways can be achieved through starting campaigns for tree planting in the areas. Since trees act as water catchment areas they would assist in raising the ground water table hence ensuring easy access to water. These trees can be useful in improving the natural setup of the area and also in ensuring atmospheric balance. The company releases gases such as carbon (IV) oxide and carbon monoxide which may cause atmospheric imbalance. Therefore, the trees absorbs the unwanted gases and release oxygen during the day which is necessary for human respiration. Planting of trees would also curb desertification within the area which would be brought by cutting down of trees to provide furniture for construction purposes.

It can also sponsor drilling of dams within the area in order to provide enough water for industrial purposes and also for domestic use by members of the neighboring community. This would reduce the competition for natural resources between the company and the surrounding community. For instance, establishment of dams would provide enough water for industrial use in cooling and washing of machines and also for irrigation purposes by the neighboring farmers. This would promote the relationship between the community and the company hence ensuring its success in conducting business operations. It would also create jobs for the local people hence improving their living standards. Therefore, it would have established a good market for its products since the purchasing ability of the locals would increase due to improvement of their living standards. Promoting irrigation within the surrounding environment would also ensure provision of raw materials to the company at fair prices since there would be no high expenses incurred due to transportation costs as opposed to obtaining raw materials from far areas.

Conclusion

The success of American Express has been contributed to by the good relationship which the company has established with its publics. The workers have been comfortable with their working environment since it takes care of their needs. This has established motivation in them and loyalty to the management of the company hence increasing the overall performance of the company. It has also established a friendly neighborhood by creating job opportunities to the local people. This has facilitated towards the smooth running of the company’s operations since it does not face any opposition from the neighboring society.

Introduction of innovative techniques in the production sector has promoted efficiency hence leading to low expenses. This has enabled the company to provide products to their customers at affordable prices while still ensuring profits.