Service worth paying for

Let's say you're stuck in the airport and you need to figure out if you can transfer your seat from your airline to another. Would you pay $20 to talk to a competent, empowered agent who answered on the first ring?

That's four calls an hour, $80 an hour for an agent that costs the airline a fraction of that. A new profit center, one that causes joy, not hassles.

Of course, no one would use the service if it wasn't worth paying for.

So, that's the interesting challenge. If you had to charge for service, what would the service be like?

Increasingly, the web makes pricing cutthroat. And service suffers, because it's expected for free. So charge. Or at least act like you could if you wanted to.