There is an interesting (though slightly hard-to-believe) case study in the Irish Times today, with some interesting observations from experts. It’s strange, some of the observations seemed quite good in the print edition, but seem quite lame on the Internet. Part of the reason for that is that the full details of the contributors aren’t given on-line and these are really an integral part of the article.
Anyway, the important lesson from the article is that service is something that can be designed and improved, and many problems can be solved or at least reduced without always needing more resources.