Communication Problems

I rarely write about my work, partly because I don't want to cross any boundaries but mostly because it probably wouldn't make very interesting reading. I meet some really nice people in the course of my work, but sadly I meet plenty of the other kind too. I always try to be helpful but is not unusual to get shouted at and called names, you would be surprised how nasty seemingly ordinary people can be about the most trivial things. I have even had to deal with threats of physical harm. So you can imagine my confusion when an Indian gentleman approached me with a broad smile and began to remove all his outer clothing. Hat, scarf, two pairs of gloves, coat, padded waistcoat etc, etc. It wasn't an especially cold day but it seemed that he was dressed for an Arctic expedition. It is rather unusual for customers to remove their clothing, they are not usually with us long enough for that, so despite his smiles I was a little weary of his motives.


Thankfully he stopped disrobing before it became embarrassing, but then I was faced with another problem. He began talking to me and I didn't have a clue what he was saying. He repeated himself several times but I was making no progress at all. I asked him what language he was speaking (thinking I could perhaps find someone else to converse with him) but he informed me that he was speaking English! A very long 20 minutes followed with lots of smiles, nodding and waving of arms but not a lot of progress in terms of communication. He had brought out all sorts of documents from his pockets. He showed me pictures of his wife and children and he taught me how to pronounce their names. He showed me a train ticket indicating that he had been to London the weekend before and a series of mimes suggested that he had visited Madam Tussauds, Buckingham Palace and other landmarks. After 20 minutes, I knew his name and job title from a business card, I knew the names of his wife and children and I knew what he had done with his leisure time in the last week or so but I hadn't got a clue why he had come to see me! 


At that point we were joined by a second smiling Indian gentleman, also dressed for the Arctic. He possessed a few more words of recognisable English and over the next ten minutes the pair told me that they were here for two weeks for a training course, but they both lived in India. They had enjoyed their stay here very much and they wanted to find out as much as possible about our town and how different businesses worked so they had come in to have a look around. The first man had just stopped for a chat and he had showed me the pictures of his family because he missed them very much. They left still smiling and promised to come and see me again next year when they are back in England. It was rather a surreal experience, but it is something I will remember with a warm smile, it was much better than being shouted at!

A Railway Rant

Robbie has been really struggling mobility wise recently, in fact at the end of last week he was so bad that he simply couldn't make it to work and he had to work from home. This week it has been a real struggle for him but he has got himself to work. At times like this he has to plan his journey even more carefully than usual, making sure that he travels on a train that gives him more leg room and planning his return journey so that it works well with his bus connections and does not involve an excessive amount of standing around in the the cold. 


Yesterday his train home was running on time, but it was delayed at Rugby to allow a freight train that was running late to go ahead of the passenger train. This caused great inconvenience to the passengers as the train arrived at Northampton 12 minutes late. Meaning that Robbie missed his bus - and at that time in the evening buses are not very frequent. He was forced to walk to the bus station, a long walk when you are in pain, all up hill, and just to make matters worse it was freezing cold and raining heavily. By this time he had missed his connecting bus too, so he had a long cold wait at the bus station. It was passed 9.30pm when he eventually got home, and by then he was in agony.


Unfortunately this issue of a passenger train being delayed at Rugby in favour of a late freight train is a frequent problem for passengers. Robbie expressed his frustration (rather mildly in the circumstances) on facebook. He was met with a barrage of criticism from one person who works for a company which until now I have trusted and respected. Among his various unhelpful comments was a suggestion that Robbie should just put up with it and that he detested passengers claiming compensation because it takes money out of the railways. He also said 'thats the joy of public transport' and 'if you don't like it get a car' I was staggered by his attitude, it makes me wonder how many other people think like that. It certainly makes me wonder if the company he works for shares his lack of respect for passengers! Passengers have paid for a service and they should complain when things go wrong, especially if the same problem happens often. It is the only way to make rail operators understand how much inconvenience it causes and hopefully this in turn will lead to better service. It really isn't about compensation, nothing could compensate for such a miserable end to Robbie's day. If a train is delayed by a tragedy or by problems arising from bad weather that's one thing, and most passengers would be understanding about that, but to deliberately delay a passenger train that was running on time to accommodate a late running freight train has to be wrong. 


I understand that the railway has many customers and freight companies need to make a living too, but whatever the rules say, it is not unreasonable for passengers to expect their trains to be punctual and to expect that consideration will be given to their needs.  

Normal Service is Resumed

A series of problems have conspired to keep me from writing the blog for almost two weeks. The first was lack of internet access courtesy of AOL, but more of that later. We had a very stressful few days before we finally got back online, but then I was ill. I don't know exactly what was wrong, no doubt the doctor would say it was a 'virus' but whatever it was I felt absolutely dreadful and I spent several days in bed. I am feeling better but I hope nobody else gets it because it really wiped me out.

On a Thursday morning two weeks ago our internet connection failed at about 8am. It seemed that no internet signal was reaching the router but our telephone was working perfectly, so I wondered if there was a problem with our cables. I popped out to buy new cables but when I tried them there was still no signal, I even tried a different router but still there was nothing. I got the line checked and there was nothing wrong with the line, so there was no alternative we had to ring AOL. Robbie rang them first, but he had to give up on the call after half an hour because the man would not deviate from his script and was no help whatsoever. I hate having to talk to call centres in foreign countries at the best of times, but AOL have taken poor service to an all time low. 


Anyway after over two hours of being passed from one unhelpful person to the next totally useless person I was reduced to tears of frustration. Not one of them spoke good enough English to understand me and I had extreme difficulty understanding them. To make matters worse they kept putting me on hold and playing dreadful music down the phone. My blood pressure must have been off the scale! They couldn't solve my problem, they didn't even seem to care about it. At one point they told Robbie that they could not check our internet signal because their equipment was broken and they had no idea when it would be working again! I told them that I had suffered enough and I wanted to leave AOL - NOW!! They treated me with total contempt and disconnected my call, but after calling back and queueing for an eternity they finally gave us the mac code needed to transfer to another provider.


We now have a better and faster internet service at less than half the price charged by AOL and as an added bonus  their call centre staff speak and understand English! So normal service has been resumed and I will be able to bring the blog up to date.

If...... 11.02.08

If I failed to meet my targets at work I would wave goodbye to my bonus.
If I continually failed to meet my objectives ...........
If my leadership was inadequate.....
If my inaction damaged the reputation of the company ....
If I was invisible when problems arose and I left my minions to face the music ................
If I didn't learn from my mistakes.....
If I tried to shift the blame to everyone else ..............
If I was responsible for appalling customer service, arrogance, and woefully inaccurate information..........
If these failures were compounded by massive budget overspends, huge fines and compensation claims ......
I would be sacked!!

So how did they get away with it?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/money/2008/02/11/cnrail111.xml

Who created this monster and who was so keen to have a scapegoat that they failed to impose and maintain adequate regulation?

Here's a clue

The last time I encountered this sort of madness I was reading Alice in Wonderland!!

Total Frustration 05.09.2007

We arrived home yesterday afternoon to find that the internet wasn't working. On closer inspection I found that our telephone was not working and my heart sank. I have had dealings with BT many times before as their service in our area seems to be very temperamental. I had to deal with the automated faults - system, press this number, press another number, stand on one leg, tell us how to contact you, tell us again, now press another button and key in all that information again just to waste a bit more of your time while you are calling from a mobile. Having done all that I was invited to transfer my calls to another number and yes, you guessed they wanted the same information all over again! Finally the dratted machine gave me the option to speak to a live human being, I pressed yet more buttons and waited, only to be told by the machine that they were very busy and if I gave them my contact number - again, I would be called back within 45 minutes. I kept my phone with me (even when I went to the bathroom) and 19 hours later I am still waiting for the elusive call back!

Much later in the evening Robbie managed to have a protracted conversation with a live human being, unfortunately she appeared to be in India, she couldn't understand what he was saying and eventually told him that she couldn't give him any information about the fault except that there was a fault - very helpful! How hard would it be to provide a real person based in UK who can speak and understand English in the way that we do?

Customer Service 01.07.07

We went to renew Robbie's season ticket today. What a performance, the first member of staff was friendly but quite new and wouldn't even attempt to issue a priv season ticket, the second was clearly part of the furniture, full of opinions but clearly there was nothing holding his ears apart. He didn't have a clue, he even asked why Robbie couldn't issue his own ticket if he worked for a railway company!!! The demise of Silverlink will be a huge relief to those of us who have to endure what they dare to call customer service.

On a lighter note, I met one of Robbie's women today - another one. He seems to have his own fan club with admirers stashed away in the most unlikely places, oh well, I have to admire his energy! He claims he just has a naturally friendly personality.