Today I tried to order some central heating oil. The local office of Certas Energy is in Stornoway but since Covid you can no longer pop in and order anything over the counter. You telephone Certas Energy and give your details and eventually someone will hopefully ring you back at a time when you are not half way through climbing a ladder onto the roof or some such other inconvenient moment.
If you live on a western Scotland Island there is a good chance a great deal of your life is involved with the Country's ferry operators, Caledonian Macbrayne Ltd. At the moment residents of Lewis have the opportunity to pop into the Stornoway Port Office for tickets and bookings. That's fair enough given that it's a lifeline service and we frequently have to change booking because of cancelled mainland hospital appointments or cancelled ferries because of the weather or breakdowns.
However it's not possible for everyone to get into the office. So they have to telephone the main booking number or use the website. This is where Calmac have absolutely excelled themselves and, in my experience of using websites they have managed a first: a waiting list to access the website. The other day this popped up in response to me trying to access the website:
It's all very well for business to do everything they possible can to streamline things and keep costs down (if they reward customers with fair prices) but it seems to me that the last person ever to be considered these days is the service user - whatever it is.
Sixty years ago I joined Liverpool Corporation. When I was given the job I was told by the Assistant Town Clerk "You have joined Liverpool Corporation. It will look after you (and it certainly did in that it sent me to University and much more) and ALL YOU HAVE TO REMEMBER IS THAT YOUR JOB IS TO SERVE THE PUBLIC! NEVER FORGET THAT."
I never did. I just wish that the same could be said in any organisation today.
ADDENDUM: A friend pointed out yesterday that he had started off at with, let us say 3000 people in front of him and when he went back at this expected time he was further down the queue with 800 odd more people in front of him and even more time to wait. That looks like a system in turmoil to me.
I think that is a wonderful idea, Graham, to have a waiting list on the website. At least you could have a cuppa tea or coffee and read a page or two of your book while you wait. When you live where you do and where I did in the mountains, there are certain really important things that must be planned in advance and planned exactly. I always told everybody from the neurologist to the dog groomer that I would make it at such and such a time if......As with living on an island, there were a lot of things that could make up that "if" when you lived in the deep woods.
ReplyDeleteDonna, you more than many understand the vagaries of Island and remote life. However, I've never ever before had to wait to get onto a website to book anything or to buy anything or to read a blog. The whole point to me about websites are they can be used at my convenience not the seller's convenience. It seems to me that now we the consumer/customer is being treated as almost a nuisance to be regimented and dealt with at the convenience of the provider. I'm retired. I might be able to come back later but I might not.
DeleteGood grief, that seems like an inordinately long queue for the website!
ReplyDeleteThe previous owners of our house installed a device which alerts the heating oil company automatically when our tank needs topping up. It seems to work fine, except there appears to be a shortage of heating oil at the moment so we only had half a tank delivered last week. We are wearing lots of jumpers, just to be on the safe side.
JayCee we don't have that option but I'm quite happy to manage my oil but it's the removal of the local element that irritates me. Presumably they's now managed to get rid of some local staff who knew their customers. I pay a couple of pence per litre more because they have a local office. Now I might as well deal with Highland Fuels who have no office (as far as I'm aware) but charge less.
DeleteI agree with JayCee, that seems like a very long queue for a website?! I've been met by messages to try again later, but never so far an online queue system. I just managed (I hope!) to change a dentist's appointment online instead of by phone, that was a new experience too. (Seemed to work though, and no queue!!)
ReplyDeleteMonica, it just irritated me that everything is being done for the convenience of the provider and not the customer. Or perhaps I'm just becoming a crabbit old man.
DeleteNo, you're not! :) I feel the same about a lot of things. Some online services are helpful, but others seem to just make things unnecessarily complicated instead.
DeleteSorry the system isn't faster
ReplyDeleteIf I am given the call back option, then I try to take it because when machine-voice says it is an hour wait, it is.
Maywyn, I've never been given a time for a call back on the phone. I now know too (see the addendum to my post) that the wait time for the website is fictional too.
DeleteIt does seem like a very long wait, but at least you know up front what you are dealing with, and you don't have to sit with a phone glued to your ear listening to what is always a very poor choice of music, often repeated ad nauseam. Sadly, in so many instances these days customer service is a forgotten art, but occasionally I am pleasantly surprised.
ReplyDeleteOr worse yet, the rotten music is interrupted every 30 seconds by a canned voice telling you just how important your phone call is to them. ARRRRGH!!!
DeleteYes, David, you have a good point (but see the addendum to my post) and that canned music is always dreadful. And Debbie I couldn't agree more with your ARRRRGH!
DeleteA waiting list to access a website. That's a new one on me. They need a bigger server.
ReplyDeleteI wish you luck!
Thanks, Kylie. Indeed they do.
DeleteLots of satisfaction is gained by serving the public.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with that, Red.
DeleteBooking flights online is often a nightmare, as is trying to deal with a banking problem. I thought new technology was supposed to improve, not worsen.
ReplyDeleteCro, I agree wholeheartedly. You might be heartened to learn that I popped into my local Bank of Scotland yesterday to get £20 of 50p pieces (I never use cash so don't have tip money for my coffee or the car parking machines in Stornoway) and knew the two cashiers (both of whom I'd known since they joined the bank as teenagers when Adam was a lad. When I had a problem with my banking app on my phone one of the youngsters in the bank sorted it for me. Just like the "good old days".
DeleteMy bank here (RBS Brighton) simply closed without them telling me. I've only had need to see them once since I've been back and I went to 'mother ship' Nat West, which seemed to be OK. They could have said something!!!
DeleteA waiting list to merely access a website - let alone DO anything there, such as booking a ticket - is new to me, too. Do you reckon the number of people in the queue before you is realistic? As you say, the ferries are a lifeline service, but can there really be more than 3,700 people trying to book at the same time?
ReplyDeleteMeike it's a complete mystery to me. At first a few of us thought the person who posted it on Facebook was playing a practical joke. Then I tried it. The numbers seem bizarre to me I have to say. Having said that I'm just going into town to meet a friend for coffee and will pop into the Calmac port office to change my booking for the cancelled hospital appointment. Small community life can have it's advantages.
DeleteSeriously?! What happens in the summer time when tourists are added to that queue? We prefer the system that says - "press 5 to hold your place in the queue, and hang up. We will call you back."
ReplyDeleteTigger, I suspect a lot of those are tourists booking summer holidays as well as the hundreds of everyday journeys by local residents.
DeleteIt certainly is a conundrum, Graham. I think they have a lack of staff to handle the problems. I am sure it must be frustrating to work there as all of your customers must be unhappy with the service but the staff can be working as hard as they can.
ReplyDeleteEllen, they may have a lack of staff but I suspect that they staff for the quietest period to minimise staff costs and keep everyone busy at all times.
DeleteI struggle to understand your problem. Years ago I just drove up for a ferry. If it was full I went away and waited.
ReplyDeleteIf we want oil of any sort we phone round for the spot price and get it delivered within twenty four hours. Even for domestic oil if you got together with your neighbours and had a truck load between you then I doubt this would be a problem. Come to think. Why do you need oil with all the wind?
Adrian, your peripatetic approach to life in a camper van is completely at odds with mine when it comes to commitments and a bed for the night. Years ago the ferry was rarely full. today it can go for weeks without a spare place in the summer. If I set off from Glasgow to get home I do not want to wait on the whims of weather (usually in winter) or traffic (usually in summer) with the expense of hotels or the disruption to my life. On the mainland you may be able to barter for your oil. That's not an option here and getting everyone round about to have empty tanks at the same time is fanciful to say the least. A wind turbine costs well in excess of £30,000. At nearly 80 that's not an economic reality for me.
ReplyDeleteI swear the whole world is going mad. And dare not ask "What next?" Pauline
ReplyDeletePauline, even my positivity is being sorely tested these days.
DeleteI must add the sevice provided by Dyson 's customer service. Phone call answered within the 10 mins they said, part organised, paid for, sent and received by Royal Mail two days later. Lesley (Your system insisted on me being Anonymous. AKA Potty)
ReplyDeleteSorry about the anonymity, Lesley, I'm not sure what the problem is but it's not consistent. I agree some companies are still giving superb service and I do like to give credit where it's due.
DeleteI'm trying to remember when I encountered a queue to go on the website. Then I remembered it was Tesco's website at the beginning of lockdown. Nobody could go out shopping in real life, yet it was pretty well impossible to get a slot for home delivery. It wasn't the shops' fault, of course, but I do recall you had to pay an absolute fortune to even get a slot, and phone up at the dot of midnight otherwise the slots would be gone within 10 minutes and you would have to wait to the next day. I hope things are not that desperate with Calmac! But perhaps they are. Regarding public service, the complete loss of the concept is one of the worst things about the last 10 or 15 years. These days public services are like the poor relations, struggling to stay alive in the midst of constant funding cuts and austerity. It's really dreadful considering that it is our money that pays for it. Don't get me started!
ReplyDeleteThanks for your input, Jenny. I think there were a lot of problems with home delivery websites during lockdown. I think, too, that many private organisations forget that they are providing a service to the public and it from the public that their shareholders' pockets are so well bolstered. I could get started in earnest too ..... but I won't.
DeleteAfter the words "climbing a ladder up onto the roof" everything else in the post was "wahwahwahwahwah".... CLIMBING A LADDER ONTO THE ROOF?!??! I will never sleep again, GB.
ReplyDeletePS: Just so you don't feel like the only one, I recently noticed a charge on my credit card that I did not recognize. The reason I noticed this is because I'd paid off that card and the balance was zero. Suddenly there was a suspicious $19.53 sitting there looking at me. I signed into the card website to see where the charge was from, and it said "STAMPS.COM". Interesting. I have not actually bought anything from that website, although a few months ago I had looked them up because I thought I could use the site to print out postage for something I needed to mail, and I was looking for a way to avoid standing in line at the post office. As it turns out, they didn't have what I needed, so I shut down the site. Apparently, because I had put my credit card information INTO THE FORM (never clicked the "order" button) they signed me up for a monthly service (that I did not select) and were charging my credit card!!! I called them up and gave them what for, of course, and the representative tried to blame it on me, but I wasn't having it. You have a lot more readers than I do, GB, so here's some free advice to anyone considering using STAMPS.COM - DON'T DO IT. They are a bunch of sneaky lying bastards and thieves. Imagine how many people are getting ripped off this way, on a credit card that's not paid off, where the charge gets mixed in and unnoticed for ages! I checked the Better Business Bureau website, the complaints section, and the answer is: A LOT. Caveat Emptor.
Marcheline, I'm still okay for climbing ladders onto the roof although, in truth, I usually employ someone else to do that these days. I'm not as keen on ladders as I used to be. Fortunately stamps.com are a UPS US only website so far as I can tell. We can get stamps on line for The Post Office/Royal Mail and I've seen no problems with them. Mind you I buty all my stamps at the post office in Stornoway on the basis of "use it or lose it.".
DeleteGraham, you are so right about customer service going down the tubes. Today, it is mainly about the organization/company rather than the customer/user. Of course, this is not meant to be a broad-based statement as there are any outstanding small business and stores which do provide wonderful service and attention to detail. Like others, I also hate the interminable wait times and the awful background music and, if provided, always select the opt-out of music option. What's even more annoying is to in a store/business and next, only to have a phone call interrupt your place in the line.
ReplyDeleteBeatrice I find that the interminable waiting times arrogantly assume that we, the consumers, have interminable time to waste. Most of us certainly do not.
DeleteI don't blame the staff or the customer service, I work in retail and know when we get swamped we are trying our very best, is it possible they are more understaffed than anything? Shame on the wait time though...I know I would find it frustrating.
ReplyDeleteAmy, I agree that when you actually get through to someone the service can be exceptional in the same way that any customer service in a shop can be. It's the waiting times that are so frustrating.
Delete