Customer C.A.R.E. by Dr Trilogy
| sponsored by Federal-Mogul
3.
Mushrooming Your Customer – here, the horse manure, as is the case with all
parastatals, is delivered in ten ton trucks. That is, when there is actual communication
from the Post Office. E-mails and phone calls to management go unanswered, and just
when one is ready to slit one’s wrists, an “update” is issued, on a letterhead saying
that “we deliver, whatever it takes”. This update is just a continuation of a litany of
lies, promising the impending end of the strike, and totally dishonest statements that
Witspos is open, or Tshwane is open, whereas it is patently clear that nothing is open.
A disgraceful mushrooming of the customers.
4.
Losing Your Cool – well, this is a difficult one. How can a non-compos mentis entity
lose its cool? If you don’t get a reaction, then I suppose it is difficult to say that
someone has lost their cool. Let me give you an example of how surreal the Post
Office situation is. At the height of the strike, and after receiving a mushroom update
that the strike was broken, I decided to get the facts from the horse’s mouth, i.e. our
local Post Office branch. The branch was open, not for post, but for the renewal of
vehicle licences, but when I went in there were no customers. At first I thought that
there was no one behind the counter, but there was someone – fast asleep. I awoke
her from her slumber, and enquired whether the strike was over. “No, the strike is
still on” she said, and promptly went back to sleep. And this branch was open to the
public! How does one top this? I was so flabbergasted that even I, the wounded and
abused customer, could not lose my cool, because my jaw was on the ground. Not
cool, you goofballs.
5.
Second Best is Good Enough – no matter at what level you approach this one, when
it comes to the South African Post Office, it is not even second best is good enough.
It is the worst service ever experienced that is good enough. And this attitude, apart
from the damage it has done to South Africa, has international ramifications – during
the first long drawn out strike in March 2013, Italian expatriates in South Africa were
denied the opportunity to vote in the Italian general elections, because voting papers
were not delivered. Another surreal experience brought to the world by the South
African Post Office. It was a tight general election, and maybe the result in Italy was
influenced by a bunch of hooligans in South Africa – top that Monty! As per Sanral,
Telkom, SAA, and whatever parastatal you would care to mention, it is an entrenched
problem that is endemic in these institutions, and as I have said before, only genuine
competition will change this vexatious customer care aberration.
41091 FM-Motorparts_ABR_ad.pdf
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9/17/14
10:40 AM
| words in action
30
december 2014 / January 2015