Post by Baron von Lotsov on Sept 24, 2024 8:55:10 GMT
A little and very simple story for you which I'm in no doubt affects most of you here, even if you might not be aware of it.
A certain delivery company which delivers a large proportion of UK online shopping (seems to be a duopoly with Everi) is the firm Yodel. It has earnt itself a terrible reputation but I do not fully blame it. The website and computer system seem to work ok and the way it is set up is reasonable and makes business sense in my mind, but for one thing, and that is who they employ. If you have a problem with your parcel you need to deal with an Indian call centre. In my latest delivery from hell I estimate this has wasted about 3 hours of my time. Each Indian tells you a different story. I don't think I need to explain further as you will be familiar with the experience.
I can't be bothered to bore you with all the details of the countless problems and lies I was told to get this pot of paint delivered. What is worth mentioning though is the last two deliveries and the reason why there was a problem in the first place, since no problem means no need to waste 3 hours at an Indian call centre employing snake charmers.
The previous delivery was delivered to the correct house number but the wrong road. The last delivery though after making a complaint about the one before appears to have found the correct house but the computer says no one was in when I was in all day x 2 attempts, after which it got stuck at the depot and the firm told me to make a 100 mile round trip to pick it up. Finally after a lot of wasted time they agree to redeliver due to not delivering to the correct door. On the one door is a sign that says deliver to the other door. it is about 6" to the left of the bell. The reason is the door is jammed shut, but this is not the problem. The problem was why did the driver not read the sign and deliver to the correct door.
I think it might be something you can guess by the clues, but its worse than that. On the third attempt, the driver gets the right door, presumably after the manager whacked him again on my request. He does a very faint knock on the door as if entering a mosque or something, as in not loud enough unless you were in the hall near the door. I only just heard it as I was the other end of the hall with total silence in the house. When I said, you can always use a bell he replied no worries.
Now put all that together and the reason my parcel screwed up was the driver looks like he has just come out of Afghanistan and there is no such thing as a door bell over there and homes are like single rooms with nothing like a television or anything to drown out the noise, but a quiet knock is probably customary so if the home is praying it does not unduly disturb them. No worries is probably the only English phrase he knows.
Now it all makes sense. He did not see the sign as he never uses the bell and he delivered to the wrong road because he could not read the address. Of course Yodel being a large firm is forced to employ these people by law, so this is why I put the issue here, over in Westminster. It is the cause of 3 hours wasted time. Time is money.