Today I went into a government department, which I suppose is not very 'popular' at the end of the month; and was reminded that sometimes there really is no service in Customer Service.
It is one of those places you go to where the junior workers treat you with a sort of contempt and when you ask to speak to someone with a little more authority you realize that the contempt is learnt. Junior staff members come into a department and along with the 'how to' of their job they are also taught the bad habits of the organization.
For instance,:
- How to annoy members of the public to the point where only their god could keep their tongue in check.
- How to make themselves seem valuable, even when they are performing at minimal levels.
- How to make simple procedures complicated and 'painful' by not explaining to customers all that is needed to complete the procedure/task. Have you ever been to an organisation to collect your XYZ and the customer service rep. says to you, "Please bring back BAL ". You take back your BAL and are then told you brought it back too late, or you were to have it in duplicate, or you were to take it to be stamped by another department before bringing it back to them?
- How to behave as though the department will survive no matter what (whether they are courteous or not, whether they are efficient or not...).
- How to convince customers in less than 5 seconds that; "you could work no where else but in a government institution,". Let's be honest public servants often get away with on the job 'crimes' that a worker in the private sector would be given 'marching papers' for immediately...and they know this. I believe they are given extra special treats by their supervisors for this one.
I could go on and on with this list but I am sure you understand where I am coming from.
In short it appears to me that most government workers who interact with the general public especially those who deal with money tend to not understand that their task is essentially to serve the public, not to infuriate, bad wuk, and harass the public, but to be of assistance.
It would be great if these workers were to understand the meaning of 'service' in the term- Customer Service.
Jus' sayin'!
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You are so right about what you have mentioned and I can go on and on with you. It seems also that they profile you when you come in and if you seem important enough to them, they would stop to ask if they may help. If not, they will continue on their BB or FB and when they feel satisfy enough to notice you
And the other bad thing is:
1. They get to work late in the morning
2. you have to wait until they go and have breakfast
3. tell their co-workers the latest "gossip",
4. check to see who sent them a message while they were having breakfast 5. and then at 3:50 pm their bags pack, computer off and heading out the door........
Just another day in the system.......