I've been thinking about the following for the last three days. Thought of putting it here and let it go out and hence this post.
I applied for a check book from my online bank account. I was given an acknowledgement that the check book was shipped through a courier service and will be delivered within the next two working days. I had waited for the next three to four days but did not get the delivery. And then I dialed the courier office to check about the shipment. I informed them that I did not get my delivery which was supposed to happen two bays before. They asked me for the courier tracker number for a few times and finally said that the courier boy did visit our house but since it was locked, he returned it back to their main office saying that 'house was locked'. When I called the courier main office, I was said that the check book will be delivered back to the bank and that I should go and collect it from the bank itself. After three days of I was said so, I visited the bank to collect my check book. The bank official informed me that the check book was not yet received. I then immediately dialed the courier office. As usual, couple of their numbers came switched off and finally I could reach on a number of their main branch. That's when I was informed that the courier was still not returned back to the bank! And it wasn't easy to digest that.
I had put in all efforts on a Saturday morning to finish the breakfast and the other formalities, and you know how suffocating it is on a weekend's morning, drove for almost twenty five minutes in all the narrow roads by ensuring to put the horn and brake on for a few times, parked the vehicle with a lot of difficulty on yet another narrow road in front of the bank, and here I was finally being informed that the check book was not yet returned and that too after I myself called the courier services! I could not take all that so easily.
Why the hell that the courier delivery boy on the first front did not call me when the house was seen locked? According to the courier office, they do not call the customers to deliver the shipment. They deliver only if the customer is available at the said address! So, the customer should leave everything aside and wait for the courier at home, by bunking the office or by avoiding going anywhere including the market? When two people stay in a house and when both of them are working, how come they are expected to stay back to say 'hi' to the courier fellow? I asked the same question to the courier official as well as the bank official. Both of them gave me a weird smile and said that they would not call any customer.
After all, their job is to deliver the shipment and they should do everything to deliver it. And moreover, making a call to the customer is not very much difficult as gone are the days when it used to cost more than 1 rupee for even a call of second's duration. I suggested the courier official to think about calling the customers in case they are not available at the said address. But what they said surprised me. It was said that customers were also not so good to them and that they keep changing the time of parcel collection. But I somehow cannot agree to that because I keep getting couriers and all the other courier delivery boys call me many a times to deliver a courier. I also requested the courier office if they could send the courier at 6:15 pm to my house again so that I would collect. But what they said this time was awful! They said that they did not work after 6 pm. Which did not make sense to me as they will have to do it on occassional basis and not regularly. May be they are correct in accusing the cistomer, considering thier experiences with few customers, but there must be a failsafe w.r.t. the large customer base they might have.
What I understood finally was that the problem actually was with this particular courier company and any other courier services who follow the same strategy as that of this. And I also think the bank should rethink about maintaining the partnership with them as they are the ultimate ones at whom the customer would look at, in this case say for the check book.
Anyway, be it bank or courier, both are service oriented organizations and their survival depends largely upon their customers' satisfaction to achieve which they are responsible largely. Up to them all in all, either to serve or to just be there.
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