Last Updated on November 2, 2023 4:53 am by Editor
It is anybody’s guess whether the Prime Minister’s most recent initiative is going to make any dent into the behaviour of government departments towards Barbadian citizens. If the character of recent behaviour is anything to go by, the interaction between government departments and citizens has now gone from bad to worse; from what we continue to call “customer disservice” to arrogance.
Programmes such as Face-it-and-Fix-It may have increased the level of awareness of the problem of poor customer service in Barbados but it appears to have had minimal impact on the behaviour of government departments and other service providers.
Superglue Missing
The one salient problem that we are finding in customer service is the breakdown in communication and more recently, the sheer absence of communication. One of the reasons for this is the fact that organizations are employing more young people at the customer interface, especially in retail outlets. Many of these young people do not know how and when to communicate with customers. Even acknowledging an email is a problem.
But many of the homes from which these young people come are not the best source of training for basic manners, let alone professional customer service behaviour. We know that is a hard thing to say but it is the truth. Unfortunately, this is the behaviour they carry into the schools!
In too many homes, the atmosphere is cantankerous and antagonistic; family members do not speak to each other and when they do, it is perverse shouting. You cannot employ the products of such homes at the customer interface simply because they are “good with modern technology”. You have to first give them adequate and explicit customer service training. By the way their being “good with modern technology” is a myth but that is another article for another time.
So one of the major problems of poor customer service and poor customer relations is ignorance; ignorance of the importance of communication and other good customer service principles.
Communication is the superglue that holds together ALL elements of the customer service endeavour: from the backend where accounting, logistics and other operations take place, to the frontend where the organization interfaces with the customer, to fulfilment (delivery).
Arrogance
However, there is another growing customer relations problem in both government and corporate Barbados. We call it “arrogance”. You can call it by any other of its dictionary equivalents: conceit, superciliousness, self-importance, condescension.
Our definition for arrogance is: “a deliberate, dictatorial, disrespectful disregard for the person, concerns and rights of customers”.
With that definition in mind, here are two recent cases from the trenches.
Barbados Revenue Authority
When a citizen finds that a matter on which she /he has engaged a government department a year ago has not been dealt with at all, despite written assurances to do so, we have moved from customer disservice to arrogance and are well on the way to injustice.
If that citizen feels that a matter is so serious that he or she has to send the director of a department a piece of registered mail, most reasonable people would expect the recipient would at least acknowledge that mail – preferably in kind – or at least by a phone call. Evidently, the BRA does not appear to agree with the foregoing principle but such is the lived experience of at least one senior citizen who wishes to remain anonymous.
Our understanding is that that citizen’s choice of sending piece of mail was adopted AFTER calls to lower level officers led to the usual passing of the buck. Sensible citizens are aware that a director has many issues with which to deal and such a citizen would engage the communication option above only if it was felt absolutely necessary. At least, that is our surmise.
But is gets “interestinger” and “interestinger” because when an attempt was made to contact the director by phone to ascertain whether that mail was received, the officer who answered the phone indicated: “We cannot give out that number”.
Reading between the lines, this means that there is no provision for routing calls to the director. Not even a screened call. So how is the citizen supposed to get redress for what we understand is a matter where the BRA is demanding payment when the client has provided cancelled bank records (cheques) as proof of full payment? We call this arrogance.
Digital ID Required
The second case of arrogance comes from the private sector. It is from the service centre of a well-known retailer in Barbados located at Brandons, St. Michael.
Less than a week ago, a customer attempted to complete the purchase an item costing less than twenty dollars with a debit card from that institution. To the customer’s surprise, the cashier intimated that the transaction could not be completed unless it was accompanied by the new Barbados digital ID card. To boot, the cashier pointed to a sign behind her to support her statement. Barbados Uncensored has obtained a photo of that sign.
Did we not read somewhere that a certain government department (Barbados Licensing Authority, if our memory serves us correctly) tried this same “stunt” about a year ago even though at that time, use of the card was not mandatory? By the way, to the best of our information, use of the Barbados digital ID is still not mandatory!
Why on earth would you need to show or use your ID card, digital or otherwise to make payment with a debit card into which is built all sorts of security? How can the use of the Digital ID prove that you are the card holder? What if I allow someone (like my wife!) to use my debit card? How will you know?
In these matters you seldom can blame the poor service or stupidity on the frontline operative. Instead, it has to be assigned to some anonymous superior in the backend such as a supervisor or manager.
Why is the supervisor or manager in question in so much of a rush to implement the controversial Barbados digital ID? Is there some coded message here or is it simply a matter of neurological dysfunction on the part of the superior? Do we have among us individuals who are impatiently waiting for the New World Order or Global Reset where we will all be reduced to an electronic sequence and, “own nothing and be happy about it?” Neighbour! neighbour! I think gine go back home!
Actually, we think this sort of bahaviour is the work of a strain of virus that we have dubbed dictadura barbadiana. FYI, the strain was introduced to the island in 2018 and has become endemic since 2022.
Our summary advise to customers who experience such manifestations of this pathogen, is to report it to the nearest FTC office, practice “corporate distancing” (the distance between your hand and your wallet) and for good measure, post such incidents on social media.
Conclusion
Seriously, this whole matter raises the question of the gullibility and stupidity of some Barbadians. It is now common knowledge that the so-called p–demic was really a plandemic and that wearing a mask did not and cannot prevent c-19. However, you still see some Barbadians – who should know better and who are of all age groups – walking around or even going to church wearing a mask. So much for a so-called “highly educated society”.
Sadly, too much of the output of our education system is tantamount to Pavlov’s classical conditioning: ring a bell and the dog will salivate every time, food or no food!
One thing is clear: no system of transfer from primary to secondary school that this administration can come up with is going to change this level of obtuseness. Why? Because no one has yet been able to address the issue of teaching critical thinking in our schools!
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