Good & Bad
The GOOD the BAD and the utterly STUPID
We have always believed in praising good products and services just as we want to highlight the bad ones.
For example, a few years ago Barbara had such outstanding service on an EasyJet flight and, as a former stewardess herself, she wanted to thank the crew and the airline. A search of the EasyJet website showed that it was only possible to complain or make a claim against the airline but not to praise it. After searching various company registration sits, we found the e-mail address of EasyJets Chief Executive who immediately thanked Barbara for her kind remarks and promised to pass them on to the flight crew.
These days there is a trend, especially among service companies, to continually request feedback on their performance. I tend to avoid these tick box responses especially when it is clear that the survey is being carried out by a third party or agency. Far better to send a thank you e-mail!
So I thought I would try to post our thoughts on the GOOD, BAD and utterly STUPID (avoiding politicians of course), lets see how it goes.
THE GOOD STUFF
THE BAD STUFF
To echo the theme of supermarket filling stations, we recall that a few years ago E.LECLERC attempted to do away with their payment kiosk at a popular site just off the Route National. Apparently, they receive complaints from regular customers and a noticeable fall in sales! There was the additional problem of the bottled gas sales which had previously been handled by the lady in the kiosk.
After about a month they gave in and re-instated the kiosk so we continue to have the best of both worlds 24 hour access to fuel with a jolly lady in the kiosk during the normal working day! Congratulations Leclerc.
Amazon to the rescue:::::::::::
For some time, we had been in the habit of buying things on-line from the UK, but UK’s divorce from mainland Europe and more correctly Prime Minister Johnson’s ‘get Brexit done at any cost’ deal has, due to the bureaucracy and taxes involved, forced most small businesses to stop selling in the EU altogether. AMAZON has filled the gap by enabling their vast network of partners to sell into Europe. While some items come directly from the UK their network of warehouses has facilitated the distribution of British goods, even English books throughout Europe at reasonable prices. We have to be a little careful with specifications, but have the choice of both the UK and French Amazon sites!
In praise of La Poste
It naturally flows on from shopping on line to the delivery. We would like to praise La Poste here in France. We are happy when Amazon tell us that they have consigned our delivery to them as they often deliver sooner than the senders stated time! If its a large parcel or something requiring a signature, they will let you know if they will try to deliver next day or, in the worst case tell you where and when you can collect your package ‘locally’.
Of course there is a growing army of delivery services ranging from pretty good to really bad. And one of the really bad ones features in the BAD COLUMN opposite.
There appears to be a lot of collaboration between the different delivery companies and we notice that even some of the major international couriers use La Poste for what they refer to as the ‘last mile’ of the delivery.
The French post office La Poste is one of the few public services in France that gets high praise from the public for the quality of its service. It is not just the amiable postman that wins it for them, but the widespread presence of post office counters in most towns and larger villages of the country, largely because it also offers Insurances, Banking and other public services, even Mobile ‘Phones. France has one of the highest number of post-boxes of any country in the world.
Whilst La Poste is currently a state owned service, under EU regulations it is planned that postal services in France will be fully open to competition, at which time the French post office will become a company, with the government remaining as the majority shareholder.
There is concern amongst consumer groups that private enterprise may lead to the closure of uneconomic post offices and, while this risk exists, a public service agreement will be in operation that should protect many smaller rural post offices.
We are old enough to remember when you drove onto a garage forecourt and the attendant came to you, filled your car with petrol, took your cash and often cleaned your windscreen too. Then, as the oil companies, discovered, that self service pumps could bring customers into pay in their newly discovered ‘shops’ and buy all sorts of things that every traveler needs??, the major supermarkets quickly got into fuel retailing.
Clearly this makes economic sense for the supermarkets, as it now seams likely that half of the motor fuel used in the UK and France is sold by them. In France the supermarkets have been investing heavily in new refueling areas. Motorists may benefit from competitive prices, choice and convenience, but there are problems. These filling stations are usually sited in remote parts of the supermarket’s vast parking area and the trend now is to remove the payment kiosks in favour of fully automate pumps. So you are obliged to use a card for payment. Surely there are the security cameras but nobody seams to replenish the gloves and paper towels or clean up spillages. Many times we have slithered about on a build-up of stinking diesel spillage which ends up ingrained in our car mats.
We go along with this new regime, but supermarkets, get you act together, have a regular clean-up and please, please make sure that your card readers are in working order!
AND THE UNDISPUTED WINNER OF OUR BAD SERVICE AWARD FOR 2023 IS*** CHRONOFRESH!!
Prompted by their e-mail, we placed an order with Le Tuyé Du Papy Gaby on 30 May. We often ordered charcuterie from them, sharing the order with our neighbours. This time they were offering fresh chipolata sausages, which we added to our normal order together with a large slab of cheese. According to their courier service CHRONOFRESH, delivery would be made on Thursday 1 June between 08h00 and 13h00. This was within the normal expectation for this specialist chilled delivery. Naturally we stayed at home to receive the delivery, but neither we nor the suppliers were able to trace it and with concerns about the condition in which the fresh meat was being kept, we told the suppliers that we would not accept the delivery and cancelled the order on Friday 2 June.
As we were out most of the following Saturday collecting a visitor from the train station, we advised all of our neighbours not to accept any delivery (should it eventually turn up). However, when we returned home later that afternoon we found the parcel of meat had been dumped at our front door fully exposed to the full sun and a temperature in excess of 31° C, probably since mid-day! We were not surprised that it was starting to smell!
Although Papy Gaby eventually reimbursed us for the cost of the order, we were left to dispose of the tainted meat and cheese with very little by way of apology either from them or their delivery company Chronofresh. Unfortunately we can’t choose the courier service but we can choose where we buy our fresh food!!!