My Rossi came to visit last weekend.
I still don't have a car so we rented one from Easycar - another triumph for online services. Although not as seamless a process as Easyjet or Virgin Trains, it certainly beat standing in line at Avis or Hertz. And it's comparatively cheap.
The company achieve that by offering a very pared down service. There's one type of car and one type of car only for hire. And you pay penalties for going long distances. So they're after a very limited clientele. And if you fall into their catchment categories, that's great. If you don't then look elsewhere. They make no concessions about amending their services to suit you.
So, it's a reasonably good service but, when the anodyne email arrived from customer services saying how much they valued my business, I thought I'd take them up on their request for feedback. This is what I sent them.
I shall certainly use the service again. However, at present I would rate it as middling to fair.
I have the following four suggestions to make.
- There is a lot of data to type in. Some of it (ie home address) is duplicated. I had to key in the fact that this booking is based in the UK four times. Though the drop down menu is appreciated, surely more people in the UK will use it rather than those in Afghanistan. Perhaps the top three countries referenced could be promoted to the top of the list. Overall, this element of the service could easily be stream-lined.
- As a returning customer, I have to type most of this information in again on all subsequent occasions. This is unnecessary.
- The Rental Agreement is poorly laid out. The paper counterpart for new photocard licenses is regarded as an essential piece of documentation. It should therefore be given its own tick box. Currently, there are four tick boxes on the form. The implication is that there are therefore four items to present. Had friends not alerted me to this, I should have been placed in difficulties on the evening I collected my car.
- As a returning customer, I shall be expected to re-present all my proofs of identity. This is unnecessary.
I received a standard email back which seemed to imply that I'd made a complaint
and that the answer was contained in the email. It wasn't. It has the potential
to make excellent case study material for our course at work about managing
customers online. We need some meat in the "how not to do it" section.
So, anyway, we took the chance of having some trips out. We had been going to meet up with Phil and then Roland but life got in the way. Instead, inevitably, we went to Tesco's for a mega shop. We also went to the National Trust area at Formby Point. The main attraction here are red squirrels. Now I thought that these creatures were endemically shy and that we didn't stand a chance in hell of seeing any. WRONG.
In this location they've become very comfortable with humans - particularly those who are throwing monkey nuts in their general direction. So, we got to see quite a few.
The small, ratty thing in the middle of this photograph is not a distant image of Bigfoot.
It is a red squirrel.
I used to work with someone who never saw a real life squirrel until he was well into adulthood. He was completely shocked by its small size. He still had this child-like impression that squirrels were about a metre tall and roamed the countryside wearing yellow waistcoats.
So, Rossi and I had another of our lovely weekends together. He brought me presents as he is more wont to do these days which was fabbity. We had nice meals and good sex. We also completed one of those household tasks which was relatively simple to do but I wouldn't have wanted to attempt on my own because it meant going up ladders. I've now eased the window in my bathroom so that I can have proper ventilation in there. This may sound trivial to you but I see it as yet another step towards making the house what I want it to be. Also, Rossi was tolerant of my current Big Brother obsession. We watched other TV as well and chilled to a tape of Carry on Cleo - all together - "Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in for me!".
Then he went away again. And I had time to myself. I will be glad when my life stops being a series of stop-go episodes.
Sunday evening ended on a happy note. It was Fathers' Day. Robert rang me to wish me a happy day. He's never ever acknowledged Fathers' Day before. I suspect that his girlfriend, Rachel, had something to do with it but hey. My heart swelled with love and I snuffled gently after I'd put the phone down.
