I don't know what baffles me more: the delivery habits of the guys who drive for logistics carriers or my own tendency to misunderstand basic kitchen appliances.
For years, I have worked in the repair logistics industry, and the frequency of delivery incidents has always amazed me. All too often, it seems that the incidents could have been avoided simply by confirming the address. I have resolved countless situations where a package could not be delivered because the customer was not at home. Upon speaking with the client, I would find out that the customer had given their home address despite knowing that they would not actually be at home when the package was to be delivered. "Oh, I work during that day, so was not at home," is something I have heard repeatedly. "Can the package be routed to my office?"
"Of course," I would always respond. "Any reason you didn't specify that address when arranging the service?"
This works in both directions, of course. Just last week, I had a particularly difficult situation where a customer had sent their mobile device into the repair center for service, but somehow the wrong contact name was listed on the waybill. As a result, despite the fact that the delivery location was an actual repair center, the small package was put on the desk of some guy who happened to be on holiday. Two weeks later, he returned to find a package on his desk, and he immediately gave the unit to the repair area. Unfortunately, the two week delay caused great dissatisfaction to the customer, and understandably so.
Last year, the company I work for took over the management of the mobile phone repair network for a billion dollar company. During the first months of our involvement, I handled several cases where naive customers (and rather poorly trained customer care centers) sent their expensive mobile device simply to the address of the company headquarters, where the package would effectively go into a black hole and never reach the place it should have.
In my own personal life, I always take care to make absolutely sure I am specifying the address that I want a package delivered to. I make my share of online orders, and really appreciate the requirement that I confirm, then re-confirm the shipping address before my order is finalized.
So, last Thursday morning when the switch on my electric kettle finally broke, I jumped online and placed an order for a replacement Wasserkocher. At the check out screen I confirmed my address, and looked forward to receiving it in the next day or two. Normally, the order confirmation gives a target date for when the package will be delivered, and when I received my per-alert that the order had been sent, I knew to expect delivery sometime on Saturday.
I really only had one task to do on Saturday, which was to do the shopping. I figured I would putter around the flat during the morning, at least until the delivery guy showed up, then go to the store.
By early afternoon, I decided to take a chance and dash down the street to the store; I was tired of waiting and really wanted to avoid the late-afternoon shopping rush. I would just have to risk missing the arrival of the delivery guy.
As I stepped out of my front door, I checked my mailbox, and found a "Sorry we missed you!" delivery notice. The notice went on to inform me that my package had been left at the house two doors down from me. I was rather surprised and irritated. I had been home the whole morning, as had several other neighbors who live not only in my building, but also the building right next door.
The bell never rang, and I suspect it is because the delivery driver never bothered to press the bell.
Many years ago, I did have the unfortunate issue where my doorbell was not functioning, but I never knew this. At the time (much the way it is now), I was not receiving a lot of visitors, so it took me longer to realize that there had been a problem. However, that was a long time back, so there really was no excuse this time. After all, I know perfectly well that my doorbell is in working order.
The thing was, I had ordered two items on Thursday, and this meant that there would actually be two deliveries. Therefore, I still needed to be quick at the store, so that I could return home and plant myself at the window overlooking the street to make sure that the next driver didn't try and pull the same stunt and simply put a notice in my mailbox instead of attempting to deliver the package. I took my notice with me, and after making my quick shopping trip, I intended to stop off at the house two doors down so as to collect my first package.
My shopping trips are always pretty short, and I was fortunate to have been in the shortest check-out line, so 15 minutes later I was about half a block from my house when I saw a guy carrying two packages. He looked a lot like guy intent on making a delivery, and sure enough, I could see that he was approaching my house. I was a bit too far away to call out to him, but I could see that he seemed mildly irritated as no-one was answering the door after he had pressed the bell.
His irritation turned to mild surprise as he looked in my direction, to see me hustling towards him with a couple of shopping bags. "Hey, I think you are looking for me," I said, only slightly out of breath. "Kann sein," he responded.
Sure enough, it was my second package!
I quickly signed for it, then shoved it inside the door, then went back to the house two doors down, rang the doorbell, and was delighted when a woman holding a package addressed to me opened the door. I wished her a pleasant weekend, then returned home with all my stuff.
In fairness, at least one of the drivers who delivers in my neighborhood makes an effort to actually deliver packages. On the positive side, everything worked out as it should have, and by Saturday afternoon I was opening my new kettle.
I tend to glance through the accompanying user's manuals for even the most simple of items, including my new kettle. As our world has grown smaller (and sadly, a lot more ridiculous, though I will refrain from discussing politics, disgusting movie producers, social media, and Arsenal football in this post) I have noticed that the manuals that come with items are usually translated into lots of different languages, which I find very cool. However, it might be a stretch to actually call these user guides, because more often than not, there is simply a set of pictures illustrating the step by step process.
OK, so there really is not too much involved in heating up water, but what I had failed to realize when selecting my new kettle was that there was no indicator light. Again, this is not a huge deal, but two days before when I was telling a friend that I had just ordered a kettle, he asked me what color the indicator light was, and went on to explain that he had recently had a kettle that had a blue light, which didn't seem logical, as one does not usually think of blue when thinking of boiling water, but rather red, or as in the case with my old kettle, orange. I plugged my new appliance into the socket, and looked forward to seeing what color the light would be, and was slightly let down.
That being said, the water heats up nicely, and makes a sound that I find quite comforting.
Last evening, as I was cleaning up after dinner, I spent a few extra minutes on my salad spinner. This particular gem I ordered (and received without any delivery incident) several months ago, and I absolutely love it. Not only have I increased my greens consumption by about 1000%, I just like the idea of thinking that my lettuce really enjoys playing on the "sit n spin."
The item itself is very simple and fun to use. Sometimes I get a little frustrated with the colander, since I have to kind of work harder to get all the small bits washed out, but that is a small price to pay. One thing that I had been wondering about, though, was the top portion, where the spinning happens. Over the past months, I never have felt like I could clean that as well as I would have liked, and I thought, "Hey, it would be really cool if this piece can come apart."
Pop.
Just by playing with the lid a little bit, I realized that indeed, the top did separate into a couple of parts that immediately made cleaning almost fun. I dug out the user's guide again, just to see what I had overlooked months ago, but never found a picture illustrating how one took the top apart. Alas, it seems some technical writers believe certain things to be intuitive.
And of course, this is exactly why I never looked for an indicator to light up telling me when the lettuce is clean.
See you out there.
bryan
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