to be utterly fed up of "because of pandemic" being used as an excuse..

[5foot5]

..for piss-poor service. Particularly on call centres and the like.

Granted in the early stages I can see it would have an impact - people off sick or self-isolating. Initially also I suppose there was some set-up to get people working efficiently from home. But, come on, it has been over a year. Surely things should be sorted by now?

I have just spent 45 minutes of my lunch hour waiting for my call to be taken. And yes I do know that some of my questions might be answered on the web-site FAQ and yes I know that I can manage my account on-line for some things. But not this thing. Even though they gave me four choices of musical style to listen to while I am waiting it doesn't help. Of course I wasn't arsey with the person who eventually answered as it's not his fault (I assume) but I do wonder if some companies are now using this excuse to cut down on staff and explain the long waits away on "unprecedented" circumstances.

DH is in a similar position. He sent a query about something to one of his pension funds. February was when he made the original query. He got the "because of difficult times" excuse and was told it would be in excess of 20 working days before they they could reply. More than 6 weeks later and no response he chased it. Then he was told another 10 days. Of course no joy so queries again and now it is 5-10 days. FFS 3 months to answer what he thought was a simple query

Just how long I wonder are companies going to keep hiding behind the pandemic excuse

[5foot5]

However I work in the back office of a large company and we work closely with our team in India, and they are suffering heavily with staff sickness etc,

I can understand that would be having an impact on some call centre based work at the moment but the one I was contacting were definitely UK based.

I have been working from home since March 2020, the same as nearly everyone else in our company. I am pretty sure I am at least as productive as I was before.

[QueenPaw]

Ours hasn't changed, I'm WFH and still the same service. We are very busy though so people complain about call waiting times but that's the same whether in the office or not. Think we only have about 4 staff WFH now

[5foot5]

I need to be patient during this difficult time as staff are working from home and have had to adapt their ways of working to suit, so to expect long delays.

Pretty much word for word the script I listened to today

[QueenPaw]

Oh but my GP is awful now. New recorded message says your call will cut off if more than 15 in the queue. And queues of up to an hour
Apparently due to everyone calling about vaccines

[saltychoc]

I assume the long wait on the phone for call centres etc are because those companies have taken the opportunity to furlough their staff and see what they can get away with - nothing to do with WFH

[MusicMenu]

"I have been working from home since March 2020, the same as nearly everyone else in our company. I am pretty sure I am at least as productive as I was before."

I think this is one of the problems actually. You think you're being productive and I'm sure you are for your own work, but inwas talking to a friend who leads a customer facing team all currently wfh. He old team are doing what they always did but they've had to fill some vacancies during the pandemic and there's no one around to support those new staff in the way that there would be in the office, so overall service and response times has declined.

[Thymeout]

Large M&S on two floors. I have a voucher for £50, for taking out house insurance with them. Can't be used on-line. I'm recovering from major surgery, chemo and nearly a year of shielding. I can't walk v far and standing in a queue makes my back hurt. But it runs out in 4 days.

You'd think, with their customer demographic, there would be the occasional chair for people who need to sit and rest for a bit. But NO. 'Because of Covid'. (Not true. I've had this convo with them before the pandemic.) When I asked why, I was told because I would be in the store longer than if I queued standing up. No I wouldn't. I'd be queuing sitting down, instead of propping myself up on a clothes rack, and quite capable of making it clear when it was my turn to be served.

And don't get me started on their moving their depts around every week. If I've micro-calculated my trip to get the lift into lingerie, I don't want to find that I've ended up on totally the wrong side of the store staring at towels.

[TheKeatingFive]

I assume the long wait on the phone for call centres etc are because those companies have taken the opportunity to furlough their staff and see what they can get away with - nothing to do with WFH

Nope. Or certainly not entirely. It’s very difficult to manage call centre style outfits while wfh. It’s a very small part of the business I work for and keeping motivation and focus is a huge challenge.

[LolaSmiles]

If everyone’s being so much more efficient, why aren’t customers experiencing a better service?
I have wondered the same.

Part of me wonders how many people still working at home have used it as an opportunity to avoid/reduce childcare costs so are actually half working, half looking after their children. Obviously when schools were closed and some nurseries were limiting childcare, I understood. DH and I have both had Teams calls where people have had children around, but that's gone down since restrictions started to lift.

[3cats4poniesandababy]

Some of the work from is nothing to do with people nit being efficient as a lack of investment. Management have happily gone let's work from home, close office, save money. I think personally invest some of the saved money in better Internet for staff, upgrade laptops ect ect.
And I agree some is furlough staff - thry are testing how much can they drop customer service standards by before losing customers.

GP Doctors are useless now. They just don't seem to grasp that I need an appointment fave to face because I have massive anxiety attacks if I have to talk about it on the phone.

Other favourite was got a medical letter scything they would pcntact me at their earliest convenience- took 2 months to get that letter. Funnily enough tge NHS's earliest convenience to help me would have been when I was in the hospital last March when all I wanted/needed was someone with me for support but wasn't allowed due to covid.

[thefishthatcouldwish]

Totally agree OP at the start I understood but now over 12 months on I’m like 🙄

[lap90]

You're not the only one!

I do empathise that these have been unusual times and have been understanding of kids in the background for tech support, people telling me to call the office number again to speak to someone else because they can't currently transfer calls on their equipment, being cut off e.t.c...

I am even understanding of having to hold on the phone for half an hour plus to get to speak to someone... but I was so frustrated by my university having finished my course and needing a letter from them that they took over 3 months to provide it (and that was only after having a moan on social media). I just found it so ridiculously that well into this year they are still blaming covid!

Although everyone swears they are so productive wfh.

[MintyMabel]

I got that excuse when DD’s DLA application still hadn’t been assessed.

I pointed out a whole load of people I knew had got their back in record time, quicker than usual. It was apparently because the specific type of claim for her had fewer assessors because Covid. I pointed out that others with similar conditions and claims to her has still got theirs back. Guy looked further in to it and said “it hasn’t been allocated to a handler yet” This was beyond the point at which we should have had a decision. Nothing to do with Covid, someone hadn’t done what they should have done.

He apologised and we had a decision within the week.

[MintyMabel]

On the other hand, when I’ve been calling for quotes from suppliers, I’ve found their turnaround times have been way better.

[JackieTheFart]

YANBU.

Just to give some perspective though, from someone who works behind the scenes in a contact centre -

• we still have most staff WFH. Piss takers in the office are even worse, and there’s really very little proof that we can request for repeated ‘having to isolate/childcare issues’. My company is very lax with some of this IMO
  
• my company has been hugely impacted by the wave in India. Most of the tech stuff is designed and built there, and a lot of the maintenance stuff happens there also
  

Part of me wonders how many people still working at home have used it as an opportunity to avoid/reduce childcare costs so are actually half working, half looking after their children

You are absolutely correct that this is happening. What is also happening is that staff in less busy departments are being drafted in to assist with the busier departments - but when they can’t have the full 8 weeks training, and don’t have the luxury of on hand side by side support, they’re never going to be as efficient. They alleviate the problem enough for senior leadership to move comfortable with the figures and customer dissatisfaction is dealt with as an after thought. In my opinion of course.

[idontlikealdi]

YANBU the doctor situation is pissing me off to no end. Thankfully I have doctor on call with work but

[pointyshoes]

My DB is a non-exec director of several businesses. These companies are finding that initially everyone wfh quite well, particularly in the circumstances and it worked well as an emergency measure. However, their efficiency/effectiveness has tailed off as the year has passed. More people are cutting corners and seem to be taking wfh for granted and think it’s ok to blend it with their home lives. I think lots of people (not just wfh) have wound down slightly, become slightly apathetic. However, the main problem is that all the employees genuinely believe they are working efficiently, and they actually aren’t. It’s a huge perception problem

[StrawberrySquash]

YANBU. Fed up with companies who won't let you contact an actual human being. I have checked your website. It can't help. This is why I'm on the phone, so stop patronising me with messages to redirect me. And stop making your webchat people work over goodness how many calls at once so that it takes them ages to reply to a simple thing while actually chatting.

[BrightYellowDaffodil]

YANBU.

A shop local(ish) to me has cut their opening hours 'due to covid' which means they shut earlier and open less at weekends. Covid my arse, but no matter because I go to their competitor who has managed to open all day every day throughout the pandemic.

And that's before I consider the shop staff in highstreet stores who have been unendingly rude. Any complaint or comment is met with a "Well, we're just trying to keep people safe 'COS OF COVID", as if somehow we're oblivious to a pandemic. No love, I just don't want to be shouted at because I used my own hand-sanitiser, or had the temerity to purchase (or even look at) something you deemed non-essential, even though it was displayed and on sale.

[Deux]

Totally agree with this. I had to ring a contact centre and the recording went blah, blah, blah.... Covid. It then went on to tell me that I might hear normal household noises in the background of the call. I found myself thinking what? Still? A year on? Fine to hear household noises a year ago but now it just seems like taking the piss not to mention being hugely unprofessional. And this is an organisation that’s supposed to be managing money.

[TheLonelyCup]

DDs not seen her paediatrician in 2 years due to covid, they're 80 weeks behind as it stands and have 1 paediatrician for the whole county (around 400k children in the county) so who knows when we'll be seen.

[loulouljh]

Agreed! We are over a year in now.

Awful service at local bank. One person serving. Massive queue. Cause of Covid apparently. Staff working from home!!!!

[ExConstance]

I agree, I've been trying to talk to someone at my pension providers ( 2 of them) as I'm thinking of retiring, it takes 45 minutes for them to answer if you are lucky, then they say things that are clearly not true such as having sent out documents you asked for over a week ago. if they are back in the office this shouldn't happen. If they are working from home then surely it should be more efficient than this?

[FussyLittleFucker]

B&Q refused to get a member of staff to carry a heavy thing to my car the other day because of COVID. It was too heavy for me to lift but they refused. I did question the logic but they weren't having it so I went to Wickes who were happy to do so.

[BraveBraveMouse]

@Ellpellwood

Yep. I reported a roof leak on my 8 year old new build in October, to NHBC. The scaffolding finally came down 2 weeks ago. 6 weeks for an inspection, 3 weeks for a contractor to be assigned, oh whoops, November lockdown, and then it's Christmas, oh and now the roofer has to isolate. And then they were so busy they forgot we were under scaffolding for a month and we needed a final job doing. On and on!!

To be fair to NHBC, they were shite before the pandemic