To think that since covid happened some businesses have 'got lazy and stayed lazy'

[Ilovechocolate87]

DH and i used to have an expression a couple of years back 'because covid' which we used when we thought a company was just using the virus as an excuse for not doing something properly or making unnecessary cutbacks.

But even now it seems that this is STILL continuing, but for no legitimate reason!

Some examples include;
-Our local bank shutting at 3pm...every day of the week.Crap for 9-5 working people like DH!

• No fireworks display at center parcs, which is a shame as it was really good and atmospheric over the lake.
• Soft play at our local sealife centre sitting there unused and wasted...such a shame as there is nothing wrong with it.
• Fitting rooms have been scrapped at sainsburys and asda (maybe elsewhere too?) so there is nowhere to try on clothes, resulting in either having to order online and have the expense and bother of posting it back if its not right (which it often isn't) or travelling to return it, neither of which are very good for the environment either, with all that plastic packaging and fuel!)

Has anyone else noticed that it just seems like SOME businesses/companies 'can't be bothered' anymore and are just doing the minimum possible? And the most frustrating thing is that as usual, they make the cutbacks, but the prices keep on going up!!

are these the Ed psych assessments that are being done as part of an ehcp needs assessment or ones that the school is getting down before? If it’s the former then there is a 20 week legal limit for the assessment, I know the la’s aren’t sticking to this at the min but it legal limit. Get the parent to complain and if they still get no where they are threaten judicial review (lots of guidance on how to do this in ipsea website), unfortunately in this area it’s very much a case of who shouts loudest I’ve found and if you sit and wait you’ll be waiting forever

@LadyPenelope68
So what's the excuse for no day time activities then either?
And if it's work to rule why not just say, instead of hiding behind 'safety reasons' etc
Teachers could at least own it!

The school I work in is 100% back to normal apart from parents evenings - we did a parent survey and practically all our parents preferred to have telephone calls, ant that WANT a face to face can book one and three families did that last term.

My local shopping centre is fine, shops have fitting rooms, well stocked and staffed BUT some of the units are empty.

Passport renewal last summer took days, as did my DSs provisional driving licence.

My NHS dentist is great, usual regular check ups as soon as they were allowed to do so.

GP services are an absolute shambles. Staff car park used to be full, now has two or three cars in it max. I had to drop in a letter during “surgery hours” - had to ring the bell to get in, waiting room empty, all consulting room doors open and empty. I’ve been diagnosed with two lifelong conditions OVER THE PHONE by GPs who wouldn’t be able to pick me out of a lineup! I need regular BP checks for my medication but they don’t do them at the GP “because Covid”, they told me to buy my own monitor, might not be accurate but hey ho….

In MY experience the only service really still using the “covid” excuse are GP surgeries.

Yes, the local council used it as an excuse to permanently close the library, the swimming pool and the leisure centre! And now they are blaming the cost of living crisis for pausing redevelopment projects so potentially a whole generation of children will grow up without any sports facilities in the town.

@Maverickess your post at 00.07 is spot on. People do treat customer service staff like shit. They do expect to be treated as if they are always right - even when they are wrong. They simply say, "well I'm going to make a formal complaint" - because they can - and they do and then the whole thing has to be investigated.

In frequent threads PPs are told to complain, make a fuss etc because they haven't got exactly what they wanted (or "paid for" - except they won't pay for what it would really cost). And so it goes on.

DP runs a business and we cannot recruit - mainly for this reason. (No Brexit reasons just people don't want to put up with shit for low pay when they can get slightly less on UC but not have to commute or put up with being insulted on a daily basis). We can't pay more because we're struggling too and cannot put prices up as we'd lose business. I think it's unlikely we'll survive TBH.

I'm also a customer and I hate it too. I had a few days off this past week and spent hours on the phone to my bank, my energy supplier, my broadband supplier - just trying to sort out problems. It is shit, no question about it.

@Morph22010 That's interesting that it costs that much for one to go into the school and that fact that schools are having to cut their budgets even more now, dose makes me wonder if they will ever go back in. We did see one this week, but that was only due to him having an assessment for Dyslexia (which they said he has) due to him having ADHD, otherwise it would have just been a normal assessor. That's cost us nearly £800.

I might have to make some more enquires with the school.

As far as NHS appointments are concerned I really think that they need to see you in person.
Phone calls are ok in some circumstances for minor things where maybe the patient knows exactly what it is and just wants the drugs. But on the whole i think the HCP can get a much better picture by looking at someone.

Cottages, AirBnB and some hotels. I didn't read the small print properly for one and booked it. Check in 5pm....check out 9am on a Sunday. £60 to stay till 11am. It was an average 3 bed cottage, but was not cheap. It is such a rip off. The timings were 'for cleaning'. It wasn't even meeting my low standards of clean.

She also wanted you to strip all the beds and the linens and towels had to be folded and sorted into specific piles.

I was replying to you when I said we will just have to agree to disagree not the OP.
You are misunderstanding a lot of what I’m trying to say (and you’re not even the OP) so it’s pointless us discussing it any more.
We’re all just giving our opinion so there is no objective “right” or “wrong” but my comment to you about let’s agree to disagree was because we will clearly never see eye to eye on this issue.

Spot on @RedToothBrush.

The Ed psychs in the LA where I worked were still not going into assess children long after my team ( specialist teachers) went back into schools and homes visiting. They were even allowed to have their COVID vaccine earlier where my team were apparently not eligible. They were the very last group of specialists to go back to working normally. Not sure why they were so special when everyone else in education was back on the front line...

Well no, there are some objective right and wrongs here because the poster concerned has actually told us about her work situation in detail. Do you actually accept what she's said by the way, and if so what did your comment about universities not doing this mean?

Yes, agreed. With that in mind it's not a sad thing at all that workers vote with their feet.

@RedToothBrush absolutely right. Thank you for taking the time to write this.

I was hung up on twice after repeated attempts to try to phone a dentist after ours closed to all NHS patients. I didn't believe it the first time. I hadn't even asked if they were taking new NHS patients, just patients, they wouldn't have known if I was able to afford private. Walked in instead and there were three staff members in the reception area and no patients waiting, they could have easily just told me they weren't taking new NHS patients on the phone. They hadn't updated the government website in a year either.

And this is exactly what is wrong.

My old employer had the oldest phone system of all time but even that had a divert function

I think this is exactly the point, it’s difficult to get perspective on all the circumstances that have converged to get us in this position (and let’s not forget this is really global). It’s easy for people to say, oh it’s covid, oh it’s Brexit, oh it’s the Tories etc. people want something concrete and immediate to blame.Bit like Matt Hancock being the focus of hate for things that the other Celebs in the jungle have gone through in Covid.

In practice, where we are is the culmination of overpopulation, decreasing resources, reliance on technology, materialism, consumerism, too comfortable life styles, living cheaply greed, war, ideologies, secular, political and religious, false and often unrealistic expectations, pandemic, laziness, narrow focus, “progress”. In themselves none of these things are bad many have the ability to help as well. it’s when they become unbalanced thats where issues arise.

History has shown us time and time again empires rise then they fall. Gods are killed and new ones rise (although these often appear in the new mythologies, either renamed where continuity is needed or literally demonised where a clear break is desired)There is usually a period of things seeming to go back wards, then actually we see things changing in a manner that is often seen as an improvement (usually tied to a change in perspective which give these improvements more prominence). But people are mistaken if they think life will just keep getting better on a lineal state of progression whilst largely staying the same.

DS almost certainly has adhd and it's affecting his work. He is meeting all his targets though so he's not got a chance. School are saying that he is capable of exceeding.

His behaviour is starting to become problematic. DH clearly had adhd and ended up going off the rails by high school.

We are waiting on the school over it (suggestion has come from teacher), but even going down the private route isn't simple. We need cooperation with school to do that, and teacher is saying they can't guarantee that even though she's identifying a problem. And then we need to make sure it's recognised by both the council and the GP if we get a positive result. It's not just the outlay for a private assessment that could be an issue. It's being stuck in a situation where the diagnosis isn't recognised so it's pointless in terms of the school (and might actually cost them money without additional funding) and then being stuck having to pay for medication because the GP won't recognise the issue.

We CAN afford to go private if we absolutely need to, but that's only if school allow us to. Still at least 6 months on that from what I'm hearing. And thats not necessarily in the schools financial interests to which is absurd. So we are likely to get blocked at every opportunity anyway.

We have a friend who has a son with very obvious learning disabilities also in the same class. He has been stuck in the Cahms process for 3 years now. Still not got a diagnosis. He's really struggling.

And that's on top of another child in the class who has profound behavioural issues which is both leading to others getting involved in fights and other children getting hurt. All because he is also not getting access to the support he needs either.

Its utterly appalling and every single class in that class is being utterly failed, but I also don't see there being a resolution to it either. Cos of the backlog.

Its a whole generation lost in education opportunities.

Yep. No one seems to want to work any more.

According to the media nobody has wanted to work since at least 1894. Claiming that is lazy at best, and at worst a way of dismissing the actual issues affecting workers of the day.

mobile.twitter.com/paulisci/status/1549527748950892544?lang=en

Out of interest why would you think that businesses should be operating to 2019 levels just one year after a global pandemic essentially shut down the world and during an ongoing energy crisis, a cost of living crisis, a staffing crisis on multiple levels from recruitment to retainment to staff just not wanting to deal with the public anymore (and who can blame them when you see threads like this), and a red tape trade crisis?

Why would you think businesses could navigate all those barriers and just carry on as "normal"?

And for those wondering why covid is still being blamed well that's not too difficult to figure out is it? For one it's pretty much the root cause and is still and ongoing issue, and for two it's the only crisis that doesn't have wider risks attached to it.

Admit that brexit or the staffing/energy crisis is causing your business real issues and you expose yourself to media accusations of being political, financially inept or a terrible place to work. Say that it is covid and you're left alone mostly.

I work in a consultancy role, the biggest issues facing the sector I work in stem directly from brexit and the governments failure to invest in energy security, yet you'll find no one publicly admitting that.

I dont normally complain but I sent several angy emails to a doctor (not a GP or emergancy worker a specialist referal) as they sent me a letter saying to phone and book by x date or they would discharge us, I phoned EVERY DAY several times not once did someone answer.

I had to email to say not to discharge us we have tried constantly, they replied by phoning and booking an appointment, we showed up and sat for hours... the doctor hadnt bothered coming into work that day.

I sent an angry email about how we wasted HOURS trying to get this appointment and HOURS waiting for them to show up which they never did, they replied by phoning instantly saying they 'thought' they phoned to tell me a week ago that the doctor would be off sick that day (mind readers are they, I wish I new I would be sick a week in advance) but they booked another appointment.

We showed up again, this time we only sat for an hour before complaining and left... to be told by reception the doctor had forgotton us and gone home.

Another angry email and another phone call this time them saying we dont actually need an assesment and they'll just add us to the waiting list... still not heard anything back.

I took 3 YEARS to get this referal with 'covid' being the excuse and the just keep fucking us around.

I'm not sure that banks closing is to do with Covid only, they were closing long before because we don't use them enough with on line banking.

Too many to mention , financial services and utility companies are probably the worst businesses....apparently there are gdpr issues inherent for anyone working from home.
Public services such as NHS and Social workers/Health and social care still quote "covid protocols" as the reason for lack of appointments,inability to carry out home visits and meetings that can only be carried out via Zoom

🤣🤣🤣🤣

I fully agree with you. The whole customer service, public services position is appalling at the moment.

It is also much more socially acceptable to blame COVID than the big old BREXIT shaped elephant in the room for things like worker shortages, import issues etc.

This is an excellent post.