Dial N for non-response

A neighbor of mine is building a garage with an office on the second floor. It will have a sink and shower facilities. He isn't very comfortable doing the plumbing so he wants to get a licensed plumber to do the job. He has called several repeatedly, and only one called him back—after my neighbor's third call to him. They agreed on a time for the plumber to look at the job, but the guy never showed up. He didn't call either.

Another acquaintance moved from one Massachusetts city to another, and filled out the proper forms for the Post Office to forward her mail to her new address. After a month, she hadn't received any mail. Very strange, she thought, so she called the Post Office manager in her former city, who said the blame must be with the Post Office in the new city. The new city's postal manager, of course, said no, it's the other guy's fault. No one offered to do anything to help her track down her mail, and one postal clerk actually hung up on her.

I have a baby grand piano badly in need of tuning. I don't play, but everyone else in my family does, and the notes sound awful—mostly because of the piano. It took several calls to get one local piano tuner to agree to do the job.

You may have had some of the same experiences.

What's going on here? What ever happened to the concept of customer service and response, let alone courtesy? It's not like any of us are asking for something special. We're not trying to borrow money from these people. In two cases, we want to give them money for services they can render. But, alas, they evidently don't care.

Contrast these situations with what happens in manufacturing every day. Engineers, increasingly, are called upon to respond immediately to customer needs, and to deliver their designs in less time than ever and they do it!

Eventually, the work for plumber and piano tuner will slow down, and they'll be looking for things to do. I'm not anxious for a slowdown, but if it comes I'll be ready for the first call asking if I need any of their services. I'll just let the phone ring and ring.