Friday, July 29, 2005
New technology blues
I have spent most of the evening struggling with the Assembly laptop that I have the use of whilst I remain a member of that austere body. On more than one occasion I have called it a 'useless piece of junk' as it has taken an age to perform even the simplest of tasks. At increasingly more frequent intervals it decides for itself to terminate the antiquated dial-up connection it operates on, apparently out of sheer malice. In the end I gave up trying to read my e-mails and went to use my own computer which operates off the more user-friendly broadband.
Now that I have got the laptop working for a short while I have found one e-mail that illustrates that it is not just the Assembly that is having problems with new technology. It seems that Swansea's DVLA is also experiencing some unexpected downtime.
A colleague of mine e-mailed them earlier this week to find out how to correct a typo on his vehicle registration form. Instead of the answer he was expecting, he got this:
We are currently installing a new e-mail system which will provide a better service to our customers. Unfortunately, we cannot deal with your enquiry. You may wish to search for an answer to your query on our website http://www.dvla.gov.uk
Do-it-yourself is all the rage in customer service circles I am told!
Now that I have got the laptop working for a short while I have found one e-mail that illustrates that it is not just the Assembly that is having problems with new technology. It seems that Swansea's DVLA is also experiencing some unexpected downtime.
A colleague of mine e-mailed them earlier this week to find out how to correct a typo on his vehicle registration form. Instead of the answer he was expecting, he got this:
We are currently installing a new e-mail system which will provide a better service to our customers. Unfortunately, we cannot deal with your enquiry. You may wish to search for an answer to your query on our website http://www.dvla.gov.uk
Do-it-yourself is all the rage in customer service circles I am told!
