My hour in one MTL shop

I told myself I would never go into that shop again. I swore that shop had a curse. But I did and boy oh boy did I regret it. MTL city centre shop is that kind of shop you almost always leave angry for one reason or another.

Well yesterday I happened to be in the area and thought I would buy a LibertyNet internet voucher from there. I noticed they had moved into another building so thought new premises should translate to a new customer experience. I was dead wrong!

I walked into the shop just after 3pm, found three people on the queue and the shop had five employees that I could see. A sixth one walked in about 15 minutes later.

Employee 1. She was handling customer service. She gave me a form you have to fill with your name and address to purchase a voucher (and to date I wonder why). The only other person she assisted was a mzungu gentleman who came in the inquire about broadband internet which she rightly said they don’t offer.
Employee 2. Also handling customer service. Assisted one mzungu lady who had come in to inquire why her application for a phone line in August 2008 had not been attended to. He quickly fished out her application from a folder, referred her to a back office and sat down to browse the net. At one point he sent a document to the printer and quickly dashed over to retrieve his documents. I noticed that the printout had pictures of plenty women. When he returned to his computer he maximized a screen and what did I see? A pink coloured screen with plenty pictures of ladies. Now am not jumping to any conclusions here but my creative mind tells me something not work related was going on. I don’t come across many business related websites with pink backgrounds and pictures of women! He obviously had no idea that I could see part of his screen.
Employee 3. Not sure what work he does, if any, because he was sitting slouched and motionless in his chair the whole time I was in the shop. The only thing I could see moving were his eye lids, consolation he had not died in his chair! He is obviously an extra piece of ‘furniture’ worth disposing of!
Employee 4. A cashier who only assisted one gentleman and referred us all to her colleague.
Employee 5. The cashier who eventually assisted us.
Employee 6. A gentleman who walked into the shop at around 3:15pm. He came in a jovial mood and immediately sat down to make a call. He then received a cheque from a customer so this customer could go off do other things. After that he made another phone call. I then asked him if he there is any other way we could be assisted being that I and a colleague had been on the shop for over 30 minutes and still had not been assisted. He said the ‘system takes a long time to print receipts hence the delay’. (Boy, some people just specialize in giving the most feeble excuses on earth!). Then after this he escorted a friend out of the shop and never came back.

I was finally assisted at 4:03pm!! I spent a whole hour in a shop where it seemed only one person was working a lot harder than the others. This shop and it's staff never cease to amaze me!