adminBen Chiganze A Bassfisherman’s Approach
We finally arrived in Dar Es Salaam around 2200 hours on Sunday and the main bus stop was a place called Kariokoo.
It had been such a long journey and we could not wait to arrive. Most of the passengers openly said it was the last time they would board that particular bus.
The bus crew responded sarcastically saying, “We will see you soon because this is the only bus that comes to Dar Es Salaam (from Zimbabwe).”
The response to the customer complaints amply demonstrated the arrogance due to monopolies or near monopolies in any type of business.
Customer complaints are thrown into dustbins once the spirit of invincibility, or irreplaceability or inevitability enters the mind of a service provider.
Allow me to share my recent travelling experience from Harare to Dar Es Salaam by bus.
The scheduled departure time was 2000 hours but the bus arrived at 2200 hours and left shortly thereafter.
No apology or explanation was offered for the delay. The bus crew was not empathetic to the plight of their customers.
Missing agreed deadlines is not negotiable, especially without customer consent.
However, our anger was cooled off by an offer to all passengers of a canned drink each and a chicken piece. Offering value added service is a good outreach programme for customers.
In addition, they were playing nice sungura and urban grooves music right up to Tunduma Border Post. This was a very good strategy of creating rapport with the customers.
With the exception that the bus was overloaded, such that some customers travelled all the way from Zimbabwe to Tanzania standing, they tried to be sensitive to customer needs until we reached Tunduma Border Post.
They gave us enough time to freshen up ourselves and buy food at the Intercity Bus Terminus in Lusaka, Zambia. After Intercity we had two additional stops, one at a conventional stopover and the other right in the bushes. At the second place, women rushed to the front of the bus and men to the back of the bus to relieve themselves.
Operate within the current legal framework.
It is compulsory for all businesses to operate within the legal framework of the country they operate and abiding by safety standards as well.
Good customer care entails offering customers products and services which do not create any legal liabilities to the customers.
The crew tried by all means to respect the speed limits and driving laws between Harare and Tunduma Border Post as well as being responsive to customer complaints.
However, all hell broke loose on arriving at Tunduma Border Post. Four customers who failed to keep pace with the rest either due to border post procedures or in the rest rooms were left behind although the driver knew they had been left behind.
When someone confronted the driver about his relative who had been left behind the driver said, “Anyone who had travelled with Taqwa Coaches knows that If I hoot three times and you don’t show face I leave you behind.”
Service offerings must be consistent
This rule was conveniently thrown away by the bus crew upon entering Tanzania.
The behaviour and attitude of the bus crew changed abruptly. At times they choose to answer Zimbabwean customers’ queries in Swahili even though they know that most Zimbabweans do not speak Swahili.
It is an unforgivable sin and rude to speak to customers in a language they don’t understand .
This breaks the whole communication process.
The wall sockets in the bus for charging phones were switched off when the bus arrived at Tunduma and were only switched on after about 500km in Tanzania, despite some requests from passengers to have them switched on earlier.
The TV channel and music were all changed to Swahili despite requests from passengers to put music and videos they could hear and enjoy. This was a sensible thing to do as almost 100 of the passengers in the bus were Zimbabweans.
The “seemingly now possessed” driver’s attitude changed to the extent of ignoring passengers’ requests to stop so that they could relieve themselves .
The bus only stopped after covering about 600km.
The bus only stopped for a short time such that some passengers messed up their clothes while short-cutting the call of nature.
The journey became uncomfortable, scary and unforgettable as the bus driver started speeding and flouting road regulations willy-nilly.
At first people shouted and complained to the crew and the driver but it was to no avail.
All we could do was to just keep quiet and pray.
He would overtake in front of oncoming traffic or overtake four long vehicle trucks at one go. Even fast cars such as Mercedes Benz and BMWs would not compete with the bus. Small cars and motorbikes were hooted at to make way as the bus cruised past.
At weigh bridges, the bus would not join the queue, but would jump straight to the front.
At road blocks the bus was not stopped nor fined for breaking the law, an indication that the buses are owned by an influential person.
This journey opened my eyes to the real complexities involved in customer care. It reminded me of the popular Shona idiom which says, “matakadya kare haanyaradzi mwana” (a customer is never comforted by the past good experience).
While the past good performance lays good foundation for market acceptance, the current performance maintains the goodwill of the company.
Customers demand consistent high service every time you provide a service to them. The minimum level of performance customers expect from us is to maintain consistency in quality and performance.
Customers must never be treated as mere statistics. People have feelings and personal needs which need to be listened to.
Customer care also require the service provider to attend to the safety needs of the customers.
Though Tanzanian highways are infested with speed humps, the driver just cruised over them throwing customers to the roof as we passed through them.
It has since emerged that the same bus operator has been denied licence to operate Tanzania to South Africa route due to over speeding .
NB. The name of the bus operator – Taqwa Coaches.
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