OT: Delivery Fail

[Davey]

I came back home yesterday afternoon, to find a white van with its flashers on outside the house. I asked the driver if I could help, as he was doing the standard action of punching a 'phone screen, and he showed me that the device, the one used to record a delivery, had a failed battery. Even though it was plugged in to the power socket, it would not take a charge, and went blank immediately if disconnected. He had a package to deliver to my neighbour, he knew where the house was, the neighbours were at home, but he could not deliver the package because the tablet thing was defective.

Has the world gone mad? I thought that systems were supposed to serve man, not the other way round.

[charles]

he could deliver, but might need pen and paper to record that he had done so. Or, he could have asked the recipient to come out to the van and sign on the screen when the device was plugged in.

But both of those need initiative.

[Jethro_uk]

The problem is the slimy salesman (and the slimy person who bought some said salesman) sold the system as 100% perfect. So why would anyone waste a seconds time (or a penny) on devising a backup system which will never be needed (I know).

It's all very well becoming "low cost" and "100% efficient". But the corollary is you are completely unable to cope with any change in the environment.

I suspect the coming woes from all angles are going to leave a lot of operations floundering. Yes, it was a great idea - trebles all round - to reduce 2 people who can do the job to one. But when that one person is unavailable ....

[newshound]

Presumaby not an eastern european immigrant, then.

[Tricky Dicky]

Or he could sign it himself as quite a few do. My signature on those touch screens tends to end up squiggle no matter how I try to do my normal signature.

Richard

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Quite. Wonder if an expert could prove it was yours?

It would make more sense to take a thumb print.

[Jethro_uk]

Or a photo of the recipient ?

[Tim Lamb]

In message [e-mail], Tricky Dicky [e-mail] writes

Very slowly is best. I can usually find a sharp finger nail for the ones without a scribing tool.

[Tim J]

Makes a lot more sense to take a photo of the individual who accepts the parcel. That way if a neighbour accepted it etc, you can see who did.

Happened to me too. A new laptop battery had the street number on it not very legible and it got delivered to the neighbour across the street. When it had not showed up, I talked to the person who delivered it who was adamant that he had delivered it. That neighbour was happy to hand it over when I knocked on the door of the house the courier said he had delivered it to and claimed that he hadn't got around to bring it to my place days later.

[Brian Gaff]

I hope he delivered it and made a hand written receipt and told the boss where to stick his chrappy machine! Brian

[Brian Gaff]

Probably not paid enough to use that. Brian

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Don't they put a card through your door saying where it's been left?

Not up to your neighbour to deliver it to you.

[bert]

In article [e-mail], Tricky Dicky [e-mail] writes

I struggled to do a normal signature on a piece of paper the other day - so accustomed to just doing a squiggle on a screen.

[Davey]

Next time I see the neighbour, I will ask if it was delivered. He won't know about the machine, though.

[Davey]

The problem here, though, was that the machine was broken, so it couldn't even know that it was at the right place, let alone accept a signature.