Twitter & Facebook

[notepanel]

There's been a few comments lately that have got me thinking about Social Media being used by public transport companies.

Obviously, when it is used correctly it can useful to the company in receiving feedback and also helpful to the customer, who can have their views heard or find out about disruption quickly.

What really annoys me though is when the following happens:
1) When a customer tweets/posts about a driver doing something good or bad, with all the relevant details included, but rather than Twitter just accepting this praise/complaint and it being processed, the customer is told to fill out a complaints/feedback form online.  Why! In particular with positive feedback, I think the customer is not going to go through all this hassle and the driver will ultimately not be recognised, when surely it can just be processed as an email?

2) Similarly, when a customer complains where was my bus this morning. They are told to fill in a similar form, rather than the person manning twitter just finding out and informing them - surely with AVL and the Central Radio Control this can't be that hard? (The NXC page is very good for telling the customers what's happened).

3) When a customer is rude or abusive about or to an employee, and the firm responds all nicely as if they've asked politely. I find this happens quite often on the National Express Coach page and it really irritates me! Examples include...

From today...
Seriously going to loose my shit at the @nationalexpress driver if he gives me any attitude tomorrow. I TRIED BOOKING ON TO THE COACH.
NX Customer Service ‏@nxcare  5h 
@danielsmith_ I'm sorry to hear this can you email me details with ticket number and a contact no. to tweet@nx.co.uk so we can look into ^sw

Or on other occasions...

Reezus ‏@RemAffiliated  11 Jul 
@nationalexpress your website is shit for booking anything! How the fuck can I not get a coach to Alton Towers? Is it so hard?
NX Customer Service ‏@nxcare  11 Jul 
@remaffiliated Where are you looking at travelling from? ^gp


If someone spoke to me in my job like that, I would refuse to serve them and have them removed. In particular there have been instances where they have specifically called the staff member a very offensive name, and still get answered like a lovely customer.

In my opinion this is not acceptable, as it suggests to these people that it is OK to be abusive towards or about the customer facing staff, and firms should take a firmer line on this. The customer is not always right.    

I was just interested to hear other peoples thoughts on the topic...

[Westy]

Would I be correct in thinking that 'Arriva Midlands West' on Facebook is based in Leicester?

The amount of times I've seen along the lines of 'Please give us your details & we'll speak to the local depot' are amazing.

Isn't there a spare member of staff at each depot social media savvy to update stuff quicker?

The complaints could still go through Leicester Facebook, but the individual depot could also do their own traffic updates, because what's Leicester gonna know about a problem in Pye Green without having to ask the depot first, then posting the reply themselves.

[The Real 4778]

Seriously going to loose my shit at the @nationalexpress driver if he gives me any attitude tomorrow

'Loose' his S*** hey!

Illiterate as well as ignorant.