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Education and telephones
Morris Cargill
On Thursday, November 12, the last section of my column for that morning got pushed off the page by Martin Henry. I don't resent this in the least, because Martin is one of the columnists I most admire and on that Thursday morning, he was writing some very sound sense. He was making the point that a high general level of education was irrelevant to the achievement of national prosperity. He pointed out that all the most developed countries had achieved their development long before there was much in the way of general education. Indeed, the demand for a high level of education and the capacity to pay for it comes after development has been achieved and not before.
Even in the matters of technology, we should bear in mind that Bill Gates, one of the world's richest men and a computer genius, was a high school drop-out.
In Jamaica, we are constantly told that a high standard of education is essential to our progress. Well, we have an excellent university and a lot of well educated professors and graduates, but none of them have up to now added a brass farthing to the country's earnings.
The piece of my column that was left out on that Thursday had to do with the difficulty of getting one's telephone put back in service when it gets out of order. When we had the rains a couple of weeks ago, my telephone went dead on a Friday morning. I am fortunate in having a most efficient flesh-and-blood friend within the ranks of Cable and Wireless who normally gets things put right for me. As she does not come to work on Saturdays, I was left to battle trying to get 115 to answer. Unable to surmount that impenetrable obstacle, I had to wait until the following Tuesday to be rescued. One major problem with Cable and Wireless is its lame customer service. I must say in fairness that once you succeed in telling somebody that your phone is out of order, the repairmen come along quite quickly thereafter. The problem is to find any live human being to whom you can report a fault.
But poor customer service is not confined to Cable and Wireless. Too many firms are guilty of it.
Account moved
Some time ago, the bank which held my current account was the commercial bank of the Paul Chen-Young organisation. Taking fright that it might collapse (which it didn't), I moved my account to CIBC. You couldn't find a more solid bank than that in Jamaica. Its only trouble is that, like Cable and Wireless, I find it extremely difficult to get hold of a human being to untangle problems. During last year, I have tried three times to get the manager on the telephone and every time, he was out or in a meeting or, for all I know, was in the gentlemen's room. Until last week when I read that he was standing down, I didn't even know his name.
I have learned the wisdom of getting to know some bright woman in every organisation I have to deal with. At CIBC, for example, there is one most admirable young lady who is available on the telephone and who is an expert in undoing customer's tangles. I won't give you her name because some spiteful person would probably cut her throat. Nor will I give you the name of my flesh-and-blood contact at Cable and Wireless for the poor soul would be inundated with requests for help. However, for some years now, I have had a friend and ally at the office of the Collector of Taxes at Constant Spring. I don't mind giving you her name, which is Mrs. Kerr, as she is the most caring and competent Collector of Taxes in Jamaica and her Collectorate is run with the greatest efficiency.
So it is that I get along as best I can facing fearful odds.
Morris Cargill is The Gleaner's senior columnist and has been writing for more than forty-five years.
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