Half-life –7– mop-head
11th December 2020
The man in the shiny red jacket was greeted by a fanfare of barking and frantic tail wagging. He’s JJ the dog’s favourite postman, probably due to his pocket-full of dog treats. He didn’t knock and, as he vanished around the corner, she continued barking for a good ten minutes after he’d gone. She barks at her own reflection and, although cute and adorable, has the intellectual capacity of decomposing sheep. Stepping past her, I collected the small package from the door, together with yet more promotional material for sheltered housing and incontinence clothing for the elderly which a friend of mine signed me up for as a joke when I turned 50. He still denies it, but I’m sure it was him and am planning my revenge. More importantly, the new mop-head had arrived.
Even before we were all driven inside, I had taken up the role as chief purchaser of household hardware and started to master finding all we needed in the virtual world I inhabit from my tiny office. I am not yet allowed to buy groceries as the Head of HR has given me feedback that my vegetable acquisition skills are sub-optimal. Although, my meat buying competencies are excellent, with an outstanding ability in the ready-to-eat processed pork purchasing sub-competency, this is not enough to allow me to use the family Sainsbury’s or Ocado accounts.
The mop-head fitted the excessively complicated mop handle that it was designed for; a purchase made before my role had been fully established. Since my mopping days are over, one of the many fringe benefits of crutches, the now rejuvenated mop went back to its usual home for future use by the tolerant saint who comes in once a week to clean our house in a never-ending battle against the Boys. Her victories are short lived and performance feedback to the Boys has yet to generate any change in behaviour. The Head of HR still lives in hope, as do I.
It was only a matter of time until the inevitable email arrived demanding my wisdom and reflections on the mop-head. Opinions have never been in short supply in this house and, usually, I am able to provide quick, insightful, responses to the demanded feedback on even the most trivial purchase. I take my role seriously. This is the punishment handed out to those forced into the virtual shopping world and I usually endure it with fortitude. My preference for using suppliers other than the one named after a rainforest, presumably due to the volume of packaging it gets through every year, has never helped. Every other supplier, in true Jungle Book fashion, wants to walk, talk, and be like them.
The supplier was the first off the mark, asking for a review of the ‘delivery experience’ and rate it out of five. Reviewing the entire Royal Mail was going to take too long and their short text box what never going to allow a proper consideration of the issues it faces. Besides, I like the postman almost as much as JJ does and certainly saw nothing wrong, right, or different in what he did. Realising the impossibility of rating this successful, but otherwise unexceptional, delivery, I took a short cut, gave it three stars and fired my reply back. Afterall, our postman might have given the package a farewell kiss as he sent it on its way through our letterbox, but I doubt it. Second, a few short hours later, the manufacturer demanded my attention and considered expert opinion on the mop-head itself. My ability to provide meaningful feedback was, for the second time in the day, stumped. The mop-head, without its mop handle, is just a carefully shaped sponge with some bits of plastic glued into it. I assumed it absorbed water as well as its predecessor, although I had no evidence. However, it felt unreasonable to not reply. After all, it was part of my newfound role and purpose in life. I explained the situation in detail and gave the mop-head a reasonable three out of five.
As it turned out, neither of these incessant feedback-seekers claim that my views are important to them ran to the extent of reading my carefully crafted responses explaining why I was unable to provide accurate feedback on the mop-head or its delivery. As if part of a coordinated effort, two further emails turned up at the same time. One demanding why I had given the delivery three stars. The other one pushing for information on why the mop-head failed to meet my expectations and what I thought they should to do to rectify this. It hadn’t failed. I don’t think it’s possible to have five-star expectations of a mop-head.
Having time on my hands, and simultaneously knowing time is draining away faster than I would like, this generated a burst of spontaneous anger at the entire email, scoring, feedback, and evaluation universe that has infiltrated every website viewing, online purchase, or even minor email exchange. With the rant control turned off, I unleashed a most unprofessional sermon, sent to both email addresses together, about the ridiculous nature of their requests, their £2.99 mop-head, and their respective companies. It’s possible I mentioned that they were intellectually failing to reach even the levels of JJ the dog with their absurd time-sucking requests. It may not have been purple prose, but I was quite purple as I wrote it and felt significantly better after pushing send.
All future requests for feedback heading my way will languish in spam from now on. No more precious days will be wasted. To help recover my good mood, I’m going to hack into our Sainsbury’s account and start buying whatever I want, chucking in the odd cabbage every now and again. I might even think about trying another approach to getting The Boys to tidy up after themselves, although I suspect that was a lost cause many years ago.
Hilarious! Made my Sunday morning. Thank you. (NB: Particularly loved the one line takedown of the incessant CRM/feedback loop of the e-commerce cesspit: 'I don’t think it’s possible to have five-star expectations of a mop-head'). Genius.
Laugh out loud funny Charlie. There are lots of very silly hoops we are invited to jump through these days under the guise of customer feedback. Quite surreal sometimes. Loved it. Keep up these fantastic posts