Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Creating Senior Friendly Companies

So, just in the past few months, I've dealt with several large companies, none of which were particularly senior friendly, and one, Marketplace IGA, which has a nice, but limited, example of how to be so.

It came up again the other day with the Vancouver Province. A client of mine received an invoice from the Province for a one month bill. It said there was a start date of July 24 and a stop date of July 22 (yes, I know, but that is what it said), and then there was a bill for over $12.00, or about four dollars a day for no days. When I called to find out what this was about, they told me her subscription had been cancelled, because the bill hadn't been paid. The bill wasn't paid, because it was being charged to her credit card, and for some reason, the credit card stopped paying the bills by direct debit from her account. How any of THAT happened is kind of beyond me, but the result was her paper was cancelled. They couldn't really explain why they sent her this relatively meaningless, but definitely confusing notice. She is too confused to know why the paper was cancelled (apparently I am too), and too confused to know what to do about it (at least, I thought to myself, that part I can still handle). She definitely would not have had a clue about how to handle the notice they sent.

We couldn't start the paper again, because she was unable to sign a cheque, and her power of attorney has not been finished being set up because she left it almost to the point where she was not competent to make it.

Too bad the Province couldn't somehow have been more senior friendly and senior aware of their customers, maybe this little problem would have been handled differently and more easily (and more profitably for the Province).

It reminded me of the problems my clients have recently had with Telus, which I blogged about, and recently with Shaw ( a client being charged for a some kind of box and for channels which she never knew she had, didn't know how to use, and wouldn't have watched anyway).

How much would it take for large companies to have policies and practices in place for ethical dealing with Seniors.? How much would it take to put into practice what they would have us believe about being responsible corporate/community citizens ( I assume Shaw, and Pacific Press would state that is important, Telus puts it on it's website).

What would it take? Some awareness of the issues and problems that face seniors. A way of identifying who might possibly fit a profile or need some special attention. A method for asking people if they would like to be taken care of in this way? Unfortunately, a willingness to forgo some profit (no more $300.00 phones, Telus--sorry).