Customer Service - Ikea style

Next year, same time, things will probably be somewhat different from where I am now. These are the classified reports keeping the home front informed about what's really going on in Canadia.

Continuing last week's story.

The normal checkout procedure in the Ikea follows the same formula all over the world. After the customer thinks he / she is satisfied with his or her intended purchases, Ikea requires the client to go down into its storage facilities and collect the packages him or herself. Once down, the customer is supposed to find the required items through a numbered shelf system. The only thing the customer has to remember is what item is in on what shelf.

Ikea understands putting the average customer in charge of keeping track of what item was where, may not result in the most optimal sales figures as there are a lot of numbers to remember (sometimes as much as three (!) per item). So they provide customers with a little notebook and half a pencil (a full pencil is a waste of precious potential furniture material). This reduces the challenge for the customer to the capability of reading his / her own handwriting (usually only a problem to those who hardly use the pen anymore, i.e. me).

Once the shelf and item is located, the customer can claim the item. Depending on the size of the soon to be interior improvements, the customer drags the cardboard wrapped bundle out of the shelves, optionally dropping it on his or her foot, and engages in an awkward dance to get the item correctly positioned on the cart. Usually the cart doesn't quite cooperate and starts to roll slightly out of range of the customer and his or her cardboard-packed prize. If the customer is accompanied by a significant other customer, the significant other is entitled to make useful remarks about how clever the taken approach was. The latter will result in a very entertaining ride home (*).

Packed with a cart full of items, the customer then heads towards the checkout. The checkout is invariably manned by a collection of bored students provided by the local university. Purely for variation, Ikea will put a very very very slow and not so clever 'checkout specialist' in place that always seems to make a ton of pricing errors regardless of the number of items. The idea is to make the customers understand, there are worse things than bored students handling your money.

As soon as the customer has paid, he or she may have the 'option' to have their stylish Swedish furniture delivered to them, instead of dragging it to their homes themselves. Sometimes this is even mandatory, as some items need to be ordered. Regardless of what the customer paid at the checkout, the Swedish Furniture Empire appears to feel that the customer should be happy that they will 'only' charge a modest delivery fee somewhere between a 'mere' $49.50 to as much as $227.50 (**).

Having paid already, Ikea apparently feels comfortable enough to dictate all the other terms of delivery as they see fit. The Blue Yellow Team requires the customer to provide them with a four hour window at any designated day. Sure, the customer may get upset, but what is he /she going to do ? Return the items after committing all that effort in retrieving the packages from their shelf system ? Loudly discuss the rather imbalanced distribution of interests with a student who couldn't care less ?

For hypothetical purposes let's something happens: say a flaky landlady who doesn't provide a key to an apartment where the delivery has to take place. This very hypothetical situation puts the customer in a very 'interesting' situation as the customer now has to coordinate the delivery through a group of people called the Ikea Customer Service group. These handpicked cream of the crop human beings, excel at being capable of less than nothing, with the possible exception of being in an eternal state of PMS – even the guys. It is an established fact that these people:

• Do not know the terms of delivery and will make up the terms as they go, claiming that whatever they say is in the contract the customer signed.
  

• Cannot move the delivery, cancel the delivery or change the delivery location at any time prior to the delivery.

• Despite living in 2007 where every 12 year old owns a mobile telephone to stay in touch with his homies, the Customer Service people have absolutely no way of getting in contact with the truck.

• Are incapable of solving anything and will pass the buck to departments which are in an ever lasting state of maintenance ('I cannot reach the Delivery Solutions right now, they're in maintenance').

• Will offer a 'thank you and have a great day' despite the fact you made it abundantly clear you're day is anything but good.

The fact that any furniture does end up anywhere is only, and exclusively thanks to:

• Understanding truck people, who are equipped with mobile phones and do understand how to drive around two blocks.



• Very friendly neighbours who own big pick-up trucks.

(*) Note that as far as I know, this never happened to the SO and me. It is inspired by a similar scene of a man and woman buying a door at the Gamma (a Dutch tool shop).

(**) I base this last number on what I seem to remember, but since their price table page is down at the moment I feel I can make up whatever number I feel is appropriate.

By popular demand: a shot of a not so sober night in one of the Vancouver pubs. Two random coworkers show their best side (happy now Lux ?)

Blue / Yellow Intermission

Next year, same time, things will probably be somewhat different from where I am now. These are the classified reports keeping the home front informed about what's really going on in Canadia.

The hockey games are frequently interrupted by commercials. Nowadays these commercial messages are not necessarily restricted to the television. When attending a game, one will see the players stop the game every so many minutes. Most likely giving the chaps at the tv station the much needed opportunity to leech as much monetary gain out of our attention as they can. So to stay in style, let's switch to the commercials.

This blog is brought to you by the Swedish Yellow Blues of: Ikea.

“Do you need your new house decorated with affordable furniture ? Do you wish to stay in style with the latest in home decoration ? Here at the Ikea we offer you exactly what you need. You too can dress up your home exactly like your friends / co-workers or other relatives ! Come and visit one of our many stores”

I have no special feelings for the Ikea. Their products are generally pretty mediocre in terms of durability and style. Moreover, for some reason I always end up with the products which have the holes for the screws just a few millimeters off from wherever they were supposed to be. This meant that at the best the screw would put up a big fight and eventually gets stuck halfway at an odd angle, or at the worst I'd give up after some prodding and poking. Don't be surprised if you find some “leftover material” in my old apartment, on top or near a certain Ikea item. Some day I intend to use them, unless the SO decided otherwise and toss them away, knowing that my idea of “some day” can be pretty close to “whenever”, the relative of “never”.

Despite these gripes, my place back in the old world is – naturally - filled with a lot of Ikea products. From the good old “bookaåse”, the resilient “bedmessö” to the britle “klöruhkahstingge”.

As it turns out, the highly successful Swedish furniture manufacturer, has invaded Canadia as well. Being in need of some affordable and mediocre items to sit, lie and put stuff on, I turned to my fellow Yellow / Blue European friends...

The Vancouver area is blessed with at least three Ikeas and adventurous as I tend to be, I ended up going to the most the remote one, in the far end of the plains of Coquitlam.

Braid, Ikea station

If any one has the somewhat odd, if not downright ridiculous desire to come all the way from where ever they live, to visit a Canadian Ikea, I can save you the trip and tell you a little secret: the Ikea dogma dictates that every Ikea must be 100% the same, everywhere. Walking into the Ikea in outer Coquitlam, is exactly like walking into the same inspirationless store in Delft (Holland). Two floors, the upper one dedicated to mock up living rooms / bathrooms / bedrooms and kitchens and the lower floor to the actual goods / lightning / decorative stuff and pots and pans. You will also find exactly the same crowd as in any other place: students looking for a cheap couch, first-house-owners and me.

After an hour of looking around, trying out couches, testing tables and convincing a Canadian kid all Ikea furniture come with a real, very scary and very lethal authentic Swedish troll, I went for two lamps, a coffee table and a sofa bed (*).

scary swedish trolls included with Ikea furniture

Thinking back, maybe I shouldn't have done that troll story as it seriously screwed up my karma for that day and things would get... “interesting”.

Next week: Customer Service, Ikea Style

(*) Anyone with the intentions of visiting and staying over at my place: you will get the pleasure of sleeping on this baby.

more boobies

Go Canucks Go ! (2nd Period)

Next year, same time, things will probably be somewhat different from where I am now. These are the classified reports keeping the home front informed about what's really going on in Canadia.

Continuing last week's story

We were waiting in a dimly lit hallway for our transport to come, "I've got our high speed priority transportation covered", 'R' said ... He didn't lie

Being in the infiltration business for one month and some days now, I expected something more undercover or limousiny at the worst, instead a big red and very obvious bus appeared... 'R' seem unconcerned and hissed: "Run, we can still make it !". After a highly intensive three meter dash, we hopped onto the hooligan filled vehicle.

Accustomed to the European soccer fans, this prospect didn't seem too promising. Any time now, I expected the Orca wearing crowd to sing the Canadian variant of "hee buschauffeur, we gaan je busje slopuh", after which the riot police would surely appear and we all would get arrested. Bye bye infiltration mission...

... Luckily thanks to our commanding presence and the imposing looks, the hooligans remained calm. No harm was done, no busdriver was beaten up, the innocents remained innocent and the bus even arrived on time.

the canucks bus, bringing the hooligans to the arena

After disembarking we had to go through the usual "security", meaning our credentials were checked and my bag was searched. The latter consisted solely of an uninterested quick glance. The contents of my bag could be used to influence the game in any way a proud hooligan would have wanted. It contained a throwable umbrella, a tossable book and a hurlable notebook. Should things really get dire for the Canucks, the entire bag could and probably would, be thrown onto the ice, distracting the game for at least a minute and maybe tripping one of the opposing team. Two on a good day.

'R' and I made our way through the crowd, eagerly awaiting the glorious performance their gladiators would bring to light. In anticipation of this event, the vicious pack feasted on the local delicacies : fat hawt dogs, cubic meter popcorn boxes generously covered in liquid butter, nachos dripping in molten cheese (with some pickles) (*) and eight dollar beers (**) .

the crowd wants jumbo dogs and molten butter

Despite the efforts of the security and the tasteful distractions we finally made it: The arena of ice, the cold theater where thousands upon thousands of raving fans were kept in check by four silly stewards, the ring where fate was decided by effort, wooden sticks and real men on real steel blades ... The Vancouver Canucks Ice Hockey Pitch.

Coming soon: Go Canucks Go ! the 3d period.

(*) After seeing this, I expect no further condensending comments from a certain American regarding our "frikandellen", "kroketten" or "sausijzenbroodjes".

(**) Horeca of Amsterdam, take notice: you can get away with this.

boobies

Go Canucks Go ! (1st Period)

Next year, same time, things will probably be somewhat different from where I am now. These are the classified reports keeping the home front informed about what's really going on in Canadia.

North Americans in general don't get sport really well. They missed the intention of rugby and called it football. Football became 'soccer'. Americans seem to consider soccer as not that interesting, since there's not a goal every ten seconds or so.

An american soccer cheerleader

So the they took the ball from the ground, shortened the pitch, raised the goal, fired the keeper (why would you keep anybody from scoring anyway?) and called it basketball. Basketball is so much about scoring, that it eliminated the significance of scoring in a totally different way (*).

Then there is baseball, a game with a design which focuses on making as many people do as little as possible. Baseball is the only 'active' game, next to sumo, which features fat players.

Luckily the North Americans have one saving grace: ice hockey.

Ice hockey seems to be a good mix of the better elements of other sports. There's usually a couple of goals, there's active and often strategic team play and plenty of room for the brilliant individual action. Even if that's not enough, players can also decide to participate in a build-in mini game. To unlock that mini game all a player has to do is skate up to the nearest opponent and suggest he had intimate contact with the opponent's mom, wife or sister. Et voila: the boxing / wrestling minigame ensues.

so... regarding my sister (***)

Since the Canadians are so big in ice hockey, I had no choice to start an in-depth investigation into this matter and setup an infiltration attempt to estimate the potential of this activity. Last Tuesday, one of my local contacts, which I will refer to as 'R', managed to secure entrance to one of the ice hockey gatherings: The Vancouver Canucks vs the Los Angeles Kings.

To make sure I cheered for the right team, I delved into the origins and background of the Canucks.

One of the first things I did was to look into the meaning of the name Canuck. My first guess was that someone got creative with the words Canada and Duck. I immediately dismissed that idea as downright silly; given the impressive titles of the other teams (eg the Atlanta Thrashers, the Buffalo Sabre, the Carolina Hurricans) who in his right mind would think of a timid animal like the duck, as their team's symbol ?

Silly maybe, but not as uninformed as the very strong opinion of some bar lady. This induhvidual insisted Canuck means 'Orca' (/killer whale) in the language of a local native tribe. The latter was creative though: the Ice hockey team has an Orca on their shirt and there are native tribes around. But when you make claims in an attempt to demonstrate your extensive knowledge, make sure you are aware of the fact the Canucks are owned by the Orca Bay Sports and Entertainment company and no tribe uses the word 'canuck' to indicate a killer whale (**).

In fact, as it turns out, the origins are not 100 % known and most likely is slang for 'a citizen of Canada'... Anyway I digress.

Packed with some basic intel on the team's colours, whereabouts and ice hockey rules, I set off to meet my contact, 'R', in the Yale Town Brewery. 'R' was to provide me with the right credentials and instruct me on the upcoming infiltration. Instead we ended up eating pizza, meatloaf and drinking beers.

My contact 'R', photographed with my hidden camera, instructs me on hockey

While all this informal chattery was nice, but I was getting slightly nervous about making the targets. 'R' reassured me we had plenty of time. "I've got our high speed priority transportation covered", he said ...

Next week: Go Canucks Go, 2nd period.

(*) Despite all this condescending talk about basketball, I actually kind of like watching (parts of) it (every now and then)

(**) I'm pretty sure there is no tribe out there, because my extensive research showed no correlation between orca, canuck and native tribe (on the first results page).

(***) While being not too well versed in the entire hockey thing, I do believe neither of these players play for - or wear the shirt of the Canucks.

The art work may not be much, but the gameplay is so much better...



The worst Videogame Box Covers

Housing

Next year, same time, things will probably be somewhat different from where I am now. These are the classified reports keeping the home front informed about what's really going on in Canadia.

Vancouver as seen from the south (near McDonald and 32 West)

The current roof over my head is paid for by my generous employer. While this gesture is quite nice, they will only be paying for the time span of two months. After those two months I either have the choice to stay where I am now and pay a substantial amount of my net income to the real estate agency, find a suitable alternative, or join the hordes of homeless that roam the streets.

Although I like the idea of absolute liberty and freedom, the latter isn't really a long lasting option. With the upcoming Olympics, rumor has it the local government has decided it will “take care” of the homeless as many other governments have done before. Because these actions may be seen as not so very humane, the government installed a countdown clock. This clock precisely informs the local unhoused how much time they have before the yet undisclosed “operation clean Vancouver before the Olympics start” begins.

The first option, paying the rent of my overpriced temporary housing, doesn't work either. Since I need the money to explore all the interesting sides and sites of Vancouver, paying large sums of money for suboptimal living quarters seems a bit of a waste.

In conclusion I'm on a quest to find a place to stay for a longer period.

Effective Advertising, no seriously it works

Sadly that isn't as easy as it sounds as the Vancouver housing market is (still) in overdrive. The average income on this side of Canada is about $44k (which is roughly equivalent to 4somethingK euros, at the best). Common sense dictates that housing prices should be about five times as much (220K), however the actual average price is more than double that amount. So the local population keeps buying, selling and renting places out at speculative level far above the reasonable.

Naturally I find this tendency objectionable because I'm on the wrong side of this phenomena. This being on the wrong side of things, requires me to make trips to faraway and remote places in North Van, Burnaby and Northern Richmond as downtown is simply too expensive in general. In these outer areas one can admire the desolate suburban landscapes, dire homes without any trace of character and the chill of ending up on a socially deserted island...

Burnaby Suburbia

Common sense also suggests that the housing market will somehow, someday will suffer a “correction” which won't be totally unlike to the anticipated Cascadia Subduction Zone “correction” ... while I'm all in favor for corrections in my benefit, let's just hope these two will not be correlated in any way.