Got a result from a complaint!!

[Twenty Inch]

Had a run-in with a truck driver the other day. No name on the truck but “Mosaic Fashions” on the driver’s polo-shirt. I got the reg and dropped a shirty letter (not email) to the CEO of Mosaic Fashions asking him to have a word with his transport manager. This is what I got back:

Dear Mr. xxx

Thank you for your letter. I am very sorry that had such an unpleasant experience, but I do very much appreciate you bringing this incident to my attention.

I have had our distribution director investigate the background to your letter, and we have interviewed the driver of the vehicle in question. Whilst he has no recollection of the incident, he has asked us to express his personal apologies to you. He is a long-serving member of our driving team, and we regard him as a responsible and reliable member of staff, with no previous history of such incidents.

At Mosaic Fashions we do take our responsibilities ot all sections of society very seriously, and this naturally includes vulnerable road users such as yourself.

Once again, thank you for bringing this matter to my attention, and I regret that you have had the need to do so.

Derek Lovelock
CEO

Mosaic Fashions are the group behind Karen Millen, Oasis, Priniciples and several other large High St. brands.

I’m rather pleased with this.

TI

 

[bonj2]

Don't you think it's a bit unfair on the driver if you get a mate to send a false complaint in?

 

[Joe24]

You dont have to send it in about the same driver.

 

[frog]

I'd take it at face value. The next time one of us has cause to complain about them we can seen if there is the same reaction. There's nothing to be gained by making a false accusation.

I wonder if we could ask Shaun if we could have a 'Complaints' section where incidents, and the reactions by companies, can be kept. If we see a trend then you could move matters up a couple of notches, but for that you need a string of evidence rather than just a one off and a sneaky suspicion.

 

[hubgearfreak]

Don't you think it's a bit unfair on the driver if you get a mate to send a false complaint in?

very, very unfair.

if the company do take it seriously, the driver will be getting another ticking off for something he hasn't done.

hang on, am i agreeing with bonj :?: :?:

 

[ChrisW]

Well done, it may have worked,

(Thought my reply was better on Bikeradar but can't be bothered to type it out again! Seems all C+ers are over here)

 

[Keith Oates]

You got a positive and polite reply, I think that it should be taken at face value even if it is a standard letter they send out. It must be a good chance the the driver was advised of the complaint and hopefully it will have the desired affect on his behaviour!!

 

[bonj2]

Don't you think it's a bit unfair on the driver if you get a mate to send a false complaint in?

No. Because there wouldn't be another driver.

That doesn't make sense in the context of being an answer to that question. I'm not even sure what you're trying to say when you say there 'wouldn't be 'another driver'.

I wrote to a local bus company once about an incident when a driver almost took me out (intentionally) on a roundabout. It was a road used by three routes from the same company, and one of them has a bus every few minutes in the rush hour. I gave no details of the driver or the bus, and no times, except that it was the morning rush hour. There was no way at all that they could have identified the driver, even if they had Secret Squirrel on the case.

I was hoping that they would still be able to take the incident into account with their training despite not knowing the specific driver. But no, I got a letter saying that they had spoken strongly to the driver concerned, and took these incidents very seriously.

A couple of weeks later, a colleague in another office got the same letter, word for word, about a completely different complaint.

At the end of the day, even if you know the letter you got to be untrue, you can't assume that that's the same of all bus companies and all complaints.
If you were a bus company manager, and you got a letter of complaint, what would you do?
A lot of buses have CCTV on, but why guess - why didn't you write back to the bus company asking them how they'd managed to identify the driver if they didn't have anything specific enough from you to go on?

 

[bonj2]

Don't you think it's a bit unfair on the driver if you get a mate to send a false complaint in?

No. Because there wouldn't be another driver.

That doesn't make sense in the context of being an answer to that question. I'm not even sure what you're trying to say when you say there 'wouldn't be 'another driver'.

If the letter was so ambiguous that it was impossible to identify a driver, then no-one would get a rollocking because there wouldn't be another driver.

Well, there wouldn't be ANY driver to rollock if he wasn't identified - never mind another. I don't see where the 'another' comes into it.
There's either one driver, or none - 'another' implies at least two: one, and then another one.

But, only in YOUR case was the driver not identified. When I was asking about whether it would be fair to which you replied, I was talking about the OP's case, in which he DID give the bus company enough information to identify the driver.

I'd follow the complaints procedure of the company that I worked for.

No you wouldn't, you'd probably set a video camera going, call the driver into your office, give him a good rollocking, and send the video of the rollocking to the cyclist in question.

but why guess - why didn't you write back to the bus company asking them how they'd managed to identify the driver if they didn't have anything specific enough from you to go on?

Because I knew that they hadn't identified the driver.

Well surely isn't that for them to explain? Buses are bad enough, don't make excuses for them for god's sake!
If I was you, I would have written back to them asking how they'd managed to identify him. It's ok to ask a question to which you already know the answer in order to prove a position you hold. The question you really want to ask is "identification would have been impossible yet you claim to have achieved it, so it is obvious to me that you are lying - why have you chosen to lie to me?" but you don't ask that because you don't want them to lose so much face they can claim not to be responding because they find your tone uncivil, so instead you send them a perfectly civil question asking them the question you know they won't (or shouldn't) be able to answer.

 

[pfcboy]

I can say that transport companies in general do take this incidents as serious, as health and saftey is paramount, if a member of the public is hurt or injured it has to be reported to a governing body (RIDDOR).

 

[Nortones2]

They sometimes suffer from amnesia. Worth asking HSE if an incident has been reported under Riddor. Cured, for one, at the time, when a relative of a man nearly blinded in a transport operators workshop phoned - he wondered if it had been investigated. It hadn't, because it was unreported. Saw them in court for more than failing to report - thanks to BiB relative who knew the ropes.

 

[col]

Just for reference,when cctv are on buses,they also show outside the vehicle to counter bad claims ,ie,"he drove into me"when in fact they didnt,and all complaints are dealt with in a vigarous and serious way.it is possible that they viewed the cctv hard drive on those buses in the rush hour period to see what happened,which is surprisingly clear and easy to do too.to have some cams pointing outside is normal when cctv is installed as its part of the overall package to make the bus a more (hopefully)secure place with this sort of deterent

 

[col]

Its some of those inside cams that actually point outside too

 

[mark i]

I had cause to complain about a bin wagon driver, aborted 2 overtake attempts, before forcing me off the road. I wrote to the local council, they said they have checked various things that had nothing to do with the incident, speed etc. I replied explaining that my complaint was nothing to do with speed of the wagon, but do do with the fact that had I not taken to the narrow grass verge, I would have been under the wheels of their wagon and they would be dealing with more than a letter, I also explained that this was not the only incident.
I got a new letter back specifically dealing with my complaints. The best bit, the next time I saw the bin wagon, it stayed well back as there was not a safe overtake and then gave me a wide berth. I can only assume that the training and interview really did happen.