Services or Swervices?

Over the past few weeks, I’ve become increasingly concerned about the struggles that some disabled people seem to have when using or accessing the most basic customer service.

Let me explain; the Guardian recently published a story about Anne Wafula Strike, a Paralympian wheelchair user who was forced to wet herself on a train because the accessible toilet was out of order. (http://bit.ly/2jw0Xzz) A few days later I came across the story that Frank Gardner, a wheelchair user and BBC journalist, had been left on a plane because the equipment needed to help him disembark was delayed. (http://bit.ly/2jvKYkV) Then Socitm which represents IT and digital professionals in the public sector, published research which revealed that one-third of website home pages used by local authorities are not accessible to many disabled people. (http://bit.ly/2jvY41G).

I guess these stories are just the tip of the iceberg and that many of you have personal horror stories about the lack of accessible services you’ve encountered.

What troubles me is that legislation was passed back in 1995 that was supposed prevent these difficulties from arising. So what is going on?

Clearly, financial stringencies have a part to play, but I’m not convinced that this is the main reason. I sense that for some service providers disabled consumers are just a nuisance. They think it is less expensive or less complicated to ignore us and hope that by placing more barriers in our way or by making life harder for us, we will go away. Hence the term “swervices not services.”

Am I being harsh or exaggerating the situation? I don’t think so! We have been complaining about the lack of appropriate customer service and access for years; we have eschewed the benefits of inclusive design for decades; we’ve protested, sued and lobbied and despite all this, our concerns continue to be disregarded.

Perhaps there is some light at the end of the tunnel. Doug Paulley’s recent victory in the Supreme Court concerning wheelchair spaces on buses is a pointer to customer service providers that they will have to do more or face serious consequences. (http://bbc.in/2jGj3Bx)

Comments

Post a Comment

We welcome debate, feedback and comments so please feel free contribute or contact us.

Popular posts from this blog

Disability at Work - A Different Approach

For nearly thirty years I, and many others have provided disability equality training designed for, and targeted at line managers, HR professionals and other interested individuals. Given that most people acquire their impairments during their adult lives an important emphasis has been placed on helping employers and managers become more confident when managing disability in the workplace. Looking back I can see that this approach has provided some positive benefits and the workplace is no longer quite so problematic for disabled employees. Sadly I also think that this strategy has failed to deliver on two really important levels. Firstly, the disabled employee has to rely on being part of an organisation that places real importance on equality policies and practices. Even when this is the case the disabled employee is often separated from the equality process and has to sit and wait while their manager gets trained or the organisation decides to treat disability as a higher priority.
Read more

London Councils pose questions on welfare reform, Failure to treat Eddie Kidd attack as a hate crime, NHS backs GP comments on fitness to work, BBC failure on Humphrys documentary

Image
I’ve just spent a very pleasant afternoon sitting out in the garden. My next door neighbour, who is a very keen gardener, recently “qualified” as a bee keeper and has a new bee hive. Since he acquired it and populated it with bees I’ve noticed that we seem to have a lot more of the little creatures flying around in our garden. A very welcome sight given the concerns about falling numbers of bees. Of course it might just be a coincidence or we simply acquired a lot of new neighbours. As I watched the bees working on our lavender plants I singled out one for closer scrutiny. He/she worked away on a number of flowers but never revisited one that had already been visited. How on earth does a bee work that out? The bee didn’t appear to think “did I do that flower properly? Perhaps I ‘d better just check”. He/she did it right first time and moved on! I think my brain is bigger than a bees but I find myself revisiting stuff all the time. If the computer starts misbehaving I keep trying t
Read more

Another Year Another Lock down.

Image
To begin at the beginning, Happy New Year. How are you doing? Perhaps you're reading this standing in a long queue shopping for the last wet wipes, or maybe you've decided that everything's gone to pot and you're staying under your duvet with your smartphone. So Lockdown 3 is upon us but at least this time we are better prepared aren't we? We have plenty of toilet paper, PPE is everywhere, we are awash with hand sanitiser, and we can now personalise the logos on our face masks. Oh and galloping over the hill to rescue us comes the coronavirus vaccine. All great news, so why do you and I still feel dejected, hacked off and furious? Clearly, this pandemic was unexpected, and any government would have struggled to develop a coherent strategy for managing it. However, almost a year on, we still don't seem to have a plan other than relying on a vaccine with so many questions surrounding it: how long will it be effective, what happens if the virus mutates?   What we
Read more