Editor:
I visited Commuter Services recently and the visit was not pleasant. After I said I was seeking information regarding a ticket, the cashier referred me to the appeals officer and pointed to a desk with a sign reading “APPEALS” hung above it.
I asked the young man at the desk if he was the appeals officer. He said “no” and went on working at his computer. Well, he was, in fact, sitting at the desk marked “appeals.”
He refused to further acknowledge my existence, apparently waiting for me to verbalize a specific request to speak with the appeals officer, a request that by now needed no further expression.
There is an understanding that if I go to a store and appear at desk marked “cashier” and I have a piece of merchandise, I want the cashier to transact my purchase. Nowhere, except within the university bureaucracy, does anyone have the time or inclination to play these types of games.
An engraved stone at the entryway to Parking Services professes “Service, Excellence, Integrity.”
Parking Services is devoid of the first two by example and then of the third by the mere display of the engraving, pretending that it possesses traits that it does not.
Until Parking Services learns to provide service, it cannot hope for excellence. Parking Services has the entire university population as captive customers in the most literal sense with no incentive to offer any service at all.
Richard L. Dixon
Class of 2002