Government Agencies Vs. Fast Food

January 4, 2010 Mamdooh Business, Cultures, Food, Innovation, Living, People watching, Personal development, Personal Views, Services, Time management, 4

ALBAIK is a fast food company that sells fried broasted chicken meals, it is the pinnacle of success in its industry and has given kentucky fried chicken or KFC a run for its money in Saudi Arabia.

The Ministerial Agency of civil affairs is a government entity that handles the births, deaths and issuance of ID’s & Family ID’s but not the passports. It is the pinnacle of bad experiences.

ALBAIK manages to sell thousands of meals daily across the western region daily in a very affordable, pleasant, value for money fashion. They sell SAR11 meals with their famous unique garlic sauce in record time, every time. They also smile while they work and deliver, sometimes fake, but they smile.

The civil thing place, makes you sweat, literarily, you sweat to deliver your papers, you wait 2 weeks for your ID to arrive from the capital, let me try and contain the issue and show you how they function.

You come in, you take a number to be seen and the requests are written in some kind of maze around the walls, they have 2 information and ticket dispenser workers( who think they own the place)after you have your photos, your file, your copies of old or family ID’s, you are seen by a ministry official, if you are lucky… it takes more than 6 hours of waiting, ok maybe 4 until prayer time, then move on and come back in the morning with a new set of numbers.

ALBAIK: you step up tp the counter, place your order, pay, get your change, look at yor number, notice its far out, have no fear! these are masters of fast delivery and experts of process management, and they fight to get better.

Today:

Civil affairs agency: I arrive at 8:15 am I am already late. The crowds are growing, the noise is growing and the people are wasted. The staff are dead, some still in the process, or pretending to be dead, the numbers front line offices are wearing swine flu masks, very angry faces, extremely angry service people, did I say service( SORRY!).  I am treated badly when I asked a question slightly away from the line( only one guy ahead of me and he was done), I was ordered to get in line if I was to be served.

I asked for delivery area of new ID’s, I get a number 280, I run happily jumping up and down like a 5 year old high on 2 bars of chocolate, really jumping, as high as I could in my saudi gear and head thing, yeeeeha! I’m getting my ID today. Then the shock, the number was 163, that’s ok I thought ALBAIK finishes that number in less than half an hour.

I quickly scan the wide waiting room which can only handle 50 people or so, three windows for delivery, one man standing only. He barely is breathing, let alone moving, he is young, not energetic and extremely slow, just like grandma!

I calculate his handling of one transaction, 10 minutes at least, to deliver a card. I take 280 and minus it from 163 it equals 117 people, only. I multiply that number by 5 minutes, not 10 and the total time I would have to wait on average is almost 10 hours. Not bad for a guy who has only one refined, focused goal in life to get a citizen ID, he would actually be a lucky person. He would only have to wait 10 hours in his whole lifetime, imagine?

Now since we normal people, do have more goals than one, I figured they would shut down for the night, open again in the morning, and still it would not be my turn. And the funny part would be a twist in their ticketing system, valid for one day only!

So if ALBAIK fast food would handle his delivery in 10 minutes per customer, I assure you he would be studied in history books.the actual average time to pas 78 orders today was in less than 25 minutes, you do the math. If a company can do it, I guess a government entity serving people should learn a few tricks, and I bet the staff in that civil place all buy ALBAIK for dinner or lunch.

It only took some old fashioned process engineering and planning, a little bit of this and a little bit of that. If there is heavy traffic, increase manpower! cut the unnecessary work, make it faster from point A to point B…duh!

The irony of the matter is all the people that come into this area of work are doing it for the sake of work, the end user, he is just another number. I accept to become another number, but please do something with the time, I am willing to even pay…. THINK!

Now if you excuse me, its 1.30 in the AM over here, and I have to be at that dreadful place at 6 in the morning, and try to get what’s mine, if I am lucky, good thing I got my sons too so he wont go through the amazing experience I had.

Why don’t they let ALBAIK chicken handle the process for the issuance and delivery of ID cards, just take a visit to one of their offices.

1- Bad location, Bad locations, Bad location

2- Dumb people working like zombies.

3- Not one smile to be seen in a million miles.

4- Extremely bad, extinct dinosaurs working the front desks.

5- Excellent ticketing system that is put there to tell you how slow they are, so they can serve the idiot after you for actually staying the full 6 hours!

Let’s just hope no one from the civil affairs is awake reading my blog, I need to first get my card, then run, and jump in the air like I just don’t care…is this an ID card I’m talking about or the winning 100 million dollar lottery ticket?

And so many more areas that could learn a lesson or two from other areas in life, sometimes even from ants. I know ALBAIK was good tonight, I hope I get in and out in at least 2 hours, imagine someone being happy for being served in just 2 hours.

People; they come in good, bad and disgusting.

mamdooh.alradadi

me@mamdoohalradadi.com

X-Lines He only did 1 thing, very well .