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rfmcdonaldIf Livejournal can be used to gauge popular opinion in any kind of community, the rather hostile reaction to this post to the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
toronto community linking to this article on TTC workers' reactions to their recording by angry customers suggests that employee/customer relations at the TTC are going to remain tense.
Bob Kinnear, head of the TTC workers' union, strongly opposes the recording of his employees, although given how he's generally held in contempt by TTC users he's listened to only by his constituents.
The ultimate outcome of any employee/customer conflict is expressed succinctly by the title of Mary Vallis' blog post at the National Post, "In the war between passengers and TTC drivers, the masses will win". That said, there's certainly going to be casualties, even without a work-to-rule campaign that would really make a lot of people think fondly of Reagan's gutting of the air traffic controllers; as one author notes, a bus driver on the Dufferin route shut down his bus on Saturday in response to a rider's recording.
This controversy over the misbehavour of some TTC employees--something that should be recorded, I think, given my own personal fecklessness of what's jokingly called the TTC's complaints system, and you all know that I've my own camera and little compunction against using it--is just part of a wider problem with a strained TTC system that's starting to slip behind the times.
The rude and ill-considered actions of a minority of TTC users don't help things. Equally, the rude and ill-considered actions of a minority of TTC employees don't help, and since these are the people who are getting paid by the city of Toronto to provide customer service to the users of a public utility, I'm inclined to think that a bit more respect for customers is a very good idea. Don't like getting shown up as underperforming? Don't underperform.
toronto community linking to this article on TTC workers' reactions to their recording by angry customers suggests that employee/customer relations at the TTC are going to remain tense.That much is clear from a Facebook group TTC workers set up, called “Toronto Transit Operators against public harassment,” after TTC chief manager Gary Webster publicly issued a stern memo to all staff on Saturday. The note was in response to a recent series of gaffes, caught on camera and posted online, showing transit workers sleeping or stopping for coffee while on the job.
By Sunday night, a few dozen workers were pushing back at the customer complaints through a Facebook group, where they posted their own pictures of inconsiderate passengers and discussed a possible work-to-rule campaign. By midday yesterday, the group had swelled to 500, but had been infiltrated by transit riders irate over the threatened job action, who piled on with more complaints until the group's creator, Jack Gazic, had to close the site to new members.
Yesterday, Mr. Webster defended the memo, which he sent after consulting with Adam Giambrone, who remains TTC chairman as he campaigns for mayor.
Mr. Webster said he issued the memo through the media not to turn up the heat on his 12,000 employees, but merely to ensure it reached them all, unlike a similar note issued internally last month that somehow went unread by many.
“No one's told me the memo has inflamed the situation,” Mr. Webster said in an interview, adding that he met with several front-line workers yesterday. They told him they accepted his message, but wanted more support from management in dealing with problem customers.
[. . .]
Alan Levy, a labour relations expert and former University of Toronto academic, was dubious about the TTC's public tactics.
“The notion of making it public is a PR exercise; it isn't something that's designed to alter the behaviour of people who already feel victimized,” said Mr. Levy, who teaches at Manitoba's Brandon University and works as a labour arbitrator and mediator. “It's only going to alienate the employees that much more.”
The job action never materialized yesterday, perhaps due to morning comments on a TV program by union leader Bob Kinnear, who said he didn't sanction it. Still, the fact there was a threat at all, followed by an up-tick in public anger on the Facebook site, showed Mr. Webster's attempt to bring TTC workers into line had done anything but.
Bob Kinnear, head of the TTC workers' union, strongly opposes the recording of his employees, although given how he's generally held in contempt by TTC users he's listened to only by his constituents.
Bob Kinnear, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113, recently said it’s not OK for teenagers to film TTC operators in their duties:
“We’ve got 13 and 14-year-olds that feel that they have an entitlement to film our operators in the performance of their duties, and that’s not acceptable."
With some members of the transit union calling for a work to rule, what exactly does "not acceptable" mean? In the latest incident of TTC operators vs. riders, a Dufferin bus driver told his annoyed passenger to stop filming him and get off the bus. Another driver fought back at a commuter with a camera by taking his own pictures of the man.
Typically, citizen journalists and 14-year-olds with an iPhone and a sense of entitlement don’t film public employers doing exactly what they are supposed to.
The bylaw on film and photography on TTC property for business purposes says that no one is allowed to film for any commercial purposes without permission. But Brad Ross, a spokesperson for the TTC said that tourists or groups of friends wanting to take a photo on the subway is okay. As far as that other kind of TTC photography that has been so popular lately, Brad Ross, head of corporate communications for the TTC, says: “It's not helpful. We don't encourage our customers to take pictures of our operators and our employees working.”
The ultimate outcome of any employee/customer conflict is expressed succinctly by the title of Mary Vallis' blog post at the National Post, "In the war between passengers and TTC drivers, the masses will win". That said, there's certainly going to be casualties, even without a work-to-rule campaign that would really make a lot of people think fondly of Reagan's gutting of the air traffic controllers; as one author notes, a bus driver on the Dufferin route shut down his bus on Saturday in response to a rider's recording.
This controversy over the misbehavour of some TTC employees--something that should be recorded, I think, given my own personal fecklessness of what's jokingly called the TTC's complaints system, and you all know that I've my own camera and little compunction against using it--is just part of a wider problem with a strained TTC system that's starting to slip behind the times.
As she makes her way through St. George subway station, Heather Fraser can't help but feel something is missing – something other than the ceiling tiles, that is.
Or a Smart Card to let her bypass the surly fare collector.
Or a collector, period. This one has vanished, leaving a hand-scrawled sign asking customers to “Please pay your fare and go in.”
No, it's more than these things. What's missing to Ms. Fraser, a business-design guru at the Rotman School of Management, is the simple satisfaction of a basic public service, pleasantly rendered.
“It works, but something's not right,” Ms. Fraser says, unwittingly coining an apt slogan for the Toronto Transit Commission, once known as The Better Way.
TTC users have had much to complain about lately. Sleeping collectors, primordial systems, gruff service, congestion, dirty stations and delays are among the shame-badges pinned to the TTC's grey-and-maroon uniform. Another was added this week when a fed-up rider posted YouTube videos of a bus driver taking languorous coffee breaks mid-route while his passengers sat idling.
Bad as its been for customers, the stakes are far higher for Toronto's image as a progressive international city.
“It's quite stark and it's quite simple,” says Eric Miller, a civil engineering professor and transportation expert at the University of Toronto. “It's impossible to build a dense urban city with high quality of life without proper transit, full stop. It is not an option, it is not a frill; it is essential, and part of our problem is we don't appreciate that.”
The rude and ill-considered actions of a minority of TTC users don't help things. Equally, the rude and ill-considered actions of a minority of TTC employees don't help, and since these are the people who are getting paid by the city of Toronto to provide customer service to the users of a public utility, I'm inclined to think that a bit more respect for customers is a very good idea. Don't like getting shown up as underperforming? Don't underperform.
