Automated Queue Ticket Machines

[Big Boy]

I went to a business that prides itself on the fact it's staff speak English today. I encountered 2 things that really niggle me in Thailand.

• I had to queue at the ticket machine that automatically gives you a queue number. The company has gone to the expense of installing an automatic ticket machine. Why do they then feel they have to employ a human to press the buttons for you? It isn't rocket science.

• The European couple in front of us conveyed their requirements quite adequately in broken English to the button pusher. He had absolutely no problem whatsoever understanding their English. Knowing what would happen next, I asked Mrs BB to convey my requirement (OK, it was a bit technical), she refused. I step forward and tell the guy what I want. He looks straight through me, and starts talking in Thai to Mrs BB. Of course, she couldn't tell him. Impasse prevails. Eventually, he turns to me to ask what I want. I tell him I want the same as I asked for initially. Of course, he hadn't been listening because I was stood with a Thai. I then moved him to one side, and obtained the ticket myself.

• Niggle 1 - why install these machines if they don't trust the public to use them? Just buy a desk, and teach the button pusher to use a pen to write tickets.

• Niggle 2 - why, when there is a Thai and a Farang do Thais forget how to use English?

[caller]

I think because so often, the automated options are useless. They need one that say's 'the awkward stuff we don't want to deal with'. Certainly, I find that often the case in Kbank, when there often isn't an option for what I am there for. The humans usually give me a ticket and offer an explanation to whoever has the misfortune of having to deal with me.

[Scout]

• Niggle 1 - why install these machines if they don't trust the public to use them? Just buy a desk, and teach the button pusher to use a pen to write tickets.

I have limited experience with businesses that offer this type of service, mainly with immigration, banks and the phone companies at Market Village. In all three cases, the button pusher has other customer service duties besides just pushing the button for you. At Immigration the button pusher actually processes some of the simpler customer requests and reviews your application packages for completeness, possibly saving customers from waiting in a long queue only to be told later that they need to go get additional copies or other documents before returning to enter the back of the queue a 2nd time. At least that’s the theory. At the phone companies, the button pusher sometimes processes some of the simpler requests, such as routine phone configuration settings. At the banks, the button pusher also serves as a security guard and assists disabled customers enter the bank. I think in some cases, pushing the button, is only a secondary customer service duty, and may not even be in the official job description, but possibly just something the bored security guard decided to start doing on their own to be helpful.

[Big Boy]

This is possible, but don't you find it annoying having to queue, waiting to get a queue ticket whilst the button pusher is engaged on other menial duties.

I don't know if its still the same at the cinemas in town, but I will not go to the cinema if I have to use the machine myself. Back in the good old days you used to go to box office and buy a ticket to watch the movie of your choice. They then automated it

The automated process was:

• Buy a card to gain access to the ticket machines. Forget the card and you either had to return home or buy another. The objective of the card was that you keep it loaded with cash to spend at the cinema. Personally, I keep my cash in a bank.

• Go to the automated monster (the machines were huge), make your selection, and learn how much that showing would cost (cinema prices seem to vary hour to hour, so impossible to work it out before).

• Leave somebody standing guard over your machine while you go to the box office to put the relevant cash on the card.

• Return to the machine to complete your transaction.

It was totally bonkers, and took about 5 times longer. I do not see any advantage in the system whatsoever. Of course, the system designer would blame it on the user for not maintaining a healthy balance on the card - yeah, right.

Maybe it's just me, but I spent a lot of years in the MOD designing systems. If I'd even contemplated any of this BS, I'd have gone straight into another queue - at the dole office. Thai technology is so 'tail wagging the dog'. We used to vigorously go through each design, looking to remove unnecessary key depressions. Peripherals would only be introduced if they were cost effective, easy to use and saved time. In Thailand it seems to be how many whistles and bells can we add, and a shiny machine with people queueing to use it will enhance our corporate image. If we can't afford whistles and bells, lets just throw in a few hundred extra lines of unnecessary validation code to put the user into an eternal loop/lock the system up.

[handdrummer]

I think that part of the answer to the button pusher dilemma is that it provides cheap employment to otherwise out of work relatives. Homeless Pro being a prime example.

The water dept. lets you do it yourself. The other day a young woman, with an out-of-control child, came in and he kept his finger on the screen while a dozen tickets fell on the floor. Sometimes you can't win for losing.