The wrong snow and nowhere to go!

Bet you don't know what this is!

source: http://www.seikatubunka.metro.tokyo.jp/window/index.html

The news from the UK is grim at the moment, apparently there has been a nasty case of the wrong sort of snow and inclement weather. Obviously no-one expected bad weather in December and absolutely no manager can be expected to take responsibility for what looks like a complete freak of nature.

Complete surprise as snow falls in December.

In addition it is going to be truly difficult to get away this year. Even more so if you need to organise a passport. The single passport office in Petty France, London, has announced on its web site that there will be delays in just trying to get through to make an appointment to get into the queue at the passport office.

Clearly no manager can be held responsible for the unexpected desire of people to want passports. There never was this problem in the 1880's and the single office coped really well between 1939 and 1945 when a lot of people traveled abroad. So everyone in management and politics is at a complete loss as to why the wrong sort of queue has now unexpectedly appeared in Petty France.

Passport interviews in the South East

Due to increased work volumes, we currently do not have enough appointments available in London and the South East to meet current demand. Consequently our appointment booking line is very busy, especially early in the morning. If you wish to make an appointment for other areas we suggest you call after 10 am, if possible. We are monitoring the situation and will endeavour to fulfil our service to you. We will continue to provide regular updates on the website.

source: http://www.ips.gov.uk/cps/rde/xchg/ips_live/hs.xsl/index.htm

So there you have it, its official, no-one is to blame and the management systems work perfectly. No reason to complain as nobody will take any notice anyway. Oh yes, and the graphic at the top of the page! Well that is from the Japanese passport issuing authority in Tokyo. What it represents is the FOUR passport issuing offices in Tokyo and is colour coded to show when they are busy and when they are not so busy.

If you go when it shows red then you will have to queue and have a bit of a wait. Yellow shows when it is reasonably busy but not packed. Blue shows you when it is relatively empty and you can get your passport quickly. This system works, we know because HMiL went to get a passport yesterday, NO APPOINTMENT NECESSARY, and was in and out within 10 minutes.

As you can see from the image the Japanese management have also come up with an amazing and revolutionary idea; opening until 19.00hrs on some days. How is this all done, is it magic? No, they just have enough offices to serve the customer need and then publish the data from the previous year regarding how many people visit the relevant office each hour, each day of the week. I bet the bloke who worked that out is an absolute genius.

Oh yeah, and did I tell you, the trains run on time, company directors don't get massive salaries and bonus payments with many of them eating in the same canteen as any other worker. Of course this wouldn't work in the UK because you simply can't attract the right calibre of people unless they are paid like Emperors and have an expense account the size of the Romanian Gross National Product. No to get the sort of people who run Eurostar for example you have to reward them appropriately.

"Already, anyone holding a Eurostar ticket to travel to France today will not be able to go before Christmas Eve, as the company struggles to process the backlog of passengers after the three-day suspension of service caused by the wrong sort of snow in northern France."

source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/dec/22/christmas-travel-eurostar-air-flights-transport

One Passport Office

The population measure given for the Larger Urban Zone
centred around London is 11,917,000 million.

Four Passport Offices

As on October 1st, 2003 the population of the
city of Tokyo stood at 12.369 million.