Or so the driver thought... One day about 10 years ago we had a regular guy on the route serving our area. He was a likeable guy but ignorant and hard headed. Not always a good combination.
This was back when they were just working out their cell phone policy (the company) which ended up in the total ban of all devices in the vehicle when a customer was on board. But they were still hammering it out, they had a policy of "you can use it as long as you are safe" at the time.
So Ron (who could walk) got into the vehicle with me and the driver is looking at something in one hand and veering all over the road, every time he stops he is typing on the cell phone, looking down constantly, NOT looking at the road at all. It was extremely unsafe and I even said so 'I don't feel safe, can you put that away for a minute?"
He lied and said it was his GPS and he "had to have it to find the location" I told him we had been there many times, it was a very easy drop, and he did not NEED a GPS. I then asked him why he kept typing if it was a GPS and he mumbled some nonsense and veered into another lane. It was probably one of my top 5 most unsafe rides I have ever been in, and that included the ride with my sister where she kept passing out while driving.
So we called in a complaint, that he was driving unsafely and would not put his device away. The customer service person said he was "allowed" to use the device "as long as he was safe" and I said that's just it, he wasn't safe! We went back and forth for a minute and I said this:
Send Safety out to follow him in an unmarked vehicle. Make your own conclusion. But PLEASE follow him!
From what I understand they pulled him over and fired him on the spot, he was that bad. When he asked how they knew to follow him they said someone had called in on him. I had complained enough during the ride he knew it was me, and he apparently went around blaming me for the loss of his job, for some time.
I had a fair amount of drivers asking me about that because, overall, I would like to think I am pretty sweet to them.
I would absolutely do it again, and I am glad I did it the way I did - let Safety see what I was dealing with and make their own conclusion.
As a result of this, Safety released a new policy that a driver was not allowed to use a cell phone or other device with a client in the vehicle. If you had to program your GPS, you had to do it from a parked position. Very reasonable.
But calling in on a driver can result in them losing a job and I take that pretty seriously. Don't forget ALL these people know where I live, too.
So I will call the advocate and ask him to have her retrained. If she is smart she will comply and not get an attitude, keeping her job.
2 comments:
Who cares if they know where you live? You are simply calling in a request that she be retrained. Paratransit will appreciate the call. She wasn't trained properly, or she chooses not to properly secure wheelchairs. Either way, that person and the wheelchair will go flying in an accident. People have died horrific deaths when their wheelchairs were not properly secured.
Oh, we're going to call. The advocate, I should mention, is a man in a wheelchair so he will understand.
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