We mystery-shopped SEPTA and City Council. Here's how they did.

Citizen Mystery Shopper (Office 15)

Nosotros sent out mystery shoppers to test Philadelphia City Council and SEPTA. Hither, the results.

Mar. 03, 2020

When's the last fourth dimension you lot got really good customer service from the urban center? Or, for that matter, really bad customer service?

We've taken a page from individual industry and unleashed a squad of mystery shoppers to interact with city service providers and report back on their experiences—the practiced, the bad, and the disfiguring.

In this installment, two Philadelphians—i brand new to the city and one longtime resident—navigate SEPTA, and test City Councilmembers to see how well and quickly they react (or not) to the asbestos crunch. Check out our reports below.

You can find all our previous Mystery Shoppers here. And while you're at it, take function in our Integrity Icon search to detect Philadelphia's best non-elected city workers by nominating someone who's provided you good client service via the push button beneath.

Mystery Shopper Exam #35: Communicating with City Councilmembers

The Situation: We wondered how chop-chop and completely our newly-installed City Council would respond to elective questions, so we emailed each to weigh in on school asbestos.

Steps Taken

1. I look up City Councilmembers' contact info on their webpages, and click on each members' name.
2. It's a month after inauguration day, and the four new Councilpeople—Kendra Brooks, Jamie Gauthier, Katherine Gilmore Richardson and Isaiah Thomas— withal do not take their emails listed, or a contact grade on their webpages. One, Brooks, doesn't even have a completed Metropolis Council website nonetheless, just "Coming Soon."
3. For the others, I fill out the private "Contact Urban center Councilmember" boxes with the question, "Every week, it seems like another public school building is closed because of asbestos. What are you, equally my Metropolis Councilperson, planning to practise virtually this state of affairs?"
4. I receive an automated electronic mail that my message has been received past my City Councilperson.
5. Using the phone numbers listed for Gauthier, I call twice simply no one answers. Then I call Richardson, and Thomas; this time I get out a message with the same question on their function voicemails.
6.  I wait.
7. Inside 24 hours, two Councilperson chiefs of staff respond: Mark Squilla'due south and Curtis Jones Jr.'s. Squilla's chief of staff, in item, laid out a adequately detailed account of what he is doing so far to address the issue of asbestos in the schools.
8. Iii weeks later, withal no response from other Councilmembers.

Time Spent: x minutes emailing members of City Council, 10 minutes calling, and three weeks of waiting for a response.

Result: Kudos to Squilla and Jones for having staff who reply to questions from Philadelphians in a timely fashion. What about the residuum of Council, though?

Takeaway: Fifty-fifty at present, two full months since their inauguration, the new Metropolis Councilmembers don't take fully operating websites. That's non their fault, but certainly isn't a help If you want to become in touch. For the others: Why carp to take emails or voicemails if no one answers?

Lightning Commodities Rating: Squilla: ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️ for responding in a day, with a detailed respond. Jones: ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️ for answering rapidly.Brooks and Gauthier: N/A since they never received the request. Anybody else: 0

Update: Councilwoman Helen Gym's office responded this week, with an apology, noting that two of her staff members went to Harrisburg to speak with Gov. Wolf virtually boosted funding.

Mystery Shopper Test #36: Navigating SEPTA equally a new city resident

The State of affairs: Having simply moved to the city about a month agone, I wanted to get from my apartment near the Met on Broad Street to Uncle Bobbie'southward Coffee and Books in Germantown on SEPTA. As someone who is absolutely very bad with directions just has relied on public transportation in other cities, I was merely a piddling nervous about it.

The Trip At that place

Steps Taken:

1. An bellboy at the Fairmount Station on the Broad Street Line, the stop closest to my apartment, told me to get north to the Erie Station, then accept a bus. He did not know which bus to take.
2. The trip from Fairmount to Erie took a couple of minutes, during which I used my phone to wait up the fastest route to Uncle Bobbie's from Erie Station. My phone'south GPS, which seems to still call up I alive in the Midwest, did manage to give me directions equally if I was withal at Fairmont Station—and the suggested route was for the subway, only a charabanc.
3. When I got off at Erie Avenue, there was no SEPTA attendant present. I checked my telephone's maps once more, and saw that there was a bus called the XH steps from where I was continuing that could get me to Uncle Bobbie'southward in 20 minutes.
4. By the time I'd walked to the double-decker cease, my phone notified me that the bus had been delayed 26 minutes.
5. Later waiting vi minutes by myself, I checked for other routes and learned that the 23 omnibus leaves from Erie and Germantown avenues, going north toward Chestnut Loma. The ride was estimated to be 17 minutes.
6. I walked across the street to the bus stop at Germantown and Erie avenues.
7. I waited eleven minutes for the 23, which inexplicably has a stop in the centre of a busy intersection rather than on the side of the route. (Oh look, this was the Southbound bus … my bad)
8. I walked beyond the street to the stop for the northbound bus, and waited with i other person until its arrival.
9. The 23 was not very crowded, and I was able to get a seat nigh the dorsum.
10. After a 20-minute ride, the passenger vehicle dropped me off steps from Uncle Bobbie's Java and Books in Germantown. ☕️

The Return Trip

Steps Taken:

1. Walking steps from Uncle Bobbie's and crossing the street at the crosswalk, I waited three minutes for the 23 autobus south towards 11th and Market. The omnibus was packed; at that place was just continuing room.
2. I took the motorcoach to my stop at Germantown and Erie avenues without any issues or delays.
3. At Wide and Erie, I entered the Broad Street Station, merely to observe out (along with several other disgruntled passengers) that our Key cards would not swipe us into the station, and the ticket booths were locked.
4. The station was evidently airtight, despite not having a sign to point this out, and in that location was no attendant offering directions.
5. A young man citizen pointed out that the station across the street (meant solely for riders going northward) was open up and could yet get us on the correct subway.
6. Walking dorsum across the street I had just crossed, I entered the northbound Erie Station, and was able to follow signs to a southbound subway and swipe my Primal menu. I was lucky: Someone who had tried to swipe their card at the other archway was unable to swipe it again here.
7. I got on the southbound express subway, every bit this was the beginning one to come up, and plant that the express doesn't drop off at Fairmont, although information technology seems to driblet off at every other station on the same route as the local subway.
8. Hopping off at Spring Garden, I got on the local northbound subway back to Fairmount.

Time Spent: The trip itself, not including the wonderful hour I spent at Uncle Bobbie'south, took well-nigh ninety minutes there and dorsum.

Result: I got there, and home again. Merely no 1 mentioned to me that SEPTA has an app! So I had to rely on Google and asking questions to strangers to complete my trip. Even with assistance from a SEPTA worker, though, it was way more complicated than information technology needed to exist.

Takeaway: Next time, I'll use the SEPTA app to map out the route before I go and maybe fifty-fifty write downwards the directions. Clearly, riders tin can't rely on attendants or info in the station to direct united states of america.

Lightning Bolt Rating: ⚡️⚡️

Mystery Shopper Test #37: Navigating SEPTA equally a seasoned city resident

The State of affairs: I needed to get on a trolley from 13th Street to 30th Street. Easy-peasy, right?

Steps Taken:

1. On the northwest corner of 13th and Market place streets, I have the steps downward cloak-and-dagger.
2. At the bottom, in that location are two signs: Suburban Station one way; Market-Frankford line the other mode.
3. Hmmm. I'm taking a subway, and so, follow the signs to the El. That takes me by a couple sleeping homeless people, and downwards a brightly lit 100-foot hallway towards a green-tiled wall I spot in the distance. (Green, as in green line!)
4. At the end of the hall, I see more signs: This fourth dimension, one does show me the way to the trolley—in exactly the contrary management from where I came.
5. I turn around, stroll past my sleeping friends, past the stairway to the street, to the platform, just equally a trolley pulls up.
6. The commuter opens the door, and several people become out. He opens the door for me so I step in. I'grand the only one getting on at the station.
7. "Pick-up is over in that location," he says, pointing near ten feet away. "Excuse me?" I ask.
8. "Selection-up is over at that place," he says again. And then he waits for me…to leave the trolley. Which I practice.
9. He pulls upward another 10 feet, and opens the door.
10. I follow him, get on and swipe my carte.

Time Spent: 10 ridiculous minutes.

Upshot: I eventually got to where I needed to be, but would a couple more signs exist out of the question? And really with the making me go off the trolley? I capeesh rules as much as the side by side guy, but that'due south simply silliness.

Takeaway: SEPTA, I love y'all. But managing the warrens of tunnels, platforms, rules and signs is way more confusing than it should be.

Lightning commodities rating: ⚡️⚡️

Correction: An earlier version of this neglected to note the City Councilpeople whose sites are non completed yet, or that two members never received the request for a response.

Photo: R. Nial Bradshaw/Flickr

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Source: https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/mystery-shopper-septa-city-council/

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