Putting VINLEC on Blast!
This unfair world always tramples on the weak. Sadly, many ordinary Vincentians are trying daily to get fair treatment from large institutions whose service they cannot choose to take elsewhere. For months now, I have been having that experience with VINLEC.
What should have been a straightforward matter of reporting equipment damaged by power surges and having the claim investigated has become an exhausting exercise in chasing people, repeating myself and waiting for action. I followed the established process because I believed the company should first be given a fair opportunity to address the matter.
When I reported the damage, I was advised that VINLEC’s inspection, the first stage of the process, would be completed within seven working days. More than two months passed before that inspection took place, and it happened only after I raised the continued delay with the Customer Service Manager.
Seven working days became more than two months, yet I received no proper explanation for the delay and saw no evidence that anyone considered it unacceptable.
Even after the inspection was finally conducted, nearly another month passed without any meaningful update. I made telephone calls and eventually visited VINLEC’s office, where the Customer Service Manager indicated that she would follow up on the matter and get back to me.
She did not. I was again forced to make contact, only to be told then by the Customer Service Manager that the staff member responsible for the matter was on leave.
That response was as revealing as it was frustrating. Does VINLEC’s claims process stop whenever a particular employee goes on vacation, and must a customer who has already waited months simply continue waiting until that employee returns?
An organisation providing an essential public service should have systems that ensure continuity when a staff member is unavailable. Leave is normal and necessary, but an institution’s work cannot be organised in such a way that one person’s absence brings a customer’s matter to a standstill.
By then, the problem was no longer simply the original delay. It had become a question of whether anyone within VINLEC felt responsible for moving the matter forward, particularly after the company had already failed to meet its own stated timeline.
When the ordinary process failed, I sought to escalate the matter to the Chief Executive Officer. Through both his Executive Assistant and the Customer Service Manager, I made it clear that I wished to meet with him about the company’s handling of my complaint.
The response conveyed to me was that the CEO “cannot see me.” No alternative meeting was proposed, no suggestion that they can take my number for him to give me a call at his convenience and there was no indication that the complaint would receive urgent attention in his absence.
A CEO cannot personally meet with every customer, and I do not suggest that he must. But when a matter has remained unresolved for months, after repeated follow-ups and an unsuccessful intervention by the Customer Service Manager, it is reasonable to expect more than a message that the CEO cannot see the customer.
Someone at the executive level must ultimately be accountable when the system beneath that level fails. If the Customer Service Manager cannot secure action and the CEO will neither meet nor offer another avenue of engagement, where exactly is the customer expected to go?
The matter becomes even more troubling when one considers cases of which I am aware where larger entities received considerably quicker attention, including instances in which compensation was provided before investigations were completed. If that can be done for some customers, VINLEC must explain why others are left waiting for months merely to have the process move from one stage to another.
This inevitably raises questions about consistency and fairness. Are small customers required to endure delays that would not be imposed on larger or more influential customers, and does the urgency with which VINLEC responds depend on who is making the complaint?
Unfortunately, a monopoly does not face the discipline that comes from customers being able to take their business elsewhere, so dissatisfied customers have no practical alternative but to continue dealing with the same company.
We cannot change electricity providers when the service is poor or when a complaint is mishandled. That makes VINLEC’s obligation to treat every customer fairly even greater, not less.
The wider issue is not simply how long my claim has taken. It is the absence of dependable timelines, the lack of continuity when employees are unavailable, the failure to communicate without being chased, and the apparent difficulty of obtaining accountability when the established process breaks down.
I have heard from people whose similar matters have remained unresolved for a year or longer. If those accounts are accurate, then my experience is part of a deeper problem in how customer complaints are handled at VINLEC. I think about families who fridges were damage and have to wait months for some kind of resolve.
Waiting months for an inspection promised within seven working days should not be normal. Having to pursue a manager for an update she promised is unacceptable, and being told that a matter cannot proceed because an employee is on leave is simply wrong.
VINLEC is the country’s sole electricity provider, and with that position comes a responsibility to operate transparently, respond within reasonable periods and provide a credible route of escalation when its own procedures fail.
My claim will eventually be determined one way or another, but the outcome of my individual case is no longer the only issue. VINLEC must explain what standards govern these claims, how long each stage is supposed to take, what happens when those timelines are missed and who becomes accountable when customers are repeatedly denied answers.
My experience is not unique, and that is precisely why I have chosen to make it public. Somebody has to speak up for the vulnerable among us. Otherwise these unreasonable delays will become accepted practice, poor treatment will be routine, and institutions like VINLEC will begin to believe that people without influence can simply be made to wait.
