Monday, 17th October 2005.

Fantastic starts to the week, vol. IV

I love my job.

Dr Stevenson has been harping on for months now about a number of problems he's had with us. Initially we sent him a PDF of his published paper, and he complained that he'd ordered printed reprints - not in a pleasant, have-you-made-a-mistake kind of manner, but rather an extremely disgruntled tone. In his email, Dr Stevenson likened our shoddy customer service to the building of Hadrian's Wall, "to keep the civilised people from the barbarians".

We'd received and subsequently misplaced his fax requesting reprints, so the sending of the PDF was a simple clerical error for which I took full responsibility and immediately corrected. However, this was not enough for Dr Stevenson, who insisted on using LOTS OF CAPITALS in his emails to emphasise points like how USELESS and STUPID we were. He also complained that he had not yet received a copy of the journal, which was in the post. Furthermore, he was furious that we had taken months to publish his article (when it was printed in the first available issue), and also at the AUDACITY of our asking for corrections to be sent quickly when we quite clearly had NO INTENTION of publishing his article in the foreseeable future. Apparently, our "egregious incompetent office practices would be evident to any sensible person or court of law".

Dr Stevenson also complained that he had no way of telling what journal the PDF was for - information that was, by the way, provided in the top left corner of the first page of the article. I wrote a very polite response offering enormous apologies for the microscopic font that we used, and reassuring him that as far as the printed copy was concerned, he would be hearing from us soon.

A few weeks after this little incident, Dr Stevenson wrote again, furious that while he'd received his bound copy, no one had contacted him personally. "It is quite clear that your apologies are meaningless. Why not try 'waxing rhetoric' on some of your future failures?". I wrote back and said that when I said he'd be hearing from us, I'd meant the bound copy and the offprints - and apologised once again for any problems that had been caused by his apparent failure to understand simple English (only phrased with considerable more tact). In the same email, I'd responded to another request - he'd wanted to use his article in a book and needed to speak to someone in the permissions department. I responded to him straight away, giving him the name and address of the person concerned.

Unfortunately, there's a six-week turnaround in the permissions department, largely because the person doing the job is also trying to be a full-time PA as well. Six weeks for processing of a permissions request is company policy, and the vast majority of authors are happy with this - particularly as they generally have a long time to wait for publication of books in any case. Actually, email exchanges like the one I've had with our little Australian puppy are comparatively rare. When he gets in touch, or when emails fly in from others like him, we generally have a laugh, help out the disgruntled academic as best we can, and then put it down to experience.

This morning, however, I think he finally crossed the line.

From: Michael Stevenson
Sent: 16 October 2005 13:13
To: Baldock, James
Subject: Re: Taylor & Francis Eprints

Dear Mr Baldock

From your email I sent the email below to your ---- ----- on 22 September 2005.

It is now over 3 weeks since then and I have had no response whatever, not even
an acknowledgment. Although book publication may be a way off, yet I could be
informed of any procedures.

I even waited long enough for any letter to arrive but none has.

Of course one can give many 'reasons' (1) having a baby (2) gravely ill (3)
gravely ill relative (4) in prison (5) car/other accident (6) never received
the email (although there was no bounceback) (7) very stressed out over a
divorce (8) financial problems, (9) having trouble with your email server
(again) (10) wanted by the CIA/FBI/MI5/MI6 ... .

What about incompetence?

From the shortest dealings I've had with your organization there seems to be
endemic and systemic dysfunction and incompetence in just the little I've met.

Is it possible for you to get any more hopeless?

I hope you can realize that the tone of my correspondence is proportionate to
the increase in failures in your organization.

MK Stevenson

He's probably still upset about losing the Ashes.