How many workmen does it take to fix a leaky tap?

Thirteen, apparently, if Severn Trent Water is to believed.

By Michael Smith (Veshengro)

STW is, however, not the company and organization who can create such a waste. Councils can be that efficient as well.

Some years ago I was assisting the warden on a Gypsy Caravan Site and we saw the same kind of stupidity.

In one case there were three tiles broken in three separate shower outhouses thought eh breakage wee reported to the council over a number of days in on week.

Next Monday arrives a truck from the council and the workman was to repair put in a new tile at the first reported show. We then told him that there were two more shower units needing a tile each and did he have some on board that he could do it with.

Yes, he had spare tiles on board but he could not do the repairs on the other two units as it was not on his worksheet, only the one he did was.

The same workman came back two more times with one tile each to fix the other two shower units. The mind boggles as to the travel costs for the caravan site was miles from the depot.

It is no wonder that public utilities, even though most of them are nowadays owned by shareholders rather than the public by way of being state owned, as well as councils and government services, are always running up high costs in everything.

Any small business would ensure that no duplication would happen, and this can be seen, for instance, when BSG, the agents for Goldoni in the UK, arrange their service visits. The utilities and government agencies do not seem to be able to use the same kind of though process though.

One can but wonder how things work at all.

© 2011