My husband and I moved into his grandparents' apartment. His grandfather died a year ago and his grandmother has been living with his family. We wanted to get the phone transferred into my husband's name (well, of course he has the same name as his grandfather, but that is neither here nor there) so it would be official and we could handle all the phone business ourselves instead of having get something signed by yiayia every time we wanted to do something.
So to save some legwork, my husband calls OTE (the phone company) before going there to find out what paperwork he would need to bring with him. They told him he would need a death certificate for his grandfather and that is it, and he even repeated to them that this would be all he needed and they said yes.
Well, what were we thinking, to believe that whoever he spoke to at OTE actually knew what the hell they were talking about, because he arrived there only to find that he needed a notarized paper from his grandmother as well.
He got the paper, and the phone has been transferred, but this is just a shining example of how things in Greece work. When we registered our U.S. wedding in Athens, we went back and forth to the damn place so many times, because each time we went back thinking we had what we needed, and someone new would tell us we needed something else. It is really ridiculous. And in the end, what do they do with all this paperwork? Probably toss it, or lose it.
There is not much I hate more than someone who can't do their job. Whether it is ignorance or laziness doesn't matter. I really hope the Greek government continues with work reforms and that these reforms actually produce results in the end.
4 comments:
I don't know if it reassuring or not to see that government incompetence, even on the most basic of levels, is universal. Maybe it is just human nature, or maybe just the most incompetent people find jobs in places along the lines of the DMV.
Most people assume that government incompetence in North America is on par with that of Greece and they understand what we go through here. Having lived in both the US and Canada, I can honestly say, the bureacratic red tape here is into a league of its own. I have never been yelled at by a civil servant in North America with a sandwich in one hand, a cigarette in the other, his mouth full of food because I gave him my papers to register for IKA. Apparently, it wasn't his job to take papers...the guy that does it was out sick for the day and they plunked Jabba the Hut there for the day. Try to ask for a name of one of the employees...they immediately become distrustful and intimidating if you do. Ask them to sign the list containing the papers that you require for ANY state documents you need and they will refuse to do it. Avoiding accountability is a full time job here.
Yea, I can't remember things being anywhere near as bad in America. America is the land of customer service with a smile. The last time I had to go to the DMV wasn't bad either!
But Greece...they have built an art around bad customer service. It is mind boggling sometimes.
There is no comparison between the criminal negligence/incompetence that greek goverment, civil service and civil servants represent with that of developed european or US societies.
Did I say greek? I actually mean greek-speaking ex-turkish slaves
The south-eastern realisation of a kafka nightmare
By a native who witnessed more than he should
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