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Hi Lads,
As E-jobs has just gone live this week and all of the participants have signed up to an agreed charter, we now have a responsibility to police ourselves.
We have been asked to get the A.C. up and running with a basic format along with a brief description of what it is about and how it operates and those involved.
Just to recap those directly in volved are Chris, John Mac and yours truley.
Some of the reasons behind the choice of those appointed are :-
A) They are taken from a wide range of the service providers of the UKW site. In so much that they represent, the sole trader, the medium sized business with three or for engineers, and the larger operator with 10 or more engineers
B) All of those chosen have already shown a strong committment to UKW
C) It gives both the administrators and the A.C. of UKW. a certain degree of seperation and indpendence, that could be a destinct advantage in some desputes that may arise.
Some initial discusions have already taken place by those directly involved but it is hoped that all the moderators will contribute toward building a workable system of self regulation for all UKW members.
It is agreed by the A.C. that at some stage a seperate forum will be needed and that a forum introduction would be headed by the agreement that we all signed up to, as it forms the basis of the UKW service level agreement.
It has also been agreed that all disputes will be investigated behind closed doors until a decision has been arrived at. Although it has been stressed that at some stage justice will have to be seen to have been done.
We will endevour to work towards encouraging desputes to be sorted out between the agent and customer in question but where this should fail we
will then have to become more involved.
We will obviously work under the basic premis of innocent until proven guilty.But what we have to do right now is work out a basic set of rules and lay down some guide lines for the information of those involved with work issued to them via the E-job system.
Your thoughts please.
Sean
Re: Advisory Council
hi sean,
Do you want UKW to write your job description or do you want to write it yourselves.
Ken, Dave and I can and will write it for you, if thats your decision. I think you should decide.If we write it, it will be done within 48 hours of you asking. Yoy can then tweak it as you see fit for approval by the six of us.
Kevin
Re: Advisory Council
Okay, now we can get down to the nitty gritty. 😈
I intend having a page or area where the details of each instance where the AC has to be used is detailed and logged for posterity as well as full disclosure on the decisions and remedies as a result. That way people can see that it works. There is no need to give a “blow-by-blow” account of it, merely an overview.
There’s a couple of bits of the puzzle that we simply can’t tell you about right now due to commercial interests, but suffice to say that there may well be another level to this before the AC to weed out the crap and that we may be able to vet the repairers. We’re awaiting a green light on that so we have to keep it quiet for now.
The decisions reached by the AC are theirs, we have to comply as well with them in our respective repair businesses.
Where it is a member of the AC that the complaint is about one of us can step in or we can nominate someone, your call.
Seperate forum is easily done whenever you wish it done.
Innocent until proven otherwise, agreed, that is the way. But just as is the case in a legal framework you have to divorce yourself from sentiment and reach a decision based on facts.
The most basic of rules are already in place for e-jobs in the form of the charter, if they adhere to that then we should be okay and any complaints minimalised.
We have already had a bit of interest in this idea from outside UKW and, if we get it right, would we be interested in “hiring” out the idea on a commercial basis? Personally I see that as great praise for the idea, the integrity of UKW and the people involved, but that’s just me I guess.
K.
Re: Advisory Council
kwatt wrote:
Where it is a member of the AC that the complaint is about one of us can step in or we can nominate someone, your call.
K.Sean and myself have talked about this and thought that Alex might step in if this case arises, though if you look at this forums members we have a good cross section of the trade in here so I suppose any mod could step in.
I have done one e-job so far so the odds of me getting a complaint have shot through the roof 😈
JohnRe: Advisory Council
The job description is more or less what it say’s on the can, i.e. to uphold the UKW service charter as agreed to by paticipating members.
The only thing that we have to understand is that this has to be done remotely by the Council members via e-mail, fax and phone.
The only thing that concers me is that if this is pushed out to outside commercial interests they may require site visits and litigation which would be a whole different ball game entirely.
Our maximum penalty would be the removal of a member from the E-job
system. And that is about as far as I would feel comfortable.With regards the possibility of supporting some big insurance co. or work provider against an individual service provider, then you had better exclude me now, as it is not a position I would care to be involved with.
Sean
Re: Advisory Council
slow down sean, Ken is telling you things he shouldn’t as they are so far away and not in the frame at all at the moment and may never be.
Ken, stfu please.
ta.
Kevin
Re: Advisory Council
Oh okay then, I just see a future for this in many, many ways and I have only touched the surface of what can be done with it in time.
There are various sanctions that can be put in place…
Removal from Repairs@ is only the obvious one.
Removal from the Directories as well.
Ultimately removal from the website totally! 😯
And remember if these decisions are published then black marks will count.
K.
Re: Advisory Council
The remit so far for the A.C. is as a self regulatory body to oversee a mutually agreed standard of service within and exclusively for the membership of UKW. (and that I am quite happy to do.)
So that having been made clear we need to :-
a) Introduce the council members to the membership as a whole.
b) Give a brief description of each and their companies, which by necessity, means that they have to forgo their annonimity to assume their positions on council.
c) Set up a public and closed forum for the A.C. for both the reporting and investigation of complaints.
d) Include the charter as an introduction banner to the open forum
c) Also include an introduction banner for the public that all complaints should in the first instance be reported to the agent that accepted the job to try and reach a mutually amicable resolution to their problem. ( i.e. not go rushing off to A.C. arbitration because the guy is half an hour late ect.)
e) It should also be pointed out to the public that any adudication made in their favour is only in addittion to their statutory rights under U.K. consumer law.
f) That UKW is not financially liable for any loss as we are only a point of contact between customer and service provider not unlike a newspaper that advertises various services. ( or do we need to think of asking participating members to take out bond for any underwritting of successful complaints against our members who chose not to respond to instructions from th A.C.
Would you like me to go on or is that enough to chew on for now
S.
Re: Advisory Council
Del wrote:The remit so far for the A.C. is as a self regulatory body to oversee a mutually agreed standard of service within and exclusively for the membership of UKW. (and that I am quite happy to do.)
That is my understanding of the basic function, yes.
Del wrote:a) Introduce the council members to the membership as a whole.
Yep, that’s not a problem.
Del wrote:b) Give a brief description of each and their companies, which by necessity, means that they have to forgo their annonimity to assume their positions on council.
Again not a problem at all.
Del wrote:c) Set up a public and closed forum for the A.C. for both the reporting and investigation of complaints.
No need, what I’ll do will be within the articles section there is no requirement I feel for a public forum on this as, if required, the General Public Forum can be used although I can’t see a need.
Del wrote:d) Include the charter as an introduction banner to the open forum
A link and the text of it can be placed in the General Forum tonight if we so wish, there’s no problem geting that message out at all.
Del wrote:c) Also include an introduction banner for the public that all complaints should in the first instance be reported to the agent that accepted the job to try and reach a mutually amicable resolution to their problem. ( i.e. not go rushing off to A.C. arbitration because the guy is half an hour late ect.)
Yes, a very important point I feel that we detail how the customer should handle a complaint as well in order to avoid silly things. It may even prove valuable to detail out some of the things that the AC won’t deal with or at what level they will.
Del wrote:e) It should also be pointed out to the public that any adudication made in their favour is only in addittion to their statutory rights under U.K. consumer law.
Indeed, also a good point that I think we discussed before.
Del wrote:f) That UKW is not financially liable for any loss as we are only a point of contact between customer and service provider not unlike a newspaper that advertises various services. ( or do we need to think of asking participating members to take out bond for any underwritting of successful complaints against our members who chose not to respond to instructions from th A.C.
For now I think we play it as a service over and above statutory rights although that’s an interesting idea that we’ll have to explore Sean.
Del wrote:Would you like me to go on or is that enough to chew on for now
Oh just fire in things as you think of them, that’s what we do and it works as you soon weed out the crap ideas from the good ones through discussion. It’s also why Kev’s an old cranky bugger! :rotfl:
K.
Re: Advisory Council
Del wrote:a) Introduce the council members to the membership as a whole.
b) Give a brief description of each and their companies, which by necessity, means that they have to forgo their annonimity to assume their positions on council.
Sean,
I am somewhat hesitant over this part in that perhaps it would be better to keep the AC members anonymous 😕 In case of a dispute, they may be unnoficially approached and possibly ‘influenced’ by that approach??
(E.g Magistrates Court….If the ‘occused’ knew who the magistrates were before the hearing…he/she could contact that person/s etc etc…you get the idea 🙂 )Del wrote:c) Set up a public and closed forum for the A.C. for both the reporting and investigation of complaints.
Closed forum only here, we are not going back to the days of ‘The Stocks on the village green’ are we?8O
Others than that, I agree :tup:Martin
Re: Advisory Council
That’s a point. does UKW know for a fact how it stands legally as regards the sevice it’s members provide. It is always easy to assume one thing only to find out that the law states another.
Sean
We provide any services at our behest as a free service, you can take it or leave it basically. However there’s no stipulation in law that we have to allow access to teh site, advertesments placed or to provide work for any member and, if they agree to the above via the charter then tough basically as they accepted the terms.
Anything like this is untested in law as, quite simply, its never been done before.
Martin, we’ll have to disclose the identity of the siting AC, there’s no alternative as it has to be open in that way. The decision proccess should be closed, on that I totally agree with Sean. However, I see no need to change the nicknames used as it would cause consusion and, in using them, people can easily see the calibre and integrity of the people sitting on the AC.
K.
Re: Advisory Council
I, as do most on here use a nickname/alias. The only reason I use one is that I tend to use johnmac11 on ebay, connect, agora and every other web service that needs you to log in ( apart from DASA 😆 )
I would say that applies to most on here and I have no qualms with my real name being used as an AC member. I can’t speak for Del and P45 but assume the same applies also.
If a complaint is made about a member, one of the AC would have to contact that member to make enquiries. We can hardly contact them anonymously so they would have to know who the AC members were.
I also think that influencing the councils decision would not come into play at all. I cannot see anyone giving me a big backhander or putting a horses head on my pillow to force the outcome of a council decision.
Lastly I dont think the council is going to be overworked in the coming months, I assume 99{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d} of all complaints will be sorted by the firm involved and the council members will do what councilors do all over the land, nowt much.
JohnRe: Advisory Council
I have to say I agree 100{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d} with all of those sentiments John 😀
And what the hell are you buying/selling on Ebay then ? 😉
Dave.
Re: Advisory Council
Ken I think it might be an idea to put in a few terms and conditions in, in small print, along the lines that any contract entered into is entirely between the agent and the customer and only exists after they have been in direct contact with one another.
This may in some way negate the possibility of the job coming under the constraints of the distance selling law’s with regard to rights to cancell at any time/cooling off periods etc. and remove any liability towards UKW.
We can also state in the same terms and conditions that the A.C. also reserves the right to remove various degrees of support from any UKW member i.e. work, links, help forums, membership etc.
if they do not agree to abide by the directives of the A.C. with regard to disputes.I agree that we have to be in the open regards the A.C. members profiles but able to hang onto our site handles provided that we have given full details of identities in the members profiles section.
Though I would like to hear from the other two members, that they are
happy to agree to this.Sean
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