How business has changed
Tuesday, June 10, 2008 @ 6:05 PM
Following on from my last post regarding the local health care. The specialist advised me that at my relatively young age the risks involved in this operation out weigh the benefits and that it would be better to give the eye a couple of months to see if it stabilises. On the one hand I am pleased that they have considered this option and that I don’t have to cancel all my plans for the next three months while I would have been recovering, however I still cant see much out of it and I am half expecting to go back in at anytime as an emergency, plus I cant play any sports or go on any rides at the Terra Mitica theme park just in case it falls out while I am doing loop the loop.
I have a bit more time then normal today to write this post as our server has gone down in California. We have had no web page or emails for the last two days which got me thinking about how business has changed over the last decade and how did we ever manage without the World Wide Web?
Ten years ago companies would advertise their properties or a generic property in travel magazines, they would take a phone enquiry and either describe the property or send out photos in the post, then if the customers wanted to go ahead they would be sent the booking forms to fill in and send back. This was very time consuming, one booking I took last week was booked and paid for within 40 minutes this was from the time I received the email enquiry to responding and the customer phoning back to confirm and pay by credit card.
Also the options we all have when choosing our holiday accommodation, a good website will have at least six photos of the property and the information on the house, its contents and the area. So we know what we are getting before we arrive which is in contrast to a few holidays I had when I was younger and would be allocated accommodation on arrival.
I have been in undated with phone calls from customers who have not been able to get hold of us via email and the amount of business we must have lost by not being able to read or reply to enquires is worrying and when we finally get the server back I will be working all night to reply to everyone. Fingers crossed it wont be too long as I am lost with out email.