MAILBOX: Post Office today, DHL tomorrow? A reader's lost-wallet saga

My recent interview with US Ambassador Brent Bozell III struck a nerve with Lowveld resident Chuck Stephens, who says he is living through a perfect case study. He left his wallet on a flight into Heathrow, and the airline found it. He paid DHL R1,700 to courier it home. Weeks later, he is still waiting. Along the way, the paperwork had the wrong email address, a form nobody had mentioned, and a looming Customs penalty. Stephens blames BEE for the slide in service. Is he right? Judge for yourself. What nobody can dispute: a wallet the airline found within hours is still stuck in SA Customs weeks later. That tells a story of its own..By Chuck Stephens.Thanks to Alec Hogg for hosting a lucid interview with US Ambassador Brent Bozell III.As it happens, I am living through a perfect case study to illustrate the case against BEE. In the light of upcoming elections, I feel that the public has a right to know, in spite of the risk that I could be sued for defamation. Aware of that risk, I will stick to telling the truth and not wander into the murky waters of opinion.On Sept 15, I arrived at Heathrow Airport on an international flight from North America. Somehow – I am still not clear how this happened – I got separated from my vest, which contained my wallet. During my lay-over in Heathrow, I received an email from the airline. My vest had been found when they cleaned up the aircraft! To this day I do not know if there is anything left in the wallet. I cancelled my major business credit card, using Mastercard’s online system.I arrived in Johannesburg the next morning and checked my email again. The airline outlined several options, one of which was for me to pre-pay DHL for delivery to my South African address. I went to the nearest DHL desk at Karaglen, in close proximity to my guest house. I swallowed hard and paid R1700 in cash. I wondered if I was paying for the return of an empty wallet?Then I moved on to the Lowveld, where I live. I visited the DHL office in Nelspruit personally and explained the situation. They said they would monitor the delivery. I checked with them daily. A week later, they said that Customs has the right to hold any delivery for up to five days. This was Excuse number 1. They could not “escalate” the case until after that. So, I waited another week.On the ground, my situation is getting more dire without drivers license, bank (debit) card, credit cards, etc. So I started pressing DHL Nelspruit and they contacted DHL Customer Service. It was then – for the first time – on Oct 2nd – that I was told I must fill in a DHL form called Clearing Instruction. It was the first I heard of it – 16 days after arriving back in the republic, and 15 days after paying R1700 to DHL Karaglen.I would never have heard about this form if I had not been diligently pursuing DHL for answers. Only on October 2nd did we find the problem. DHL claimed that emails to me were not going through. That was Excuse number 2. They asked for a functioning email address. Checking my digital documents (I received no paper, just emails attachments) I found that DHL had entered my correct phone number, followed by the email fourwaysmall@telkomsa.net WTF?! Where on earth did they get that for my email address? My one and only email address has been the same for 20 years. This was sheer incompetence. Lack of focus.So, if their emails didn’t go through, why didn’t they pick up a phone and call me?Then came the coup de grace. DHL Customer Service rep informed me by email (after they got my erstwhile email address): “Customs only allows 14 days to clear your goods once a shipment arrive in SA, if not cleared within the time frame , DHL is obligated to move all unclear goods to the government state warehouse , the government state warehouse will impose a penalty of R5000.00 for late clearance as well as R29.00 per day for storage fees , this will be for your account.”Great, they tell me this on about Day 10 after the goods landed in Joburg, as we headed into a week-end. DHL is closed on week-ends. But the clock is relentless. This is breaking news. I don’t know if DHL’s slow habits will mean that Customs will snafu my wallet? I don’t know if the wallet is empty? Meanwhile, my cash supply is running so low that I am busking some media articles to raise a little extra!Now back to brent Bozell III and the USA’s campaign against race-based legislation in South Africa. Basically, affirmative action is causing a degradation of service, because people are hired not for competency, but by racial quotas. In the mistakes and bent attitudes that I am currently experiencing with DHL, I see the impact of BEE. It is sad to see a reputable company going the same way as the SA Postal Service. Yes, I have lived in the Lowveld for 33 years, and I can remember the postal service of 1995. It was world class. But I have not dared to mail a letter in SA now for at least five years. It’s a waste of time and money. Post office today is DHL tomorrow. What a pity.DHL was founded in America (San Francisco) in 1969. There are far more airplanes flying today, and technology has advanced rapidly. DHL should be getting better. But it’s getting worse. It used to take pride in delivering a package from one continent to another in two days. Now it can’t deliver a wallet in two weeks!South Africa’s race-based policies are having an adverse effect on reputable American companies operating in South Africa. Soon they will be serving cold burgers at McDonalds and recalls of Ford and Chevrolet vehicles will be rampant. America has every right to cease and desist doing business in a country where quality standards are compromised.I hope Ambassador Bozell will read this, and alert DHL. It should consider winding down it operations in South Africa. They are already falling apart.Affirmative action was pioneered by John and Bobby Kennedy in the 1960s to allow African Americans – a persecuted minority – to gain equal access to jobs in America’s civil service. That’s what it is for. It was never meant to protect the vast majority of the population, that is nonsensical..Read more:.Majority of South Africans call for end to BEE policy.There are about 600 American companies operating in SA, employing over 200 000 workers. I can remember how the corporate sector blazed the trail to end apartheid. For example, the Sullivan Code in 1977. That was almost two decades before 1994. It led the way. American companies - and perhaps some South Africa companies too – should lead the way. In those days, it was illegal for blacks to hold managerial positions. Industry realized that it was unsustainable – an impossible dream. A nightmare, in fact. History is repeating itself. BEE is hindering the economy more than helping..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox every morning on weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here.

MAILBOX: Post Office today, DHL tomorrow? A reader's lost-wallet saga

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