A lot has been said in the past about the cost of no-shows and late cancellations. Here is one thing that I have observed.
In the past 3 weeks, after picking me up in Rockville, the driver has had a customer to pick up at 1010 Granby Street. Of the 12 times I have been on board when a driver has been sent to that location, there have only been 3 successful pickups. This address is some sort of daytime care/training facility for disabled people. This past Monday (2/13/06), the facility was closed because of the weather and yet a driver was dispatched to the location.
One of the ways that MV/MetroAccess could help keep the number of no-shows to a minimum would be to track -by address- where these no-whos are occurring. Any address or area with a no-show record beyond a certain percentage (and 75% certainly qualifies I would think) should be investigated. Not every address is going to be a customer’s home. Some will be facilities, doctor’s offices or group homes. Some MetroAccess customers are unable to make (or break) their own MetroAccess reservationss due to mental or physical impairments and this responsibility falls to hired caregivers or state/local government employees. Obviously, these people are not following through.
There will probably be as many solutions as there are locations with excessive no-shows. Currently, the no-show/late cancellation policy is tracked at the individual user’s level. This is a start but it only covers a portion of the overall problem. A call to the [high rate of no-shows] facility to make sure the customer is there or a policy set in place so that some cancellations will be automatic (such as the current policy to cancel all non-dialysis subscription trips on federal holidays) may be warranted.
Automated calls are fine for confirming many reservations, but they do not allow a doctor’s receptionist to provide feedback on what time a MetroAccess customer will be through with their appointment nor do they allow facility staff to indicate that the customer is absent from the daycare center or had to go home early via alternate transportation because of a health reason.