Praise for DVLA Northampton

sleepystar1975

Wow, never thought I'd be posting praise, I am the original Mrs Angry-head!
I went to tax my car online last night, only to find my doughnut husbag thought the reminder I'd left on the kitchen counter on Friday was for his car that he'd taxed last month, so kindly shredded it! No problem I thought, I can do it off the log book (V5?) and reg plate....nope, I bought the car in July, sent off the change of owner slip, and have just realised the new log book never arrived (Ok, this is my fault for not keeping an eye on the timings)
So, I phoned DVLA Swansea this morning, where the guy on the phone said I could drive to my nearest DVLA centre, with certain bits of paperwork and documents and they can sort both the tax and the missing log book out.
Riiiiight, I thought, last time I queued at a DVLA office I was there for nearly 3 hours! So, I pre-warned my childminder that I mightn't be home in time for the school run in case I needed to phone her and ask if she could collect DD (she usually only has her Tues-Thurs) and off I went.
After getting VERY lost (they moved the N'ton DVLA office 6 years ago...shows how often I take in the sights), I found the new location, and found the car park full. So I was prepared for a long wait.
I walked in the centre, took my number, and sat down and opened by BIG book to read (I'd downloaded the required forms from the net, and filled them in at home) I hadn't even turned the first page when a cheery voice wandered through the waiting room calling my number. She asked what I was there for, filled in all the "office use only" boxes and explained I still had to wait to go to a counter, but she was there just to speed up the admin side. Only 2 minuted later, my number was called on the screen, another cheery lady looked at my paperwork, took the appropriate money from my card, handed me the new tax disc, sorted out the papers to get me a new log book within minutes. Job done, no 3 hour wait, no Mrs Grumpy-head leaving the office, I hadn't even read as far as the fourth page of my book! The idea of having the member of staff pre-filling in the admin parts is brilliant, and the staff there were so cheerful, especially on a horribly, icy and chilly Monday morning. So BIG kudos to DVLA Northampton from me:D

pmduk

Perhaps you should write and tell them? I bet they're more used to complaints.

custardy

Ive never had any problems when having to deal with the DVLA in person

loztiggy

im sure this is the same as my DVLA newcastle, i had to go there to get my personal plate registered,and the queues were huge! but luckily there were people in the backround taking forms and doing the admin side which really speeded things up, think i was there about 20 mins in total. all of the staff were polite and friendly,

sleepystar1975

pmduk wrote: »

Perhaps you should write and tell them? I bet they're more used to complaints.

Already on it:)
Most places won't know how to handle compliments when they are used to complaints though. I remember doing it with P&O once. I phoned to give some praise and she laughed and said the computer couldn't handle the non-complaint:rotfl: