Grad heads TTC panel for service
Posted on 03. Mar, 2010 by JoanaDraghici in News
Steve O’Brien is chair of the TTC customer service panel. (Photo by Tessie Sanci)
Tessie Sanci
News Reporter
A Humber graduate is in charge of tackling the problems between TTC employees and riders as the voluntary chair of a customer service advisory panel.
Steve O’Brien will help create a charter of rights and make recommendations on how the TTC can improve its customer service.
O’Brien graduated from the hotel management program in 1987 and is now the general manager of One King West Hotel and Residence.
“We’re going to talk to riders, we’re going to talk to employees,” O’Brien said. “We’ll do focus groups, we may even do public forums.”
The panel is a response to a conflict that intensified in January when a rider took a picture of a TTC toll collector who appeared to be sleeping in his booth and posted it online.
Since then, negative exchanges between TTC employees and riders have been documented by Toronto media.
City councillor and vice-chair of the TTC board, Joe Mihevc, said it was looking for someone who knows customer service and can work with people.
“We wanted a ‘roll up your sleeves’ kind of guy,” he said.
But despite the board’s decision, there has been some scepticism about O’Brien’s ability to lead the panel.
“There’s been a lot said that I don’t live in the city and that I’m not a regular rider of the TTC, but I’ve grown up on the TTC, I still ride the TTC, and I’ve got 200 employees who ride the TTC,” O’Brien said.
He said studying this issue includes riding the TTC through different communities at different times to understand the experience from the perspectives of the employees and riders.
O’Brien added any charter of rights has to include the responsibilities of riders.
“We’ll be looking at everything, not just how we’re dealt with from an employee standpoint, but how the riders view the TTC and how the riders treat the TTC,” he said.
The union will also be conducting forums with customers to get a better understanding of the experience on both sides, said media relations consultant for the TTC union, Bill Reno.
This initiative is separate from the panel.
O’Brien said the panel’s report is intended to be released in June.
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