Olympic Policy
The Potential Impact of the 2012 Olympic Games on Simply Drinks and its Customer Service
The Olympic Games are likely to have a disruptve impact on travel across London over a 100 day period but more particularly during the core period of approximately 6 weeks. Key dates as follows:
| 27th July 2012 - 12th August 2012 - Olympics 29th August 2012 - 9th September 2012 - Para Olympics | |
During the working weeks there will be travel 'hotspots' where travel will be restricted. These wil include, but not limited to, the Olympic Route Network (ORN) and Paralympic Route Network (PRN). Within these dates, it is worth noting that the core events which will lead to road closures (eg. long distance races - marathon, walkings, cycling) will take place on Saturday and Sundays and we therefore do not anticipate these will have a significant impact on our operations.
There are 4 main areas where these travel restrictions will potentially impact on the services we provide to our customers in and around central London. These include:
1. Delivery of Ingredients to Customer Sites
Issue: Road restrictions across London particularly at travel hotspots and along the ORN/PRN could affect deliveries/collections to customer premises.
Impact: Simply Drinks may not be able to make deliveries at the usual times.
Mitigation: Agree plan of action with the customer including agreement of specific delivery times (if necessary), consolidating deliveries eg. change twice a week deliveries to once a week resulting in additional stock holding on site where possible. Simply Drinks already makes deliveries from 04.30 in the morning but can make deliveries earlier if necessary.
2. Operating Staff - Travelling to and from Customer Sites
Issue. Road restrictions across London particularly at travel hotsspots and along the ORN/PRN will affect travel to customer premises.
Impact: Operating Staff may be delayed on certain days.
Mitigation: Most of our central London staff do not use vehicles to travel to customer sites and either walk, cycle, or use public transport. In addition, most work during the night and the early hours of the morning when the restrictions will be minimised.
3. Engineers travelling to and from customer sites
Issue: Road restrictions across London particularly at travel hotsspots and along the ORN/PRN will affect travel to customer premises.
Impact: Engineers may not be able to respond to calls as quickly as possible.
Mitigation: Some engineers in cental London will be on foot/public transport rather than in vehicles. Parts will be distributed by a central engineer either from a vehicle, on foot or by public transport. We will keep fast moving basic (small) spares on site at key customers for the machines specific to that site. If necessary, the ingredient delivery vans can distribute spares overnight.
4. Suppliers delivering into Simply Drinks
Issue: Road restrictions across across London particularly at travel hotsspots and along the ORN/PRN will affect travel to customer premises.
Impact; Deliveries from suppliers may be late.
Mitigation: As we are based in London SW18 we are outside the main areas affected by travel restrictions. We do not anticipate late deliveries. In addition, for security, we will ensure we hold additional stock in our warehouse as a back-up. We also have a second warehouse in Berkshire where we hold stock that we can also draw from.
Customer Specific Plan of Action
We will agree a specific plan of action will all customers where sites are likely to be impacted by these travel restrictions. Draft plans were agreed with each customer by 31st December 2011.
As a business, customer service is of paramount importance to Simply Drinks. We will therefore be as flexible as possible in continuing to provide excellent customer service during this exceptional period.
Steve Rawlins
Managing Director, Simply Drinks Ltd