Asset management

About a year ago I was worrying about the lack of management of the cable boxes that utilities plant on our sidewalks. See for example reference 1.

Then this morning I noticed that the box at the end of our road had come open, with the door being hinged at the bottom and so possibly dangerous to the inquisitive child from the school around the corner, rather than at the side, more usual in my limited experience of such matters.

However, inside the box was a large sticker from Virgin Communications giving one the box number and the telephone number to ring. Which I did, to get their computer suggesting that I key '1' should I be reporting that one of their boxes was open. Further palaver with the computer, which was after various other details, after which it promised me a text message to confirm receipt of message. The text message never arrived, but it does look as if asset management has come on a bit in a year. Perhaps Virgin are better at this sort of thing than BT: I remember that Mr. Branson used to make a great parade of occasionally descending on a customer with chocolates and flowers when things had gone wrong. Provided, that is, that his office had managed to arrange for media coverage of said descent.

I also thought that the computer, if provided with the information asked, should be able to have a fair crack at grouping together all the reports it gets about any one box, without needing to trouble a human.

Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/asset-tagging.html.