Sue’s Views: Ergonomically designed? I think not…

It was a bad start to the weekend. My partner, who hates shopping and shopping malls, had to change his  cellphone network provider, which entailed an excursion to one of our local shopping centres.

First up was a visit to the bank to obtain three months’ statements, only to find he didn’t have his bank card on him,  and that elicited the first rumble of discontent. We were left with no other choice but to go into the bank.

Both he and I had not been into this particular branch in months, so it was quite a surprise when we came across the new-look interior. Weird looking benches with random round coloured cutouts, absurdly spindly legs and some funny looking single metal backrest perched right on the end. Suffice to say my description of this laughable seating arrangement for public use does not do it justice.

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Now we all know that South Africa as a nation is not known for its particularly slim and wraithlike population. Balancing precariously on these ludicrous benches were some ladies of rather large proportions whose butt cheeks hung like giant pendulums over the side. “No way am I sitting on one of those things’” muttered the partner as he headed off to one of the seating areas with an odd assortment of grubby chairs and a flocked carpet with some dirty white squares in it.

Five minutes in and he was told by a roving bank assistant that he had to move to one of those bench-like numbers if he wanted to get served. Discontent finally bubbled over, “Why? Nobody else is waiting to get served and why must I sit on one of those idiotic things?” he thundered. Needless to say a few minutes later and there we were uncomfortably perched like oversized gormless gnomes on the bench.

Butt ache set in after a couple of minutes, so I opted to move back to a grubby mustard coloured chair and contemplate my surroundings. What in the name of all that is holy possesses a banking institution to rig out its premises like this. I did some digging online and up popped this little gem on the banks rebranding programme. “What is the step change in customer engagement and experience that we can now deliver if we free our banking halls of the mundane ‘bank visit’? and “Queue benches are supplied as opposed to rails, so customers are more comfortable’.

Mundane bank visit, anything but, more like pure entertainment on tap as you watch customers figure out how to make use of said queue benches as gracefully as possible so as not to end up looking like a muppet. As for me? I’ll take my chances standing in a queue thank you very much.

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