Secret identities

摘要

This writer has been trying to nail down certain basic service/schedule details for an article about options available to shippers on a particular trade route. To my surprise and annoyance, I found it almost impossible to readily obtain the necessary information. There are very few published sailing schedules in Australia now, with carriers relying entirely on direct distribution to customers or website access. Calls to two carriers' centralised customer services were unsatisfactory: one was very friendly, but needed to refer me to others with more knowledge, and I received no call back. The second could tell me everything about their own service, and then some: but what I was hearing was not exactly the truth. As someone with reasonable experience in the industry, I was confident I could get the information I needed by one means or another. Ultimately, I was right - but only by knowing how to compare carrier schedules, via three different websites, backed up with a personal call to someone I knew would really know.