ZIMRA Border Agents May Not Like Their Jobs

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(updated below)

We all know how it feels to stand in queue at the border, whilst the world’s slowest customs agent does his thing, not giving a toss about you or anyone else. Someone had the same trouble yesterday, and made sure to fill out a feedback form.

Let’s hope someone at ZIMRA actually reads the things.

I don’t know if it is going to be a story or a series of questions. ZIMRA/Customs (whatever or whoever they are)!!!

These people when you get to borders act like you are nothing and they treat you like you are a nobody. You stand in a queue for hours and when you finally get to the counter, they serve you as if they do not want and the treatment they give to the elderly is just pathetic. I have seen this going on for a while at the Beitbridge border post but then yesterday i experienced it at the Zambian Border Post, Chirundu!

These people take their sweet time and are not even polite! And when you look at them, these are very young boys who have just gotten the opportunity to deal with the public! The boys are so rude and very rough! I finally got to the cashiers counter, and this guy noticed i was already pissed off and was quite nice to smile at me and the terrible mistake, handed me a Questionnaire….yah, you know what that meant.

I wrote my feelings and though this guy was nice, i wished i could write down a compliment for him but he didnt have a name tag or employee number tag, so its unfortunate, if whoever reads the questionnaire, they will not be able to know that at least that one guy was nice to me.

Surprisingly, the questionnaire asked how long it took for us to get the service from ZIMRA and believe me, i indicated the number of hours that they took to serve us.

Then comes to searching, there were 2 guys, i think one was employee 2924 (Chirundu Border Post – 15 May 2011). They took their time, spoke on the phone, went away, while the travellers looked so desperate for them to finish searching and to be honest they did not look even bothered.

Even when one guy complained and asked them if they wanted us to go, they still continued with their pace. So i was asking myself that could it be that these ZIMRA people are like Combi drivers who are all the same anywhere in the world? I really need someone to help me….

We all know it takes some special kind of crazy to be a kombi driver … does it take some special kind of lazy to be a border agent?

As usual, we’ve forwarded this to ZIMRA. Will they be the first organisation to respond to us here? I’ve sent an EECB to their executive management team, and am holding my breath for a reply.

UPDATE: The Commissioner-General of ZIMRA , Mr Gershem T. Pasi, responded to our email. The matter is being looked into, and it is refreshing to note that ZIMRA are willing not only to acklowledge, but directly address issues raised at the Executive level (are you watching, Econet?).

Thank you, and I’m sure our subscriber (and readership at large) look forward to an improvement in service.