The SAAQ granted a vacation to an employee occupying a key position in the midst of the transition of services to its digital portal. While Quebecers are going through the crisis, the director general of communications and public relations is taking it easy under the sun of Punta Cana.
“Desktop notifications off, luggage locked, check-in complete: Punta Cana, here we come,” she wrote on her personal Facebook page on March 2.
Meanwhile, angry citizens are forced to line up for long hours in front of SAAQ offices because they are unable to access services through the new SAAQclic portal. Prime Minister François Legault himself acknowledged last Friday that the situation is “unacceptable”.
Why might vacations be granted to members of the management of the public corporation, when the situation is so critical and requires constant communication to inform citizens?
“It’s not all regarding one person,” replied Anne Marie Dussault Turcotte, spokesperson for the SAAQ, by email. All vacations taken as part of the spring break and planned for a long time, regardless of the people, have been authorized.
“We make sure we have the right people to take over the interim for people on vacation and the teams are at work to carry out all the tasks,” she added.
- Listen to the interview with Jonathan Bolduc, citizen of Trois-Rivières who saw his vehicle seized by the pound due to an error by the SAAQ on QUB radio:
The tumult and the long queues have also forced the Minister of Transport, Geneviève Guilbault, to anticipate her return from Europe to come and put her shoulder to the wheel.
Since March 1, the Deputy Prime Minister has been on the Old Continent to learn regarding public transit funding mechanisms. After visiting the Paris metro, she also had to go to London and Stockholm and then return to the country in the middle of the week.
However, she preferred to shorten her trip, while the SAAQ is badly shaken by this customer service crisis. The minister arrived in Quebec on Tuesday, shortly following 4 p.m.
Last June, Ms. Guilbault was intransigent with the federal government during the passport crisis. “Half of our taxes go to the federal government. So it’s not normal that the services are so dysfunctional,” she said at the time.
On Sunday, the SAAQ announced that 150 employees would be reassigned to welcoming customers and helping with online registration, and longer opening hours to try to meet demand. A return to normal is envisaged in April.