NLA Website frustration

ARGH! I just need to vent and well here is the place to do it. One of our members asked me to confirm his NLA status. Normally, I request a copy of the certificate to be faxed to me. I thought I would streamline the process and utilize the NLA website to make life easier and confirm status that way. Their directory feature does not work. It says "Find a limousine company" When you enter a city and state-NOTHING comes up. When you enter just a state NOTHING comes up. I tried this for multiple states-NOTHING. Then I was looking for a contact email address to notify them of the problem. There is no address except for the NLA directors. No indication of who handles the website. I thought to myself I should look around the site-when I did I noticed there was no information about LCT managing it either. The news articles were last updated October 2001. It frustrates me! I wonder how their members feel. I don't mean to bash the NLA- I know I should be an objective 3rd party but I can't stand websites that aren't customer friendly. What were they thinking?

http://www.limos.com/media/limos-logo.gif

the site has fell victim to the ongoing transition of LCT/NLA. I am not sure if the Non-Working NLA website has always been this way, or just happened recently.

I haven't been there in months so I couldn't tell you if this is new, or it has always been.

Since LCT has a functional website, we can speculate that the non-functional, smoke-and-mirrors NLA website will soon be gone and replaced with something that actually works in the near future.

http://limos.infopop.cc/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif

http://www.limousinesonline.com/proudmember.gif

No need to try to excuse Michelle's complaint, the fact is, as I have said repeatedly, that the NLA management was populated by morons. I think the crux of the matter is that in the deal signed by the year 2000 directors with Host Communications (remember them, the management company and ONLY bidder to construct the "new" web site) there was a provision that gave Host advertising and other rights in the web site, so Host would not want anybody to be able to easily get through to NLA directly without coming to them. As far as the database and directory is concerned, this has been a joke since Day One. The database is organized around the city used in the mailing address, which may not be the same as the metropolitan area. Example, there is a limousine company in Pittsburgh whose office/garage is at a Pittsburgh Zip Code but the name of the post office is not Pittsburgh. In all its wisdom, NLA categorizes them under the post office name rather than the city where they do business, i.e., Pittsburgh. The same practice is followed in the spiral-bound annual directory that is published MAYBE annually, so that if you are hunting for a limousine service in a metropolitatn area you may be missing numerous of them because NLA puts them under post office names. It might be humorous if wasn't so sad - as I have said before, the staff is so incompetent that they could screw up an anvil.
The NLA web site, by the way, reposes on Host Commumnications' server - wanna' bet they won't let NLA walk off with it (not that it's worth walking off with). I think the domain name is registered to Host, also. This ought to make an interesting confrontation.

James H. Joseph
Pegasus Chauffeured Motor Cars
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
jhj@pegasus-pittsburgh.com

worked OK for Pittsburgh. Maybe there aren't any members in the cities and states you tried. Or, perhaps, the server was down.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Michele- Vendor Relations:
ARGH! I just need to vent and well here is the place to do it. One of our members asked me to confirm his NLA status. Normally, I request a copy of the certificate to be faxed to me. I thought I would streamline the process and utilize the NLA website to make life easier and confirm status that way. Their directory feature does not work. It says "Find a limousine company" When you enter a city and state-NOTHING comes up. When you enter just a state NOTHING comes up. I tried this for multiple states-NOTHING. Then I was looking for a contact email address to notify them of the problem. There is no address except for the NLA directors. No indication of who handles the website. I thought to myself I should look around the site-when I did I noticed there was no information about LCT managing it either. The news articles were last updated October 2001. It frustrates me! I wonder how their members feel. I don't mean to bash the NLA- I know I should be an objective 3rd party but I can't stand websites that aren't customer friendly. What were they thinking?

http://www.limos.com/media/limos-logo.gif <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

James H. Joseph
Pegasus Chauffeured Motor Cars
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
jhj@pegasus-pittsburgh.com

Suddenly it is working now-Maybe somebody read my post and fixed it or perhaps the server was just temporarily down. Whatever the reason I am glad it is working now!!! I still think they ought to have a contact name on the website. That is a pet peeve of mine.

http://www.limos.com/media/limos-logo.gif