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Metro-North's Lost & Found Finds a New Way for Customers at a Loss
Nowadays you can get anything on the internet including the umbrella you left on the train! MTA Metro-North Railroad's Lost & Found, which receives and catalogues 20,000 lost items a year - and returns more than 60% of those items to their rightful owners - is now available on-line. The very system the Lost & Found department uses to achieve this high return rate- securing, documenting, inventorying, and entering all items into a data bank- can now be accessed from your home or office computer anytime of the day or night.
Using Metro-North's new Lost & Found Property Matching System, customers describe the lost item including the day, time and place or train where the item was lost. This will allow clerks to search the database for possible matches to that particular lost item. This new system gives the customer easy, direct and immediate access to the Lost & Found without having to leave telephone messages or physically show up at the window on Grand Central Terminal's lower level. Customers now have 24 houra day access via the internet.
In addition, for the first time, the railroad's 24-hour telephone center, the Customer Information Center, also has the ability to search for potential matches in the Lost & Found database. This means customers looking for a lost item can call the Customer Information Center at 800-METRO-INFO day or night seven days a week. Previously inquiries to the Lost & Found - and there are 1,600 calls a month - had to be made during regular business hours only. "These two innovations will allow the staff to create an even more efficient Lost & Found Department," said Metro-North President Peter A. Cannito. "We hope that this new system will help us return even more items." The new interactive database and internet inquiry program was developed in-house by Metro-North's Customer Service and Information Technology departments and is unique in the nation. By years' end, the Long Island Rail Road also will be using this system.
To use the system, go to www.mta.info, click on "Metro- North," then click on "Travel," then click on "Lost & Found," then "submit inquiry," which allows customers to provide personal contact information as well as details of the item, including whether it was "Left in GCT," "Left in Station," or "Left on Train." The inquiry form is then submitted to the Lost & Found. When and if a potential match is found, the customer is notified by either e-mail or telephone call.
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