Annoyance of the Day: Incompetence

I'm always surprised at the incompetence of people. I don't want to sound arrogant or suggest that I'm better than everyone else (I'm not), but it just frustrates me that there are people out there like this.

Incompetence, to me, is basically not doing a good job at what you're paid to do a good job at. I'm not saying that in order to be competent, you have to be amazing at what you do. I'm just saying to be incompetent, you're not doing what's required of you (and what's required of you can and usually does include being good at what you do).

And this can take many forms. These include, but are not limited to:

• Being too slow when your job requires you to handle things at a certain speed (and your speed is below that speed required of you)
  
• Being too careless when attention to detail is required
• ...
  

My apartment complex recently put in place a parking policy that says if you don't have a parking permit that was obtained from the leasing office, and you park your car in one of the parking spots, then your car might be towed. This is reasonable enough, considering there are not that many parking places on my street and you always see these random cars parked in people's spots for a long time.

Everyone who lives here have until the end of May to get a parking permit from the office. I got mine last week. At the time I got it, I asked them if there's a spot I should put the sticker on. "No, you can put it anywhere that can be seen," said the lady at the office.

OK. Not wanting to purposely hide the sticker and thereby risk my car getting towed, I put the sticker at what I thought was a pretty prominent-but-not-so-prominent-as-to-block-my-view-while-driving place--at the bottom right corner of my right rear window.

Today, when I got to my car, there was a sign taped to it that says something to the effect of "We can't find the parking permit sticker on your car, if we can't find it starting tomorrow, then your car may be towed." I noticed that it was taped to the side of the car that didn't have the sticker.

W.T.F.
Just to confirm that I wasn't crazy, I went to the other side of my car to see if the sticker was there. It was.

So...I can't think of any reason for them not being able to find it aside from:

• They were too lazy and only checked one side.
• They don't know what the sticker looks like.
• They checked the other side, but somehow missed it.

With respect to the last bullet, I really can't see how they could have missed it. Even though I put it in the bottom corner, it's still on a window, and it's not microscopic. So, unless the person examining was blind, there's no way they could have missed it.

Regardless of what happened, all of the possible reasons for them not seeing it is a sign of incompetency. I'm not being harsh here, it doesn't take much to see that there is a "Parking Permit" sign on my car.

That said, it would really be unfair (not to mention upsetting, to put it lightly) if my car was towed due to their mistake. I would seriously not appreciate that.

Furthermore, if they're really having trouble finding the permits on people's cars, then they should have enforced a rule by saying "You have to put the permit here", thereby getting rid of all ambiguities as to where the permit could possibly be.

And while we're on the subject of incompetence, note that it is actually all around us.
Some examples:

• That server at McDonalds who gave you a McChicken sandwich when you've clearly articulated to them you wanted McNUGGETS.
• That cashier who, instead of refunding you the amount he/she's supposed to refund you, charged you again for that same amount and does not know how to undo it.
  
• That Seattle's Best coffee shop server, who took forever to get you your drink even though you didn't have any special requirements and there was no one in front of you.

I suppose it's reasonable that these positions are not filled by rocket scientists, but still, one would think that they would be a little better at what they do.