Non Value Activities outrage

The more I read on Lean Thinking and TPS, the more outrageous I become about how stupidly our time is spent on things, which nobody benefits from.

I had to go to some bureaucracy office today in order to obtain a couple of papers.

The whole procedure required me to call in advance and set an appointment (great idea: no waiting!). An office manager from my company was kind enough to arrange that and later sent an e-mail with a confirmation code, which I had to provide at the entrance. Well, not bad, unique identification for attendees.

I came to this bureaucracy office 5 minutes in advance and handed the printed appointment code to the reception girl. She REJECTED to accept it.

"Your surname, please". "At what time do you have your appointment?". "What reason?"

She typed it into the system, checked that the information I said was correct and handed me a queue number.

I have only one question: WHY? Isn't typing the unique ID quicker?  Why do you assign it, if the officer doesn't give a damn about using it?

I entered a huge room with around 20 service windows there. All the sofas were placed in a corner of this hall right by the window #20, while all other space was free and the entrance was in the room's other side - by window #1.

While sitting there I noticed that a particular window would serve a person on a particular need. Why not place sofas along the whole space and let people know which window (or set of windows he is expected to go to). Otherwise you make people go forth and back - just as it happened with me.

My window was #2. (And good thing I had to wait only 10 minutes!)

The lady over there was very pleasant and knew her business perfectly. She checked my papers, smiled and went to make a copy of my passport. She went all the way to the window #20, where the copy-machine was. And by the way all the other officers were doing the same exact thing with EVERY attendee.

Why? Did anybody think of installing 2 or 3 copiers? Or at least about installing the only one by the window #5?

The lady came back in 5 minutes, smiled once again, handed me some paper and asked to pay 40 Euros by the cashier.

Right, the cashier's window was 20a. Right by the #20.

Well, why didn't she asked me to do this before making the copy? We would not have to wait for each other all the time.

Or even better: why not accept my money right there?

Damn, all these movements around the room are such a clear example of NVAs!

Cashier took the form I got from the officer and my 4o euros. Here is what followed next:

1) She typed some numbers (amount and operation code, I assume) on the keyboard 

2) Checked money with the false banknotes detector

3) Signed the paper

4) Stamped the paper

5) Put the paper in some kind of a printer, which printed another stamp on the paper

6) Handed me the paper along with payment check

You decide, which of these activities provide any value the client. The payment operation took me 9 minutes. Can you imagine spending 9 minutes on just payment at McDonald's, for example?

Well, enough with all this bureaucracy nonsense!!!