LATE PAPERS DRAW IRE, CONCERN OF SUBSCRIBERS

The Southeast Missourian received more than 2,000 phone calls from subscribers looking for Sunday's edition, delivered in some cases several hours past its 7 a.m. delivery deadline.

Problems with the newspaper's inserting machines forced employees to place Lifestyles and classified ad sections manually into the main paper.

Machines can insert thousands of sale bills and sections per hour. Humans are much slower.

"They are delicate machines, and they got out of adjustment," Production Manager John Renaud said. "We are working on the problem and will try to prevent this from happening again."

The Missourian's customer service department went into action about 5:30 a.m. The paper usually has two representatives answering the phones and two delivering missed papers on Sundays. This time, management called in 14 people to field phone calls and make deliveries.

Three phone lines run into the circulation department, but they weren't nearly enough to handle customers wanting to know what happened to their Sunday papers.

Excess calls went into the Missourian's voice mail system, and customer service representatives attempted to return all the calls.

Many subscribers received a busy signal when they called.

"Some people thought we just took the phone off the hook, but that's far from the truth," Circulation director Mark Kneer said. "We had people from several departments come in to help answer the phones."

Kneer said it was only the third time in 15 months the papers had been more than an hour or so late. Most customers who received explanations about Sunday's problem accepted the Missourian's apologies and waited to receive their papers. The last ones were delivered about 2 p.m.

"It's rewarding to know your customers want the product enough to call to receive it," Kneer said.