Date formats matter for Jump modem counts

Everyone has their own way of writing dates, e.g. 5-Jul-2022, 05/07/22 (or if you are of North American heritage 07/05/22), 5 July 2022, 5-7-22, etc.

And for most things to do with Jump, you have been free to choose whatever format you prefer when entering dates in your Google registers.

But our new cunning plan to dynamically adjust your modem re-order triggers to reflect the number of modems you have issued during the last few weeks does care about date formats. We wondered why the trigger formula wasn’t working for some partners, when everyone had identical formulae.

A bit of detective work revealed the date problem – only dates in the 5-Jul-2022 format (our preferred format) were being recognised, so partners using other formats to record dates when modems were issued were being ignored.

Now I would like to say that this is the only reason why 80 partners are waiting for further modem supplies – but that is not the case. We have identified a small number who were using different date formats and have corrected these.

But the main problem continues to be with the supply chain, stretching right back to the manufacturer in China. It is now 3 weeks since the last batch of modems were supplied, which means many of you will have run out. I’m afraid the solution is not just a simple matter of correcting date formats.

Over 1000 modems are being supplied every month, but we know this is currently not enough to keep everyone stocked at an optimum level. We are hoping our new dynamic trigger system will help to direct modems to partners who have the highest turnover, but there are still mitigating circumstances outside our control.

So, please instruct all staff issuing Jump modems to make sure they use the preferred date format (5-Jul-2022) when recording the date of issue in your Jump Google registers.