Electrician’s pledge to deliver for the vulnerable
IN these unprecedented times, communities are finding new ways to unite and support the most vulnerable.
This is certainly the case for Dan James, 40, owner of Holland Park based electrical company, Quantum Electric.
Mr James announced this week that he’ll be using his small fleet of vans to deliver shopping, medication, books and any of services to elderly and vulnerable people who are self-isolating because of coronavirus. The announcement was met with praise from locals on social media and already they’ve had 20-30 enquiries from elderly and vulnerable people.
Mr James, who lives in West London said: “We don’t deliver a comprehensive service across London but we can chip in a couple of extra per cent to help things get better over time.
“I hope other businesses can see it and think to themselves what can we do in our day to day activity that could incur a bit of benefit to the next person who could use it right now.”
Mr James, who grew up in London with his family, shared how his grandparents would tell him stories about the Blitz and how Londoners rallied together to get through a challenging time for the country.
From community stories of local farmers growing vegetables to help with rationing, Mr James said now was a time for people to be helping each other.
He said: “There’s so much negative news and it’s upsetting people so I thought wouldn’t it be nice to do something helpful.
“We’re electricians. We work all around London so we have a couple of vans, it’s not a huge amount of effort. Elderly people only want a handful of things so it only takes a fraction of our time to do it.
“Going out could involve them getting on two or three buses. People are very nervous about going outside right now.”
Mr James has a team of four electricians and four vans and has been operating in the Kensington area for over ten years which he said helps with reaching out to people.
The Quantum Electric team hope to continue offering the service to people for as long as the crisis continues but shared that they also have to be cautious in the case they may have to self-isolate.
Mr James said: “We want to help as long as we can really. It’s something we’ll be able to do indefinitely but as long as we’re able to do it, we will.
“We have to stop and think about what we would do if we had to selfisolate but at the moment there’s no plans to stop it.”
Mr James hopes that people will follow his example and show what it means to be a Londoner.
He said: “It flies in the face of people going into supermarkets and emptying the shelves. We shouldn’t be doing that, not in a city like London. It’s a time to help each other.”
To make an enquiry with Quantum Electric you find then on Facebook