One wedding and a heatwave fail to affect Francis’ training

July 26, 2022

When it comes to summing up his training at Power Gems HQ, Francis Cuevas is the master of understatement.

Our Product Service Engineer from Los Angeles has been in England for two weeks for training in product servicing and support, one week longer than he’s been married. “It’s been so much fun, and a very busy last couple of weeks,” the newlywed says.

After a long engagement, (read Love Doesn’t Wait for Francis) Francis finally received the go-ahead with notice on Friday 25 June 2022 of a date for the civil ceremony the following Tuesday 29 June. His fiancé had the weekend to buy a dress, both sides of the family helped with the arrangements, and less than a week later, it was their wedding day.

Shortly after tying the knot, he left for his overseas trip and arrived at Manchester Airport from Los Angeles; his luggage took another week. “We touched down around midnight Sunday. No one on the plane got their bag. Mine did not get to me until Friday, so Phil was nice enough to sort me out with some clothes and toiletries until it arrived.”

His two-week visit coincided with the hottest temperatures ever recorded in the UK. In Manchester it reached 36°C/96.8°F (it rarely gets above 25°C/78°F).

The fridges and freezers in many supermarkets couldn’t stand the sweltering temperatures and were emptied, with produce moved into the stockrooms.

“I went to the Tesco nearby,” Francis says, “and all the sandwiches were gone; I was quite fond of those sandwiches.” To help get over the disappointment, the Power Gems team made sure his spare time was used wisely – such as going for a curry in Rusholme and a night at the pub, the John Gilbert.

At the weekend, he took the 200-mile trip to London. “My return to Manchester was almost up in the air because I got to the train station maybe two hours early. There was a crowd in the station, and the board said everything was cancelled or delayed.”

Did we mention that the train system was also affected by the heat?

He says, “I was sitting waiting. And finally, the one service to Manchester opened up. Then I saw a wave of people make a break for it, so I got swept up in the crowd, and found a seat, but it was an oven in there,” he laughs. “I learned that many places aren’t necessarily built for the heat; with no air conditioning, because you might only use it once a year. So, it’s kind of like us with a heater.”

Francis joined Power Gems in Santa Clarita in 2019, and because of COVID, this was his first opportunity to visit HQ and meet his colleagues who work on the assembly line, test the product and send it out to the users (you guys!).

Asked what the difference is between Manchester HQ and the Power Gems facility in LA, Francis reverses a well-worn cliché. “It’s bigger; it fits more people. One of the things I was looking forward to most when I was coming to see the England facility was that they have the product line, and then they also have the testers. It was cool to see how the ballasts get assembled.”

Power Gems continues to export from the UK to the rest of the world, with Francis part of the team supporting the US market by providing after-sales support.

Francis was able to pick up advice and approaches from the skilled engineers to use when servicing the product.

And meeting his colleagues face-to-face dispelled any rumours that he was part of an elaborate experiment to test Turing’s thesis that a computer could be mistaken for a human. Instead, he finally met the faces behind the email exchanges of the last three years: “I got to see all the inventory and parts and all the people working on the assembly line. And, I could ask a question, and there would be ten people within earshot who could give you an answer.”

And, he says, “There’s a lot of camaraderie here, so it’s just so much fun. I feel like I fit in well.”

On his last day, Phil, Kameron and Jakub had afternoon tea with Francis, British style. Phil’s tip is ‘the teabag should never touch the milk’. However, Kameron’s Earl Grey won in the taste test.

Caption: (L-R) Francis Cuevas, Kameron Langley, Jakub Gromadzki and Phil Ellams

Francis training with engineers Kevin Eckersley and Jakub Gromadzki