Seriously, WTF? This drives me nuts, and has for my whole career. It seems like the people from every other country besides US, UK, Germany, Netherlands, and China, feel like it's perfectly ok to be 15+ minutes late for meetings and conference calls. They seem surprised when people are not willing to sit and wait for 25 minutes on a conference bridge for them to get around to showing up, (without any kind of message explaining that they are going to be late).
I'm not just talking about webmasters here. I'm talking about ALL kinds of business people, from bankers and lawyers to high level corporate execs. Whenever I am setting up a meeting that includes a party from South or Central America, Eastern or Southern Europe, etc.... I dread the fact that I will, 3 out of 4 times, have to try to make a small talk, and apologize to the other parties involved, for the wasted time out of their day.
Personally I find it rude. I make a promise to be at a certain place at a certain time to busy people with whom I wish to do business. Then I just blithely ignore my promise and just show up whenever?
Any one else have to deal with this bull crap?
And can anyone explain why it seems to be considered OK to be late in those places?

