Water cockup
Posted: Tue 9 May, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism 1 Comment »(via Pete)
Oh, fantastic – a “natural spring” that’s been running for 16 years turns out to be – um – a dripping tap.
Yet a spokeswoman still insisted: “The leaks in the past were spring water, but the spring water seems to have gone and this is a proper leak. It’s just a coincidence. The present leak is not spring water.�
Aye, right.
Cost-Cutting
Posted: Sun 7 May, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, General, Thoughts 1 Comment »You know, every time I see a story like this one, about hospitals having to sack people in order to balance their budgets, there’s really only one answer that keeps on coming back to me.
I reckon that if the hospitals eliminated about three levels of useless, pointless middle-management, then they’d…
- Save shitloads of money
- Be far more efficient
- Not be in this situation in the first place
Observer
Posted: Mon 1 May, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 2 Comments »I don’t know what it is about this town, but sometimes finding a Saturday Guardian, or an Observer on Sunday is a total nightmare.
Yesterday was a case in point – OK, we didn’t go out ’til about 1, so that was part of the issue, but when I looked for a paper, I couldn’t find one at all.
The Esso garage was sold out, the BP garage only had ones with no supplements. It’s no wonder those hadn’t sold. Tescos had sold out – but only of Observers – in both the shop and the seperate garage section. They always sell out early, but never order more for next week. No idea why.
The other Esso and BP garages had sold out too. In the end, I picked up the last copy in – wait for it – Marks and Spencers. Because, like, that’s where everyone looks for a paper. *sigh*
I just don’t understand why, if the Observer is such a popular paper (and it’s worth pointing out that most places still had plenty of all the other papers, it’s just that I like the Observer) then why don’t all the shops order more of the sodding things?
Oh, and before anyone asks, we don’t get it delivered because a) the local newsagents has closed, with no sign of anything replacing it, and b) because even when it was open he wouldn’t do a delivery for just one day a week. Which probably goes some way to explaining why it’s now closed…
Price reductions
Posted: Fri 28 April, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, Thoughts, Weirdness Leave a comment »Since getting the XDA phone, apparently I’ve had an O2 offer of “free internet”. Would’ve been nice to know about it, but there we go – that’s life.
Anyway, half an hour ago I got a message saying
We hope you enjoyed the O2 Active free promo. Charging begins from 01 June 2006, but remember it’s only £3 per Mb. For money-saving Bolt Ons, see o2.co.uk.
Then just now I got one saying
We hope you enjoyed the O2 Active free promo. Charging begins from 01 June 2006, but remember it’s only £2.25 per Mb. For money-saving Bolt Ons, see o2.co.uk.
That’s quite a price reduction for half an hour, isn’t it?
Carphone Whorehouse
Posted: Fri 21 April, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, General 1 Comment »Herself has a mobile phone on O2 through Carphone Warehouse – up ’til recently she’s had a Samsung D500, but then about a fortnight ago upgraded to the flashy new one with iMode and 3G stuff on it. All well and good.
However, because it’s a 3G phone, she needs a 3G-capable SIM-card. Not previously having had a 3G-capable phone, the SIM wasn’t a 3G one either. However, the upgrade twunts at Craphone Whorehouse didn’t bother mentioning this. At all. Not once.
Last weekend we spent a good half an hour on the phone to their customer “services” department, explaining six times to six different people that we needed an upgraded SIM card. Oh, we don’t deal with that, I’ll put you through to someone else. Not once did person a explain to person b what the problem was, or why we were calling, or why they were putting us through, so we had to explain it – and go through the ID procedures – six fucking times.
Eventually, I ended up getting through to the right person. Who had to authorise sending out the SIM card with her manager. Supposedly they normally have a cost attached to them, but because this was an upgrade, we wouldn’t have to pay, so she needed the manager to provide a code to reduce the price to zero.
The card arrived last night. I put it in the phone…
“Unregistered SIM”
So today Herself is going to call Craphone Whorehouse (again) and try to get them to register the fucking SIM card that they sent out in the first place, already knowing we’d been stuffed about once. I’m currently not optimistic about getting a resolution to this one just yet…
Ticket Barrier
Posted: Thu 6 April, 2006 Filed under: Charm School, Customer Services, Travel 2 Comments »Bracknell train station has automatic ticket barriers. In general they’re no bad thing (we’ll gloss over the fact that half the time they’re left open while the ticket inspectors sod off somewhere else) and just make getting on and off the platform into a bit more of a bottle-neck than usual. Could be better, could be worse.
I’ve got a season-ticket for using the trains on the way to and from work, and again, in general this works fine. However, somehow this month the ticket’s magnetic strip has been blanked, so the automatic barrier won’t accept it, and I have to go and deal with the Numpty Bint on the gate, who lets through people with knackered, or non-standard-size tickets. I don’t care that this person is female, but I do care that she’s a fucking numpty with, on current evidence, more feet than IQ points.
Last week I made the cardinal sin, while going past her, of having my ticket upside down. Now, bear in mind it’s got “12th April 06” on it in friggin’ huge letters, the fact it’s upside down shouldn’t really matter a toss. But oh no, to Numpty Bint we’ve got to have the “I can’t read upside down, turn your ticket round” episode. Is it really that difficult to figure it out? Obviously so.
Today, though, was the last straw. After a week where I’ve been face to face (and generally fucked off) with Numpty Bint every day, twice a day, today she says “Oh, you’ve got to prove to me that your ticket doesn’t work. I’m not supposed to let you through until I’ve seen your ticket doesn’t work.” So I’m supposed to walk back down to the other end of the ticket barriers (through a shitload of commuters all flooding off the train that’s just arrived) to have the fucking ticket barrier beep at me, tell me to ‘seek assistance’, wade back through the commuters, and get back to her.
Instead, I opted for
If the fucking ticket worked, or had worked in the past fucking week, I’d be through the bloody barriers, and going to the platform, rather than dealing with you
She let me through.