Modern Life Is - Mostly - Rubbish

[louisiana]

I'm finally online today thanks to my mobile broadband. Which I only still have as they forced me to take a 12 month contract.

O2 was supposed to activate my landline broadband today at 11.30am. Instead, I have been without landline and fixed broadband since precisely that time. I call O2 on the only number available, which is 0800. But as I have no landline, I have to call 800 from my mobile at premium rates. They do not have a non-0800 number. They tell methat my lack of anything is not their fault, it's BT's fault. BT has not correctly activated the line and a BT engineer will have to fix it.

I call BT fault reporting. This too is 0800 only. Same story. I stupidly make choice '1' on the menu tree, which is for 'I cannot make or receive calls' (I cannot make or receive calls and there is no carrier signal). Little did I know that this is a cul-de-sac where it is impossible to speak to a human being, only to pre-recorded material. At premium rates. It takes me some time to figure out that to speak to a human, I have to lie and say my phone is working. Go figure.

I finally get through to a human. We go through some joke line testing that I have already performed. They will call me back in a few minutes. An hour and a half later they still have not called me back. I call them again on premium. We go through the same joke line testing as with the first person, and find out precisely nothing. He says there is nothing wrong with my line. And still no line detection, even when plugging directly into the interior of the BT box. An engineer will visit my home. I suggest that the fault lies at the exchange, as O2 has already mentioned, as a consequence of the faulty activation. This falls on deaf ears. He is clearly reading from a script which sounds in tone like 'you do not have to say anything but anything you say may be taken down...'.

But hey, I can open a letter from my ever hapless bank - the one with the stretched cassette tape for hold music - and find that the mammothness of their screw-up with my business card has led them to award me a payment of fifty quid for all the stress and wasted time they have caused. Again.

And then there are three envelopes from my mobile phone provider. Each containing exactly the same statements. They clearly wish to keep me very well informed. It's a wonder they get delivered at all, as the address they print puts an organisation name between the house number and the street name. Despite repeated requests to correct over 30+ months.

And then two envelopes from an accounting software firm, each containing the same credit note for the money they took without authority for some 'automatic annual renewal' that they had decided to implement without informing me. I'm afraid when I called them up to challenge this robbery I gave them hell.

And to while away the time, I call the suppliers of some flooring, who have managed to take almost 900 quid from my account when they should only have taken 410. It's only the 18th or so call I have made to them.

I follow this up with a call to another supplier, who is unable to spell (the name on a cheque to me), for the seventh or eighth time since 21 March.

And from the same supplier, another envelope, with the wrong name (yes, different again) on the envelope. I've already called them to inform them such a person does not exist. At least the credit slip is to the correct card.

Meanwhile my other bank (personal account) is trying to fix the mess that Thames Water has made. I'm two years in credit with TW but they gaily continue to take more money from me, despite repeated assurances to the contrary over the last two months. Now they deny any records of certain conversations when they have made these promises. Despite me having a complete record of who I spoke to and when and what was said.

I could go on. But I don't want to bore you further.

I do have some lovely and reliable people who have been doing work on my home, but these are all individuals who are running their own specialist show. As soon as there is a corporate involved, of any size, things fall apart. Daft systems are implemented. Common sense flies out of the window. Nobody seems able to do anything. Everyone passes the buck. Incompetence reigns, scripts are adhered to closely by seeming automata, and I am invariably left stressed out and somewhat poorer, having done not an iota of real work for hours. This is my idea of hell. Were it not for my cheery self-employed workmen, I would be going out of my tiny mind.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

'Phone Thanet Council just for the hell of it. TLS reckons you get straight through to a human.

Then pour several v. large gins and tonic, stick on a record and relax.

[Xena Worried prince]

Peckhamgatecrasher Wrote:

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>

> Then pour several v. large gins and tonic, stick

> on a record and relax.

Perfect advice PGC I will drink to that

[louisiana]

This is indeed perfect advice. :)

I have a lovely bottle of Mas Collet (Montsant, Catalunya) open on my kitchen table as I type. Thank the lordy lord - and I speak as an unbeliever - for Ocado. They always deliver when they say they will, and always call my mobile if they're thinking of delivering early, and are just all wonderful human beings, the lot of them. "Mwhoooaw". Them and Green & Blue.

The other highlight supplier of the week/month has been Screwfix. Electrics and lights and and that jazz. Brilliant people, efficient, informed, do what they say. Really impressed. Yes, it's not easy to make a corporate work, but it can be done.

[HonaloochieB]

Well done Loisiana for giving Blur the title for the live LP of their forthcoming reunion shows.

[Brendan]

O2 pushed me over the edge about 2 years ago with the same thing. In fact I let off the steam with a post very similar to yours.

Feels good to get it out though dunnit?

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

As the actress said to the bishop?

[flapjackdavey]

Modern life is indeed rubbish , sometimes the only things that make me relax is listening to and watching birds , clouds , the wind in the trees etc etc the kind of thing that people have done for centuries .... and er... listening to Bert Jansch , the kind of scenarios Louisiana is describing would have made me lose the will to live .

[indiepanda]

louisiana Wrote:

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> I have a lovely bottle of Mas Collet (Montsant,

> Catalunya) open on my kitchen table as I type.

> Thank the lordy lord - and I speak as an

> unbeliever - for Ocado. They always deliver when

> they say they will, and always call my mobile if

> they're thinking of delivering early, and are just

> all wonderful human beings, the lot of them.

Ocado are brilliant. I couldn't do without them.

I would also recommend First Direct for being their brilliant telephone banking - no press 1 to get stuck in endless loop / 2 to get put through to the wrong department / 3 to get stuck on hold for 10 minutes and then get cut off, just human beings, and warm, friendly and helpful ones at that.

Vision Express also impressed me today by delivering a pair of glasses they said could take up to 7-10 days but took less than 24 hours.

And Amazon are very good, only had a parcel go missing once which given how much business I do with them is a miracle (and it turned out to be an issue with the mail room at work) and they replaced that with no fuss.

Just don't get me started on BT's internet or the Coventry building society. Last time I had to deal with the former they had call centres staffed by people with minimal english and even less IT knowledge, and the latter has security so tight with umpteen different passwords that I can't get at my own money.

[Mikecg]

Lifes a bitch then you go down the pub.

[louisiana]

HonaloochieB Wrote:

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> Well done Loisiana for giving Blur the title for

> the live LP of their forthcoming reunion shows.

Hona, that was the only Blur album I ever bought, back in the day, before they got super-big :-S

I do rib one of their number that Radiohead are my fave band B)

But it is/was a very good title...

[louisiana]

Brendan, it does indeed, but I fear familiarity=boredom and it would send anyone to sleep

[louisiana]

indiepanda, I've been a Firstdirect customer for many, many years. 1989. I don't think I would leave them unless they went bust. In fact if they went bust I would probably have a whip round. They have rapped Thames Water across the knuckles etc. etc. Unfortunately they don't do business accounts. Otherwise they would be perfect.

And I agree that Amazon is pretty damned good.

[BigPhil]

Mikecg Wrote:

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> Lifes a bitch then you go down the pub.

top plan , fully agree with Mikes idea

[HonaloochieB]

louisiana Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> HonaloochieB Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > Well done Loisiana for giving Blur the title

> for

> > the live LP of their forthcoming reunion shows.

>

> Hona, that was the only Blur album I ever bought,

> back in the day, before they got super-big :-S

> I do rib one of their number that Radiohead are my

> fave band B)

> But it is/was a very good title...

And's a good title for MB threads, which I've used elsewhere, Modern Life Is Rubbish and Modern Life Is Not Rubbish where much hilarity may possibly ensue. Right enough a good LP.

So ribbing one of the group, eh?

I'm not asking you to be indiscreet, but even a hint of who it is would be appreciated.

[louisiana]

The law and politics might be in the frame. Rather than generalised debauchery and cheese. Or monkeys on a stage.

[HonaloochieB]

Sounds like a high flyer this one.

[Brendan]

There really aren?t enough Monkeys in entertainment these days.

Flying monkeys

Monkey sidekicks

One eyed monkey villains

Disturbing but cute baby monkey ghosts

That sort of thing.

[Tony.London Suburbs]

In future LIE and get thru' to the sales section!!!...then reveal the truth....>:D

[Moos]

No-one over 30 should realy be thinking modern life is rubbish. Because if they'd lived more than a few hundred years ago they'd probably have been dead before they got to the age they are now. (my first attempt - 'they'd probably be dead by now'... er, yes Moos)

And for those of you under 30 you'd probably be illiterate. And cold. And hungry. And diseased.

Although at least you wouldn't have heard of call centres, so I do see Louisiana's point.

Glass of wine, kick the cat and - ahhhhhh.

[HonaloochieB]

Brendan Wrote:

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> There really aren?t enough Monkeys in

> entertainment these days.

>

> Flying monkeys

> Monkey sidekicks

> One eyed monkey villains

> Disturbing but cute baby monkey ghosts

>

> That sort of thing.

Brendan, surely any 'chimpy' list must contain the following. As boilerplate.

Alan Partridge's 'Monkey Tennis'

The lead singer of Supergrass

Toots And The Maytalls 'Monkey Man'

Marcel from 'Friends'. I mean, Marcel.

Monkey, that series from the 60s or 70s or 80s that was all a bit surreal and all that. F'cking Google it I can't arse myself.

Monkey Nuts. "Maximum effort for minimum nourishment"

Just some thoughts, ape you don't mind.

[louisiana]

Who gives a monkey's?

[HonaloochieB]

louisiana Wrote:

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> Who gives a monkey's?

If you can lose the 'wh' in 'who' and replace it with an 'o', and can convincingly pronounce the single 'o' in monkey's with a double 'a' then can I recommend some work as an extra on The Bill?

[charliecharlie]

oh Louisiana, I sympathise... it's what I called 'getting tangled up in the shite of life'

me... a simple request to Virgin... "please move my broadband from one line to the other in my house"

(can't, surely, be rocket science)

6.5 months later plus approx 4.5 hours of my time on the phone calling them (spread over what seemed like dozens of calls to speak to lunatics and imbeciles to then get put on hold indefinitely) and about 17 emails later... hooray, my broadband gets moved

but... (don't get too excited), it now only works intermittently

won't tell the you million daft test and hogwash ideas that have since been suggested...

yes 'the shite of life' can make you lose the will to live... suddenly, dying at the ripe old medieval age of 30 (ref moos's comments above), doesn't seems such a bad idea after all

here's one I took earlier...

http://www.audiodrops.net/images/Tangled_in_wire.jpg

[BigPhil]

I have to move phone lines next weekend , after reading all this , im starting to get worried

we want to keep our same number, but we are in Pinner exchange now , and I wouldn't have a clue what exchange we will have to change to

is there such a thing as an exchange now? maybe im a bit old for current technology.. hmmm

anyone know how easy it is to move your number with you?