Council Tax Twuntdom
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »One of the joys of moving is getting to deal with whole new levels of bureaucracy when it comes to Council Tax. (for non-UK readers, ignore this post, and simply read it as “Fuckwit cunts, can’t organise a piss-up in a brewery, rant rant, can’t find their own arses with both hands and a flashlight, seethe, seethe, sweary sweary, tossers” and be done with it) Not only do you have to register with a new council, and see what things they can screw up (council tax seems to be a great initiation and benchmark test into just how shite and disorganised a council truly is) but you have to talk to the old council in the place you’ve moved away from, and try to a) convince them you’ve actually left, b) state repeatedly that you are NOT staying within that council’s borders, and c) try to sort out whether you’ve over or under paid the council tax account, and thus try (in my case) to get a refund out of the tightfisted fucktwunt’s coffers. This is nowhere near as easy as it sounds.
Currently I’m now on my fourth letter to Tameside, and about the eighth e-mail. They’ve refused to believe I’m moving, they’ve then charged me for next year’s council tax, denied they’ve ever received the letter to which I’ve just read the reply, and finally said “Oh yes, you have moved. Silly Us. Why didn’t you register it on the website?” “I did. You lost it.” “Oh.”
Eventually, today, the final bill arrived. It’s a wonder of council workings and weirdness.
Amount due 01-Apr-04 to 28-Jan-05 £621.88 Less Disabled Relief 0.00 Less discount at 25&percent; 01-Apr-04 to 30-Dec-04 -£140.59 Less Transitional Reduction* £0.00 Less Council Tax Benefit £0.00 Less exemption relief** 31-Dec-04 to 28-Jan-05 -£59.52 Total Amount Payable £421.77 Payments made -£460.00 CREDIT -£38.23 * I have no idea what this is **I have no idea about this one either
Now, according to that, I’m owed £38.23 by the council because I’ve overpaid by that much. But they’ve listed it as a credit of negative money – which, in English, translates into “You owe us”. I’ve emailed them to ask which it is, and why the language they use is so convoluted and – frankly – fucking wrong.
I can’t wait for the answer on this one. Can you?
B&Q – Again!
Posted: Wed 26 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Letters Leave a comment »The delivery from B&Q yesterday, as it turned out, wasn’t OK. In the least.
Three items delivered – two 3m length worktops, and a metal storage rack of some sort. Only the worktops were some kind of reddy “marble” finish that’s fucking vile, and is nowhere near the black ones we ordered. And the storage rack is something we hadn’t ordered at all.
They did manage to take away the stuff they’d delivered wrong last time though. Well, they took away three of the four bits. Maybe next time they’ll get it right. But currently I’m not overly optimistic that they could find their arses with both hands and a flashlight, let alone manage to deliver an order correctly.
B&Q – Revisited
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services Leave a comment »Well, it’ll come as no shocker whatsoever to know that B&Q have the strangest concept of time known anywhere outside BT.
The delivery (and removal of items wrongly delivered last time) was scheduled for an “afternoon” slot. OK, no worries. But why are they now delivering it at 11.30am? Since when did that become “Afternoon”?
Not Taking The Piss At All
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services Leave a comment »On the other hand, I ordered a couple of spare parts from Fujifilm yesterday for my camera. They arrived today. Now that is what customer service is all about. And “under-promise, over-deliver” – I wonder why more companies can’t follow up on a policy like that?
Taking The Piss – Part 2
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »Currently my mobile phone is on the O2 network. I’ve been with them for nearly a year, so it’s coming up to the time to upgrade the handset, and all that gubbins. Joy.
I’m looking for an upgrade to the one that I’ve got now, and quite like the Nokia 6600, which according to O2 is free (plus a free bluetooth headset) with a new account. So I call them up to see if I can upgrade my current phone to this one.
Well, I can, but only if I pay £100. Frankly, fuck that. If I move my number over to Vodafone I can get the newer model (the 6630) for £30 and simply port my number over to them. And save myself a nice little £70 into the bargain. I can get the 6600 for absolutely keff-all.
When I explain to the O2 muppet this situation, that I’ll actually just move my contract to another provider, the attitude is “Fine, you’ll have the same problems with upgrading the phone with Vodafone in twelve months time”. Hardly conducive to making me want to stay with O2, is it?
I have to wonder what kind of company seemingly is so happy to lose customers. Their attitude of “We’ll charge you to stay with us” seems utterly bizarre. Maybe I’m just naïve though. *shrug*
Taking the Piss
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »As I said earlier this week, Nine Inch Nails are doing two concerts in London in March. Allegedly. Tickets went on sale today at 9am. Allegedly.
The website that’s supposed to be selling the tickets has no mention of them. Ticketmaster have no idea what the fuck I’m talking about, when I eventually get through. The Carling Live website (the London Astoria is now owned by Carling, apparently – Jesus God Fucking Christ help us all) doesn’t even list the gig.
In short, buying tickets for this event is currently an absolute no-no, and no-one seems to know what the fuck is going on. I despair.
B&Q revisited
Posted: Fri 14 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Sweary 7 Comments »About two weeks ago, we ordered some items from B&Q’s website – nothing particularly special, two lengths of kitchen worktop and some doors to replace the current ones on the units. Not bank-breaking, about £250 all told.
Because I’m a twunt, it ended up being two orders – one for the doors, one for the worktops. Fair enough, that’s my fault, and I don’t have a problem with them for that part of it.
When all the stuff arrived at B&Q’s branch – all on the same day, I should point out – they decided in their infinite wisdom that the two deliveries should go out via two different carriers. Why, fuck only knows. But that’s how they decided to do it. Ah good – insanity from the start.
The deliveries arrived yesterday and today. The unit doors delivery was done by Parcelforce, and one of the most spectacularly unhelpful and braindead semi-primates known to science. He couldn’t bring both packages to the door, so I had to carry one. The one he carried (bearing in mind it’s wooden doors) was dumped right on the door jamb, and the packaging for the one I was carrying was split. “Not my problem, mate, I just deliver them. If you want to complain you’ll have to call someone. I just deliver ’em.” I think this was a pre-programmed speech, operated by use of the expression “where do I say on your little computer ‘packaging damaged, goods uninspected’?”. But I digress.
The second delivery – supposedly two 3m lengths of worktop, and an end-cap for the worktop – arrived today. Only – well – it’s one worktop. In the wrong colour. It’s also two 1000mm wall units in “cherry”, four cherry-wood doors, and a 400mm door. None of which match. None of which we ordered.
We now have to organise to get all the stuff taken away, and then re-order what we wanted. In short, the entire thing has been about as organised as elephants working in a jelly factory. Fucking farcical. I wonder if Richard Branson is the B in B&Q?