What Shall I Do With $650,000?

We live in an age of instant communication. Computers, the internet and mobile, wireless technology mean we can communicate instantly with almost any part of the world at the press of a touchpad or click of a mouse. Satellite wizardry has changed the world and made it a much smaller place. But naturally there has to be a down side to all this. I received this email a few days ago.

Dear E-mail User,
The Office of the President Dr. Boni Yayi, of the Republic of Benin and the African Union President respectively, has awarded you the sum of Six Hundred and Fifty Thousand United States Dollars – $650,000 U.S. Dollars Only as a Compensation Fund because your email is included in the list of victim(s) who lost their fund to unidentified fraudsters in Africa or victim(s) of Unpaid Inheritance or Contract Award Fund.

This is an instant payment exercise and no fees required. Meanwhile, several emails has been sent to you from this office in this regards, but you don’t care to reply. This is to notify you that your ‘Compensation Fund’ is ready for payment to you. The fund will be paid immediately you contact the ‘Compensation Fund Award Department’. Note that the no amount will be deducted from the ‘Compensation Fund’ due to the insurance policy bond on the fund.

Hmm. What shall I do with $650,000?

Spam. Unsolicited e-mails from all parts of the globe (although mainly, it has to be said, the USA) It's a blight of the communication age and a constant irritant. Why don't you fit a spam filter I hear computer experts cry? I have - through those bastions (no, that's not a spelling mistake) of communications, BT. I pay the princely sum of £1.50 per month for the chaps and chapesses at BT to divert rogue and sometimes malicious e-mails from my in-box to the bulk mail box. And to be fair to BT it usually works with as many as 60 junk e-mails heading my way every day. But occasionally, e-mails that aren't spam are read as such by BT and are deposited in said bulk mail box. Which is as much as an irritant as having to deal with the damn spammers in the first place.

Sometimes the BT filter gets suspicious and diverts important e-mails in the same direction as dubious messages offering everything from Viagra to Valium. Which means I have to check the bulk mail to ensure there isn't anything of value there. I made the mistake of just emptying the bulk mail folder the other week without checking and thereby deleted an important e-mail from Heart of Midlothian FC about season ticket prices for the next campaign.

So, I have to wade through reams of rubbish just in case something has slipped through. At this time of the year I'm receiving dozens of junk e-mails about what I ought to do for Father's Day which, apparently, is less than three weeks away (if my daughters are reading this, that's 21 June…) Given my father has been dead for more than 18 years it's not something high on my priorities but this is a stark example of my privacy being invaded by unscrupulous companies who show no consideration for the feelings of others.

As for the companies constantly screaming at me to buy Viagra, I have considered taking legal action against them. 

But then someone who I believed was a good friend of mine and shall remain nameless, told me it would never stand up in court...

If You're Thinking of Using BT (part two)

Last September I posted a rant about BT. This was regarding my mother's change of address when she went without her BT landline and broadband services for a few weeks.

Recently, BT contacted my mother to advise her current modem - or Hub - needed to be replaced if she was to acquire the BT Infinity service which, she was told, would mean a faster and more reliable broadband service. My mother agreed and arrangements were made for a Hub to be sent and a date for an engineer to call round and set everything up. The Hub duly arrived - but, you'll not be surprised to learn, nothing else has gone right.

Despite the Hub arriving safely, BT have informed my mother they don't have the correct address details for her. Now you might think a quick phone call to BT would rectify this problem. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. A wee email, perhaps? Hah!

It doesn't help that BT's Customer Service 'help desk' - and I use the term loosely - isn't based in the UK. Going by the countless people I have spoken to in trying to resolve this matter, it appears BT's Customer Service call centre is in India. Now, the people I have spoken to have, for the most part, been friendly. But they simply don't understand the problem. My mother is in her late 70s and trying to get her message across to someone who, it has to be said, struggles with basic English is extremely frustrating and has left her angry and in despair.

I have experienced this at first hand. One person I spoke to didn't seem to know there was a city called Edinburgh and asked me to spell it for her. Others struggle to understand basic English and are clearly following a script from which they must not deviate.

BT have now advised - shockingly - that their Infinity service won't actually be available in my mother's area for some time yet. My mother was told it might be December and the person I spoke to suggested it would be no longer than eight weeks.

All told, this has - yet again - been an absolutely shocking customer experience from BT. I understand they move their call centres to India to save on costs (and by that I mean they probably pay their call centre staff less wages than they would if they were based in the UK) and they're not alone in doing so. However, customers such as my dear old mother are left angry and confused by such  incompetence. Worse still, BT have told both my mother and I that engineers have tried to visit but have found no one was in. This is blatant lies from BT and not for the first time.

As I post this, BT have still not resolved this issue. BT's current advertising campaign for BT Sport has the tagline 'you have to see it to believe it'. The irony isn't lost on my mother. Neither of us believe anything BT tell us now.

If you're thinking of switching to BT then I hope you don't have to deal with their customer service team...

Another Customer Survey

The customer is always right, so the saying goes. Of course, they aren’t always right but in these days of self-assessment and corporate image, the views of ‘the customer’ is of paramount importance to the vast majority of big and not so big businesses (BT and First Group being the obvious exception – see Rants passim)

 

I am used to using particular products and services and then receiving an email a few days later from the company concerned asking for my opinion. It’s human nature to only respond to these customer satisfaction surveys if you have something ti complain about. And, as you all know, I’m not one to complain…

 

The hotel chain Travelodge have done this for several years now. Whenever I stay in one of their hotels, I am usually asked for my opinion. The last time I stayed in one was in May last year when I stayed overnight in Aberdeen. The location was always going put a dampener on Travelodge’s effort to seek praise for their services. The hotel was clean enough and served its basic purpose of having a comfortable bed on which to crash out after a indulging in a couple of half pint shandies after watching Hearts play at Pittodrie. My grip with this particular visit was with the lass on reception who was about as welcoming as Aberdonians can be (there was never any danger of her face breaking out into a smile and she advised me the lift was ‘doon the hall there’) Naturally, I referred to this in my ‘customer satisfaction survey’ which I received a couple of days later. The point I am rather labouring here is Travelodge would have been none the wiser about their surly employee – if they hadn’t rather inconvenienced me with one of their damn surveys.

 

While I’ve been used to Travelodge’s ways of gauging customer satisfaction, it seems to me more and more companies are now following suit. I ordered something from Amazon a couple of days after Christmas. Their customer focus is second to none and upon placing the order on-line, I immediately received an email advising me when I could expect delivery. In fact the goods arrived the day before the expected delivery date so I was a happy chappy. I fully expected the ‘customer survey’ email from Amazon and this was duly received yesterday. However, to my puzzlement, the survey wasn’t asking about the delivery process; it was asking if I was satisfied with the way it was packaged. This is a new one on me. As long as the goods were intact and they were delivered on time, it’s a fair assertion that I couldn’t give a monkey’s toss about the packaging.

 

Last week, I ordered a printer from John Lewis. I opted for the ‘click and collect’ service which their Edinburgh branch operates. I ordered the goods on-line and received the now customary email advising I could collect it the following day, which I did on my way home from work. It was not a particularly memorable experience – two fellas behind a desk, one of whom went round the back of the office and returned with my printer two minutes later – but then again, collecting an item from a shop is hardly designed to be memorable. Nonetheless, John Lewis have seen fit to email me a survey asking for my opinion on their ‘click and collect service’.

 

Now, I realise the importance of gauging customer satisfaction and evaluating customer service. Good God, I work for an organisation which falls over itself at times to prove it provides excellent customer service. But, I suspect I’m not alone in becoming rather weary at receiving countless customer satisfaction surveys, particularly for nondescript, routine things like how your goods from Amazon were packed.

 

I’m like any other person in that if I’m unhappy with a service I’ll damn well complain about it (and this worked to good effect with BT in September). I really can’t be bothered with survey after survey about how my ‘customer experience’ was.

 

Unless I’m sent a survey about the customer satisfaction survey. Then I may let loose…

If You're Thinking of Using BT...

...you may wish to consider my email to BT below. My mother has recently moved house  - and has been without her BT landline and broadband services for a few weeks. Below is my attempt to get BT to do something about it.

Sirs,

 

I am emailing to complain in the strongest possible terms about the order below and your customer service.

 

I am the son of Isabella Smith, the customer in the email below. She is 76 years old and recently moved home to sheltered housing accommodation. I have helped her with the transfer of her BT telephone and broadband service from her previous home to her new one. Here is a summary of events so far.

 

20 July - completed on-line transfer of service. My mother received a confirmation email to advise an engineer would visit her at her new home on 20 August - three days after she moved in.

 

20 August - despite being advised an engineer would call between 1.00pm and 6.00pm no one called. I tried to phone the BT number 0800 800 150 but, after an hour of 'queueing' could not get to speak to anyone.

 

21 August - spent another hour after work trying to get through on 0800 800 150 - still didn't get through. I sent a strongly worded email.

 

22 August - 8.00am - finally got through (after making myself late for work) and was told an engineer would reschedule a visit for 9 September between 1.00pm and 6.00pm. When I advised that an elderly woman not having a land line for another 3 weeks wasn't acceptable I was told this was the first available date.

 

7 September - my mother receives two emails from BT confirming an engineer will visit her between 1.00pm and 6.00pm on 9 September.

 

9 September - I took a half day off work to be at my mother's home for the engineer calling. No one called. There was no text message or call to my mother's mobile to advise. I phoned BT at 7.30 and after having to wait 20 minutes to speak to an advisor, was told the engineer's report stated my mother's telephone line would be activated at 12 midnight - this despite no one calling or contacting her to advise this.

 

10 September - my mother still has no phone line. It had not been activated as promised. I called BT yet again at 5.00pm after my work and was told by another advisor that a BT engineer had called at my mother's home at 7.00pm on 9 September. This a blatant lie - I was with her at that time and I can assure you no one from BT visited or made any contact.

 

I was told by a BT advisor that an engineer would call round to my mother's on 30 September - nearly 3 weeks later! I replied this was completely unacceptable and that an urgent appointment had to be made. The advisor told me she would speak to her supervisor and phone my mother in half an hour (I had to go out and was already late for a meeting) No one phoned - but my mother received a text message advising that an engineer would visit her on 30 September.

 

Quite frankly, my mother has been treated appallingly by BT. She has been a loyal BT customer for several decades now and has her phone line and broadband services from you. She has paid a full year's line rental in advance in June and has not had a telephone line for nearly 3 weeks - with another 3 weeks delay this will be 6 weeks in total. Obviously, she has had no broadband service for this period either.

 

My mother is nearly 77 years old. She has various health problems including angina and high blood pressure. She lives alone and a land-line telephone is essential. None of this is her fault yet she is being treated like a second class citizen rather than a loyal BT customer.

 

I am extremely angry and demand this is resolved as a matter of urgency. BT have treated my mother with contempt and have blatantly lied to me, her next of kin.

 

PLEASE ENSURE HER TELEPHONE AND BROADBAND SERVICE IS ACTIVATED AS A MATTER OF URGENCY. The order details are below.

 

If not, I shall be seeking legal advice over this matter.

 

Mike Smith (son)

Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam...

We live in an age of instant communication. Computers, the internet and mobile, wireless technology mean we can communicate instantly with almost any part of the world at the press of a touchpad or click of a mouse. Satellite wizardry has changed the world and made it a much smaller place. But naturally there has to be a down side to all this.

Spam. Unsolicited e-mails from all parts of the globe (although mainly, it has to be said, America) It's a blight of the communication age and a constant irritant. Why don't you fit a spam filter I hear computer experts cry? I have - through those bastions (no, that's not a spelling mistake) of communications, BT. I pay the princely sum of £1.50 per month for the chaps and chapesses at BT to divert rogue and sometimes malicious e-mails from my in-box to the bulk mail box. And to be fair to BT it usually works with as much as sixty junk e-mails heading my way every day. But occasionally, e-mails that aren't spam are read as such by BT and are deposited in said bulk mail box. Which is as much as an irritant as having to deal with the damn spammers in the first place.

My good friend from Seattle, the lovely June, cheers me up no end with her thoughtful and compassionate words. But sometimes the BT filter gets suspicious and diverts her e-mails in the same direction as dubious messages offering everything from Viagra to valium. Which means I have to check the bulk mail to ensure there isn't anything of value there. I made the mistake of just emptying the bulk mail folder the other week without checking and thereby deleted an important e-mail from Heart of Midlothian FC about plans for my contributions to next seasons programme.

So, I have to wade through reams of rubbish just in case something has slipped through. At this time of the year I'm receiving dozens of junk e-mails about what I ought to do for Father's Day which, apparently, is this Sunday (if my daughters are reading this, that's this Sunday) Given my father has been dead for more than eleven years it's not something high on my priorities but this is a stark example of my privacy being invaded by unscrupulous companies who show no consideration for the feelings of others.

As for the companies constantly screaming at me to buy Viagra, I have considered taking legal action against them.

But then a good friend of mine, who shall remain nameless, told me it would never stand up in court...