All posts by MrDaz

Darren Jamieson, aka MrDaz, is the Technical Director and co-founder of Engage Web and has been working online in a career spanning two decades. His first website was built in 1998 and is still live today.
British Telecom, Rants

BT drop the ball again

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You might remember my previous attempt to order the new broadband wireless home hub from BT. Well, I’ve just had an email from them pleading ignorance, which surprises me as they phoned me up later that night to process my order.

See what you make of this:

Dear Mr Jamieson,

Thank you for your e-mail.

Please accept my apologies for the delay in replying to you and for any inconvenience this may have caused.

I will be happy to deal with your enquiry upon receipt of your account details. Unfortunately as you have not provided me with your BT Account number I am unable to access your account to make your requests at this time.

If you should have any further queries please do not hesitate to contact us again via e-mail.

Thank you for contacting BT.

Yours sincerely,

Samantha Murray
BT Customer Services

I found this most frustrating, and instantly replied with the following:

I received a phone call just hours after sending this email, where I was told my order would be reinstated. I was told if there were any problems I’d receive a call back. I have not had one.

Why is it so difficult to order broadband from BT? I would have thought it simple, especially as I already am a BT customer with broadband.

This is rediculous, I am still paying the GBP 26.99 per month instead of the GBP 21.99 I was promissed when I made the order in the begining of January.

If this is the level of customer service I can expect I’ll cancel my current broadband and go to Sky.

I am absolutely stunned by the level of disinterest displayed by BT in the face of a long term customer wishing to upgrade their Internet account.

For what it is worth, my BT number is ***********. You can attempt to contact me if you wish, but as BT has spectacularly failed me with outstanding dedication I won’t hold my breath for the WIFI broadband I ordered some weeks ago.

Cheers!

I really don’t understand what the problem is. I want to order broadband with the WIFI home hub, why can’t they just do it?

Rants

Chav Scum

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I found out recently that my ex-wife has given a set of keys to one of her mates to enter MY house when I’m at work in order to roam the property and take what she fancies.

Now, I have a few issues with this as you might imagine.

Firstly, I don’t really want some chav scum in my home stealing whatever she thinks she can sell or use. Who would? Secondly, the police (as I predicted before I called them) couldn’t be arsed getting off their ever increasing arses, putting down their doughnuts and coming out as they deemed it ‘nothing to do with them’.

Wonderful eh, what do I pay taxes for again?

Of course, one potential problem springs to mind about all of this. What if I’m in the house next time? If I happen to find some chav scum pilfering my goods, rummaging through my shit, I’m not going to stand by and watch. I’m not going to offer to help them carry my TV down the stairs. I’m going to treat them as a burgler and remove them from my property.

I can picture the phone call to the police now.

“My ex-wife has given her keys to her friend to steal from my house”.

“Sorry, nowt to do with us mate”

“That’s OK, I was only letting you know because I’ve caught the bitch and beaten the shite out of her”.

If you want justice, don’t bother with the police.

Rants

BSM instructor breaks the law

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While driving home tonight (which is often a subject for a good rant) I was behind a BSM instructor in rush hour, using his mobile phone while driving.

What chance the youth of today when the instructors for supposedly the best driving instructor firm in the UK drive illegally? I’d call BSM and tell them, if I thought for a second they’d give a rat’s ass. They wouldn’t of course, so I’ll just spread the word here.

It was a Vauxhaul Corsa, registration KN56 GFZ.

Direct Line Insurance, Stolen Car

Insurance fraud shouldn’t be this easy

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As regular readers of this online rantathon will know, my BMW Z3 was stolen some months ago from the Hillcroft Garage in Langstone, and Direct Line insurers foolishly paid out my estranged wife over 6k despite the car having been recovered.

My efforts to notify Direct Line of the vehicle’s recovery fell on deaf ears, as my ex had instructed them not to speak to me for the purposes of defrauding them, so every phone call to them was met with a staunch “sorry, we can’t speak to you” rebuttal.

A quick update before I recount today’s frustrating events: The car is safe with me, my ex has attempted (through an illiterate solicitor) to get me to pay the money she defrauded, Royal Sun Alliance (the garage’s insurer) have my documents and Direct Line still refuse to speak to me.

So, over to today…

I need to get my car documents back from Royal Sun Alliance, and to get the outstanding problems fixed with the car so I telephoned Churchgate Insurance Broker’s Don Robinson today at 2:00pm to try and find out why they have done nothing since I last contacted them on November 17th. He insisted he’d try and find the contact details for Royal Sun Alliance and call me back before he goes home for the day at 4:00pm. Guess what? He didn’t bother. There’s a surprise.

I then phoned Direct Line’s customer support, and got instantly cut off. After my experiences with the morons at BT last night, this did not go down well.

I tried again instantly, and eventually got through to someone called Nick in their Bristol office. After explaining the situation to Nick, he attempted to find out who was dealing with this farce. He tracked it down to their Leeds branch, but when he tried to call them they said they could not speak to me. That’s nice isn’t it? They’ve been defrauded and I’ve had a car stolen, yet they can’t speak to me. How else do they imagine they’ll get this fucking situation sorted???

Nick dealt with my frustration very well and gave me the number for their head office in Croydon, Surrey, which I’ll share with you now. It’s 020 8686 3313, and a chap named Ray Harper, who handles complaints. I told Ray everything that had happened, and he said they’d look into and get back to me.

Less that an hour later, a woman named Chloe O`Driscol phoned and said that the case was being looked into, and even though she couldn’t give me any details (because they can’t still can’t speak about the policy, due to the ex putting the bar on them talking to me) they’d get back to me tomorrow with a status update.

I truly hope they do, because I just can’t understand how I can have a car stolen, Direct Line can be defrauded, my ex can walk away with over 6k and Direct Line can persist in refusing to speak to me even though we’ve both been the victim of wilful crime.

It’s now 3:58pm, and I just phoned Don Robinson back as he’d assured me he’d call me before he left for home at 4:00pm. Guess what readers? The dopey lying fucker has gone home.

Further updates to follow as and when I get them.