Buying a new car

I have just bought a new car.  It's a very nice new car.  It's a brand new car and I will be getting it on 1st march 2017.  I am not going to rant about my new car.  As I say, my new car is very nice.  I am going to rant about the process of buying a new car.

Sooooo, I phone the car salesroom and it takes absolutely ages for anyone to answer the phone.  (When I worked as a receptionist I had to answer the phone within 3 rings - otherwise I probably would have been sacked!)  Then I have to wait for ages while I'm being transferred to the sales department.....................

.................The conversation goes a bit like this.

Me:  'I'd like to buy a new car (and I state the make and model I want).  Just wondered what the best deal is that you have for that?'

Salesperson - 'You want a brand new car?'

Me - 'Yes, Can I come in and discuss the cost and perhaps have a test drive?'

Salesperson - 'If you give me your phone number, I'll call you back in 5 mins.  I just have to go and check that we have one in stock for you to test drive.'

5 mins later salesperson phones back...........................

Salesperson:  'We haven't got the model you want in our showroom but if you want to pop in we can run through some price plans.'

Me - 'OK, what's the starting price of a new model?'  (I have a vague idea of how much a new car is going to cost.)

Salesperson - 'When would you like to come in?'

Me - 'About 2-ish tomorrow afternoon.'

Salesperson - 'Yes, that will be fine.'

So at the appointed time I show up at the salesroom and tell the young receptionist (who looks very presentable in her up-to-the-date fashionable clothes and overly made up face) that I have an appointment to see 'D'.  I'm told he's with a customer and I should go and sit in the waiting area and grab myself a free coffee.  So I grab myself a free coffee and I wait and I wait and I wait.  And I think, I've got better things to be doing than this and may be I should just buy another make of car.  And also; why does everyone think that 'grabbing a coffee' is going to solve the problem of an appointment being delayed?  I would have rather the salesman had met me at the appointed time.  I didn't actually need to grab myself a coffee, I didn't actually want a coffee, and I only grabbed a free coffee because I had nothing better to do.  Oh and I also connected to their free wifi.  But did I need to connect to their free wifi?  I did not.  I would rather have had the salesperson meet me at the appointed time.

Anyway after half an hour, salesperson appeared.  Conversation below ensured:

Salesperson: 'Hi I'm D.  D looks about 12 years old.  You want to buy a new car?'

Me: 'Yes'

Salesperson:  'A brand new car, straight from the factory?'

Me: 'Yes'.

Salesperson: 'OK, if you just wait here a minute I've just got to check on something.'

5 mins pass and by now I've finished my coffee, finished looking at every imaginable thing I can think of to look at on my phone with my free wifi and am just thinking about calling it a day and leaving when '12 year old' reappears.

Salesperson: - 'I'm going to leave you in the capable hands of M because I've never, ever done a sale straight from the factory.'

Me: 'OK'

New salesperson is about my age.  Thank goodness I think.  Unfortunately new salesperson is not very computer savy.  I tell him what I want to know........................ which is basically just how much is the make and model of the new car?  He frantically taps stuff into a computer which doesn't give him the information he needs so he constantly leaves me sitting there like a lemon while he goes off to 'check things'.  This process goes on for more than an hour.  And this is what I need to rant about.  Why does a salesperson not know how much a car costs?  It's a brand new car.  It must come out of the factory at X amount of money and then surely you just pay a bit extra for whatever 'extras' you're adding to it.

Apparently not - There wasn't a box on the computer data base to key in the make and model I wanted.  'Why not' I asked................  The answer was it was a new model and because it won't be registered until the 1st March it won't be on the computer till then.  I'm not sure I believe that but hey ho.

Anyway after about an hour and a half we eventually decide on a price but salesperson said he could only give me £2000 as a trade in price.  I ask if that is the most he can give me and after he's left me sitting alone AGAIN he eventually returns and says that is the best price he can do.  I say I'm off home to think about it and will call him the following afternoon......................  Well you have to keep these salespeople waiting don't you?

About a minute after 12 noon the following day, salesperson phones me.  I'm annoyed because I had said that I would phone him so I tell him I'm still thinking about it and ask him a lot of stupid questions about optional extras and cover and other such stuff that I've already made up my mind that I don't want.  Then I ask him if the £2000 trade in price is still the best he can do for me...................  And miraculously it is upped to £2300???

Seriously annoyed about this.  Well, obviously I'm not annoyed that I'm going to be £300 richer. Why is everything such a fight?  If he'd agreed to this the day before, I might have signed on the dotted line straight away.

Everything these days just seems such a struggle.  There's no incentive for anyone to be loyal to any one particular company or business. 

And then, even when I popped down to the salesroom and said that I wanted to go ahead, it still took more than an hour to pay a deposit.  The deposit was supposed to be £300 and then all of a sudden when I agreed that I wanted to buy the car,  the deposit jumped to £1000???  So that involved salesperson going off and leaving me alone AGAIN to check more things???

.......................I'm getting a bit fed up of ranting now.........................

End result - I've paid a £300 deposit, I've got a reasonable trade in price for my old car, and on the 1st March 2017, I'll be getting a brand new shiny car.  Yay!!!

Universal grill pan handle

The photo above is a universal grill pan handle.  Except it's not.  Universal means that it should fit any grill pan in the whole wide world and it doesn't???  It doesn't fit my grill pan.  This cost me £6.99 on Amazon.  OK not a lot but that's not the point.  It was advertised as being universal and its not.  What am I going to do with a grill pan handle that I can't actually use?  And don't say 'send it back'.  Unfortunately I had this delivered to my sisters home because she is in all day to take in deliveries and by the time I got it, it was about a month later.  I just immediately took it out of all the ridiculously unnecessary packaging that it was in and chucked away all of the packaging.  Well you would wouldn't you.  It's a universal grill pan handle.  It's supposed to fit any grill pan.  I'm so angry about this.

And actually while I'm having a bit of a rant about a grill pan handle I'll just have another rant about buying a new cooker that doesn't actually come with a grill pan handle.  When I phoned the manufacturers and asked why I didn't have a grill pan handle they told me it was because of health and safety issues.

Health and safety??  The world has gone crazy!  Apparently new cookers are not supplied with grill pan handles because stupid people might try and shut the door to the grill with the handle still attached and that might cause the glass door to break.  The fact that people might burn their hands while trying to use a grill pan that does not have a handle doesn't seem to have entered their heads??  Surely that is a bigger health and safety risk than some thick person shutting an oven door that has a handle sticking out?

So now I'm back to square one.  I still don't have a handle for my grill pan and I still am almost burning my hands on a regular basis every time I use it.  I have burnt umpteen T-towels and oven gloves because I'm actually having to stick my hands right under the grill to pull the grill pan out.

I CANNOT believe that in this day and age, with all the H&S stuff that seems to abound that one cannot actually buy a cooker that comes with a handle for a grill pan.

#seriouslynothappy

Supermarket shop assistants

I'm feeling a bit 'ranty' today.  Don't really know why. I just am.  Actually I do know why.  I always feel like this after a trip to Asda.

Much as I love all the cheap deals that Asda does..................... there's certain aspects of Asda that really annoy me.  The main one being that they only ever seem to have two proper checkouts in operation and the rest of the time one has to do self service check out.  Even if you have a big grocery shop you have to scan it all out yourself??  I'm sure they must lose loads in shop lifting via this method.

Anyway I always seem to choose the longest queue or the queue where the check out person is actually still training or the queue where someone wants to pick up a last minute item and so a 'runner' has to be called to go and get it.

Today I actually tried to count how may 'self service' tills were in operation.  I think there must have been about 12 tills for 'baskets' and a further four tills for trolleys with a total of two staff looking after them.  So I guess that's cutting down on about 14 check out operators? However there were also two tills with proper check out operators and the queues at both were more than four people long.  In other 'well known supermarkets' if the queue for a till is more than 3 people long another till is opened. Not so in Asda.

If I were the 'marketing manager' for Asda which I'm obviously not because I can't even get a job in a supermarket as a checkout operator - see previous rants - I would be talking to people in the queues and asking them what they thought of the service.

But I am not the marketing manager for Asda and the employees of Asda obviously have their own goals and targets to meet.  And opening up another employee operator till doesn't seem to be an option?? Even though there were plenty of self service tills available no body actually wants to use them.

And on that note I must have to praise 'Morrisons', who as far as I know, have done away with all their self service tills because they know their customers do not like them.  If one supermarket can do this why can't all the rest?   The only reason I don't shop at Morrisons is because living in the SW, my nearest Morrisons is quite some distance away.

As one of my friends said, 'I haven't gone to university for 3 years to be a check out girl'.

And while I think that is a bit of a snobbish statement to make.....................  (We actually all love the 'check out girls'.  I'd be happy if I could get a job as a check out girl in a supermarket.  See my previous rants?!!!), I can actually see where she's coming from.  We don't want to have to check out our own shopping.  We want someone to do it for us.  ~And lets face it girls  - every time I do a supermarket shop I have alcohol in my basket, so I've always got to wait while someone comes to check that I am over 18 years old. Lol!

But the thing that annoyed me most on my trip to Asda today was.....................  I wanted stamps.  Actually I only wanted one stamp but I know that supermarkets only sell stamps in books.  Tesco sell stamps at the checkout.  Today I asked 'very lovely man' at checkout for a book of 6 second class stamps and he told me to go to customer services.  So I went to customer services and joined a queue with four people in front of me.  And I witnessed the shop assistant on customer services being very rude to the person in the front of the queue.  OK maybe not rude, but certainly very patronising.  And I thought how can I not manage to get a job in a supermarket when rude, unfriendly people like this can.  And to be honest................... I think it all comes down to being computer literate and being able to pass online screening processing.

So I eventually got to the front of the queue (after person on customer services had actually been quite curt with the other people before me) and I asked for a book of 6 second class stamps.

Asda employee - 'Don't sell them.  We only have books of 12'.

Well I didn't want a book of 12 because I hardly ever send anything via snail mail.  I actually only wanted one stamp but was prepared to buy a book of 6 but her attitude really annoyed me.

And that's what I'm ranting about today.

Obviously it is not her fault that Asda only stock books of 12 second class stamps however it is her fault that she couldn't rely this information to me in a more civilised manner.

......................And I'm still left wondering how rude, uninterested person, with no customer skills whatever so ever,  is able to get a job in a supermarket????

Actually I do know how she got the job.................... she's very techy savy?!!!

Unfortunately most people these days don't seem to have the ability to deal with real live people............... And as far as I am concerned that is very, very, sad!!!!

Feedback?!

Just received a text from BT saying. 'You recently placed an order with us and we'd love it if you could answer 3 short questions about your experience and our agent who raised your order.'

.....................Well I'd love it if I could actually provide feedback to BT which would be longer than 3 short text messages?  Three short text messages are no where near long enough to provide the feedback I would like to give BT.  ..................So no; I won't be providing any feedback re three short text messages.

I'll provide my feedback here on a public blog because it seems like there is absolutely no way of contacting a real live person at BT.  Actually, that's a bit of a lie because eventually I did manage to speak to a real live person. But only after I'd spend a lot of time on hold, pressing numerous numbers and listening to numerous messages.  And BT want me to provide feedback via 3 short text messages???  I don't think so?!

Firstly, I have been with BT for more than 30 years.  Does loyalty mean nothing?  It would seem not.  Every year I have to make a note to phone BT to keep my bill down.  If I were a new customer I would get all sorts of introductory deals and would be put on a really cheap tariff for 12 months.  Last year I phoned and surprise, surprise, after I threatened that I would leave BT to go to 'Talk Talk' all of a sudden my monthly bill was reduced by almost £20.

It shouldn't be like that.  Loyal customers should be rewarded for their loyalty.  Not penalised because they haven't moved to a different provider.

Sooooo................... because I am a very organised person I had a note in my diary to phone BT sometime this month (because my BT 12 month contract ends on 31st January) and query how much more I would be paying.

Seriously not happy about this because a few days ago I got an email saying that my 'free caller display' was coming to an end and if I renewed my contract for another 12 months I could get another 12 months of free caller display.  Unfortunately this email failed to tell me whether my land line rental and broadband were going to be renewed at the same rate.

BT - do you think your clients are stupid?

Signed up for this 'so called fabulous deal'.  Didn't do it on BTs website because I couldn't find anywhere that told me whether or not my line rental/broadband was going to be increased.  Did it via the phone instead (because I naively thought I might actually get to speak to a real live person)  and before I knew it, an automated machine had renewed my free caller display for another12 months.  Still didn't know if my line rental and broadband were going to remain the same.

And what is really, really annoying is................... BT send out emails saying that they will give one free caller display for another 12 months but they don't seem to send out emails saying that one's broadband is going to be increased by more than £15 at the end of a 12 month contract.

So I phoned 'Customer Options' - (the number is 01324 452504 if any one is interested.)  These are the people who can reduce your tariff.   

Customer Options?....................  I have to say you're not very customer friendly.  I've been paying just over £30 for the last 12 months for line rental and broadband and  free weekend calls and caller display.  And because I've remained loyal to BT, all of a sudden you want to put that price up to almost £50 a month.  I don't think so!!!

So then BT said they could do me a really good deal £22 per month for broadband.  Whoopee doo I thought................... until I realised that BT also wanted to charge me £18.99 on top of that for line rental????

As far as I am concerned that is not a good deal.  The PO do unlimited broadband and line rental and caller ID for £19.99 per month.  BT person said that I wouldn't get such fast speeds with the PO.  Duh - speeds mean nothing to me.  As long as I can connect to the internet, and do what I want to do, am I bothered about speeds?  I am not.

However after I said that - miraculously - BT suddenly decided that they could give me unlimited superfast broadband, free caller ID, free weekend calls and line rental all for £33.99.

Thank you BT.  However why has getting this tariff been such a struggle???

I've been loyal to BT for more than 30 years but it would seem that my loyalty counts for nothing.

.................And that is why I'm not going to respond to BTs stupid, stupid, text asking me to provide feedback about my latest experience via 3 short text questions.

However, should a 'real live person' want to contact me and talk to me then I would be more than happy to share my experiences of how disappointed I am with the loyalty that I have shown to BT.

#don'tthinkthatwilleverhappen

Spam Emails

I've just had an email from HSBC to tell me that my account has been suspended due to unusual activity???  I don't have an account with HSBC.  I've never had an account with HSBC so how can there be unusual activity on my account?

Obviously there is no unusual activity on an account that I do not have.

A few months ago I had a similar email about an account that I do have.  I just ignored it.  It was telling me that I had to click on a link to confirm that I was the account holder and if I didn't do this; access to my accounts would be suspended due to security reasons.

I didn't do it.

And I still have access to my accounts.

Seems like there is a lot of spamming going on here.

But this is actually very scary.  The emails have the 'proper logos' on the top of them, they are very official looking and sounding and to be honest I bet a lot of people are taken in by them.  I'm not.  But only because I don't bother reading stuff.  To me if the bank want to change any of my details I would hope that they would contact me via snail mail.  But there again maybe I'm living in the past.

Maybe by me deleting all emails from the banks I am actually missing vital information that I need to know.

A lot of my friends still do not even do internet banking.  It scares them.  They're worried about getting hacked and people getting their money and stuff going wrong.  I worry about that too.  But I also worry about someone mugging me at the cash point or someone following me into a bank and standing behind me in the queue and listening to what I am telling the cashier.

Life is full of opportunities for someone to spam you.

Cyber crime is on the up.  But I think we just all have to be aware that we are living in a cyber world.  Everything is done online these days.  And actually.................. not sure whether any research has been done into this.......................... BUT is there actually any more crime these days than there was 40 years ago when people just got mugged for their cash?

Spam emails are 'big business' these days.  People obviously are making a lot of money out of these.  I think the only thing we can all do is be on our guard at all times.................

......................Ie if one gets an email from a bank that one doesn't even have an account with, saying that one's account has been suspended......................  don't even think about clicking on the link!!!

OK rant over.  Let's all just be a bit more techy savy peeps!

Opticians

Anyone who reads my Blog regularly will know that one of my major rants is about 'dentists'???  If I were clever enough I'd put in 'links' at this point to my last four dentist rants.  But I'm not clever enough. So if you're interested enough to read back through all my posts you may well find my dentist rants.

Haven't had a rant about dentists for months....................... because I haven't been to the dentist for months.  I haven't been to the dentist for months because the last time I went, my dentist didn't even bother to look at my teeth properly.  He didn't clean my teeth, he didn't do a proper inspection, he just asked me the same patronising questions that he'd asked me ever since he started at the practise and then he took an x-ray of my teeth (which he'd only done a year previously) and surprise, surprise, nothing much had changed.  And then he wanted me to make an appointment with the dental hygienist.

Sorry Bloggers; I digress - but there will be more dentist rantings in the future, I'm sure.

So todays Blog is about 'Opticians'......................

..................I go to the Opticians every two years and I have to say, it is not normally anywhere as traumatic as going to the dentist.  However, I have to say that my usual optician is just as patronising as my dentist.  What is it about these so called professionals that make them treat you like a child and ask the same stupid, stupid, questions over and over again even though all the information is already on their databases???  As far as I'm concerned the only questions that they should have asked me today was; 'Have you started smoking since your last eye test?, Have you had any headaches since your last eye test? Have you experienced any problems with your vision since your last eye test?'  And as I'd already sat and waited for almost half an hour I'm pretty sure that would have cut down considerably on the time that all the other people who were after me had to wait.

Anyway today, after some minion had tested my proficial vision and god only knows what else, and after I'd then had to sit for almost another half an hour after that, because 'the optician is running a little bit late', Oh and the 'free wifi' kept cutting out so I ended up using up a lot of my 4G usage. I eventually got to see a new optician.  Whoopee doo.  I was so, so, pleased that 'patronising optician' was no longer around.  Have since found out that patronising optician was just on holiday - oh no - I have to have another eye test in two years?!

New optician was lovely, but only looked about 12 years old.  She told me her name but she was foreign and I didn't quite catch it.  Does that make me racist?

The trouble with youngsters is........................... they want to explain everything to you in great detail.

.......................I was having an eye test, not a brain scan??? 

All I wanted to know was; whether or not I needed new glasses.  I'm really not interested in looking on a computer and seeing a picture of my brain and my blood vessels and the back of my eye.  I know 'very young optician' was probably only doing what she has been trained to do........................... But seriously...........................  I'm 57 years old.

DO I NEED NEW GLASSES OR NOT?

Apparently not!  My eyes haven't changed that much in the last couple of years.

And actually.................... this part of the BLOG isn't a RANT but a compliment to 'very lovely young optician'.......................  When she asked me how long I'd had my glasses for and were they transitions, and where had I got them from.............................. She didn't throw a hissy fit because I'd bought them off the internet at a much, much, much, cheaper price than anything that I could have bought in the opticians.   They were just taken away and tested to make sure they were still suitable for my eyes.  Thank you, thank you, thank you, lovely young optician.

Last time 'usual optician' just about killed me when I said I'd managed to get 2 pairs of glasses online at less than a third of the price than what they wanted to charge me for one. Talk about patronising?? Her exact words were; 'You've bought them online?  I would never, ever trust any glasses that were bought online'.

Mmmmm...................  Well she was the one who give me the prescription, so actually I wasn't quite sure what she was saying here..................  Was she saying that the prescription wasn't correct or was she saying that choosing frames on the internet was not the way to go??

......................Maybe she's just not as 'computer savy' as a 57 year old???  ................Actually I think she might be older than 57???  ...........I'm hoping she's retired???  ..............Unfortunately I don't think she has retired??

OK Bloggers - keep watching this post.................................

.........................In January 2019 I will post another 'Optician' BLOG.  If I remember???

And the moral of the story is..........................  Today I spent almost an hour an a half in the opticians for an appointment that I thought would take 10 mins. (Thank goodness I paid for 2 hours of parking).

But my faith in humanity has been restored because when the 'very lovely minion' who had tested my proficial vision told me that I was 'free to go' (YAY!) and I asked how much I had to pay, he also found a 'voucher' which enabled me, not to have to pay.  Just how good is that???

There's a lot of things I could RANT about re my visit to the opticians today but actually....................  it was a visit to the opticians....................

My eyes are fine, it hasn't cost me anything to have them tested and although I had to wait for ages and ages and ages, I have my eyesight.  I can see.

Life is not a dress rehearsal and there are a lot of people in the world who have never, ever, been able to see.

I am lucky.