Haloface
09-06-2008, 06:13 AM
Hello my babies, I missed you all so much.
OK so I just finished moving house - well, ok, flat, or "apartment", as you Yanks call it - and may I ask just when did the entire world become UTTERLY. FUCKING. RETARDED.?!?!?!.
No, I don't just mean the "oops, sorry, we got that wrong, but we'll sort it out for you asap", rather I mean the "UH OH SPAGHETEO!!!!" retardation (yes, it's a word).
Despite the financial world crumbling around us, me and 'Her Indoors' are actually doing pretty well and have managed to snag a nice flat in a good area. So we spent about 3 months peeing ourselves with excitement, and it's only our second ever home so it was a big deal.
With that in mind I wanted everything to go smooth (for that fact maybe I had it coming?) and perfect, so I ordered everything well in advance, a new bed with 3 weeks delivery, a new phone line with a 5 working day transfer time-frame, and broadband and Sky, both being connected as soon as the phone was on, etc etc.
Fine - all paid for in advance, had received all confirmation letters. Things looked set for Monday, the 25th of August, A-go-go!
It was supposed to go smooth, like Chinese Olympics smooth. But what did it end up? The fucking rape of Nanking, that's what I got. I got butt-fucked harder than Georgia.
So we turn up Monday morning with the furniture, the bed was coming at 1pm, no probs. The line was to have been transfered to us by 8am, great. Then a quick phone-call and I'd have also been online, as well as recording my favourite shows with Sky+.
The first hitch that should have made me aware was that the bed, ordered from Argos, turned up at my old address. Right, fine, that wasn't too far away. I zoomed back and collected it, and carried on with moving the furniture in. This didn't take too long, let's face it, we're poor, young professionals, we own about 3 bits of furniture. We got done around 3pm, and then I decided to put the bed together. Of course, as I unwrap it I slowly realise that the bed, which came in two boxes, has a black frame, but white legs and slats. They'd given us a bastard, half-breed of a bed. We ordered just white. But it's early in the day, I'm still excited about the whole moving experience, and I'm not too nasty on the phone to Argos when I explain I want a white frame here by the end of the week, and I'm putting this black one up in the meantime, whatever their policy says about returned items.
The bed is one of those items that comes in several thousand pieces, Ikeaish, with little stupid alan-keys. I spent literally an hour getting the frame together, when I took a step back and thought, "hmm, that's big." No matter, we're pretty poop'd and want it up before dinner, so I carried on, got the legs on, spine, and come to the slats. They're about 4 inches too short for the frame. Oh dear. Not only do we have the wrong colour, but they've also given us a king size frame, with slats for a double bed.
By now I'm beginning to see that things are not going to plan, it's not yet the Rape of Nanking, but it's definately departed from the Chinese Olympics. I explain the situation to the woman on the phone - but she doesn't give a rat's arse. Now I find this kind of behaviour annoying, I explain that I've just moved in, ordered this bed weeks ago, that it came to the wrong house, came in the wrong colour, and is in two different sizes. Now I have to sleep on the fucking floor, in my new fucking home, for a fucking week until this gets fucking sorted fucking out fucking. Fuck. (Of course I don't say fuck, I'm not as depressed and demoralized as I'll be by the end of the day. But I don't know that yet. So at this point I'm 'agitated'.) I'm offered not an apology, no, dear lord, no apology here. After my rant there's silence, then some heavy breathing, and then here it comes: "so, you want a refund or a new one sent out?" No "OH MY I AM SO SORRY SIR, WE HAVE DONE YOU WRONG AND NOW YOU ARE SUFFERING - ON THE FLOOR YOU SAY!?!? I'LL PERSONALLY SEE TO IT THAT WE SEND A TEAM OF PEOPLE OVER TO FORM A HUMAN BED FRAME FOR YOU TO SLEEP ON UNTIL WE CAN RECTIFY THE SITUATION!!!!!" Nothing. Just "refund or a new one?" like I've annoyed her for not having decided. Anywho, it's still early in my Hiroshima day, so I opt for a new one to be sent out asap.
Now, I've done all of this on my mobile, because shortly before this telephone call I've checked to see if the lan-line is up and running. Is it shite. Nothing, no ring tone, no nothing. That's odd. A quick call to BT, or British Telecommunications, or as it is now known, Bastard Terrorcommunicators. Right, now as you know I'm a liberal lefty, I'm all like "yay ethnics and minorities" etc etc. I'm down with the ethnics. But on a day like this, I am in no mood for Rimjob Sindhianrao from Islamabad sitting in a call centre of 5,000 offices in the middle of the fucking desert asking me how to spell my name - David, a very simple, old, accessible name - and then proceeding to call me Mr Daniel for the rest of the conversation. I've got shelves to put up, bulbs to put in, wiring to sort out, areial points to screw in, and no fucking bed. Put it this way, when I came off the phone, it said I had been on there for 110 minutes. An hour and forty minutes on the phone trying to figure out why a simple home phone line had not been transfered as requested AND paid for. Four Pakistanis, three Indians, 2 Scotsman and an Englishman later, I'm told that the original BT phone person had not transfered the existing line over to me, but had instead cancelled the existing line and re-ordered a new one. This process takes 10 working days - or two weeks and £124.99, not 5 days and £11.99 as promised - and as such I'll be without a phone for at least another week. Not to mention the fact that instead of being able to fill the cupboards with food, as one hopes for, we'll now be eating Tesco Saver's baked beans all week as after the deposit and first month's rent, we only had about 120 quid left anyway!!!
Anywho, persistence, growling, and a crying fit eventually gave me a reduced reconnection charge and the promise that it'll be done by mid-week. Hurrah, I'm a phone-wizard, I'm becoming an expert at handling BIG_CORPORATION_DRONE_01 (not to mention that I have now learnt intermediate Hinudistani)! Nonetheless with a few direct debits I had forgotten about, it seems we are now eating beans all week regardless.
Just when I thought it was stressful enough, I spent 45 minutes in a telephone queue (my mobile bill is going to be fearsome) trying to speak to someone at Sky to inform them of BT's delay in connecting me, only to be told that they tried to connect Sky+ and broadband at 3pm, as arranged, but as they were unable to (due obviously to BT's fuck up) the order had cancelled and if I still wanted it I had to re-order the package with a 5-10 working day wait.
No one once that day apologised, no one gave a fucking blink at my poor plight, so I sit in my lovely flat with no bed (we have since received a letter stating that the originally ordered bed is now out of stock and it will take up to 3 weeks to order a new frame), no phone, nothing to watch, and no internet, because God hates me.
But I thought I'd drop by my parent's place today to say hello to you all, and to share my Nanking with you all!
Be back online soon!
OK so I just finished moving house - well, ok, flat, or "apartment", as you Yanks call it - and may I ask just when did the entire world become UTTERLY. FUCKING. RETARDED.?!?!?!.
No, I don't just mean the "oops, sorry, we got that wrong, but we'll sort it out for you asap", rather I mean the "UH OH SPAGHETEO!!!!" retardation (yes, it's a word).
Despite the financial world crumbling around us, me and 'Her Indoors' are actually doing pretty well and have managed to snag a nice flat in a good area. So we spent about 3 months peeing ourselves with excitement, and it's only our second ever home so it was a big deal.
With that in mind I wanted everything to go smooth (for that fact maybe I had it coming?) and perfect, so I ordered everything well in advance, a new bed with 3 weeks delivery, a new phone line with a 5 working day transfer time-frame, and broadband and Sky, both being connected as soon as the phone was on, etc etc.
Fine - all paid for in advance, had received all confirmation letters. Things looked set for Monday, the 25th of August, A-go-go!
It was supposed to go smooth, like Chinese Olympics smooth. But what did it end up? The fucking rape of Nanking, that's what I got. I got butt-fucked harder than Georgia.
So we turn up Monday morning with the furniture, the bed was coming at 1pm, no probs. The line was to have been transfered to us by 8am, great. Then a quick phone-call and I'd have also been online, as well as recording my favourite shows with Sky+.
The first hitch that should have made me aware was that the bed, ordered from Argos, turned up at my old address. Right, fine, that wasn't too far away. I zoomed back and collected it, and carried on with moving the furniture in. This didn't take too long, let's face it, we're poor, young professionals, we own about 3 bits of furniture. We got done around 3pm, and then I decided to put the bed together. Of course, as I unwrap it I slowly realise that the bed, which came in two boxes, has a black frame, but white legs and slats. They'd given us a bastard, half-breed of a bed. We ordered just white. But it's early in the day, I'm still excited about the whole moving experience, and I'm not too nasty on the phone to Argos when I explain I want a white frame here by the end of the week, and I'm putting this black one up in the meantime, whatever their policy says about returned items.
The bed is one of those items that comes in several thousand pieces, Ikeaish, with little stupid alan-keys. I spent literally an hour getting the frame together, when I took a step back and thought, "hmm, that's big." No matter, we're pretty poop'd and want it up before dinner, so I carried on, got the legs on, spine, and come to the slats. They're about 4 inches too short for the frame. Oh dear. Not only do we have the wrong colour, but they've also given us a king size frame, with slats for a double bed.
By now I'm beginning to see that things are not going to plan, it's not yet the Rape of Nanking, but it's definately departed from the Chinese Olympics. I explain the situation to the woman on the phone - but she doesn't give a rat's arse. Now I find this kind of behaviour annoying, I explain that I've just moved in, ordered this bed weeks ago, that it came to the wrong house, came in the wrong colour, and is in two different sizes. Now I have to sleep on the fucking floor, in my new fucking home, for a fucking week until this gets fucking sorted fucking out fucking. Fuck. (Of course I don't say fuck, I'm not as depressed and demoralized as I'll be by the end of the day. But I don't know that yet. So at this point I'm 'agitated'.) I'm offered not an apology, no, dear lord, no apology here. After my rant there's silence, then some heavy breathing, and then here it comes: "so, you want a refund or a new one sent out?" No "OH MY I AM SO SORRY SIR, WE HAVE DONE YOU WRONG AND NOW YOU ARE SUFFERING - ON THE FLOOR YOU SAY!?!? I'LL PERSONALLY SEE TO IT THAT WE SEND A TEAM OF PEOPLE OVER TO FORM A HUMAN BED FRAME FOR YOU TO SLEEP ON UNTIL WE CAN RECTIFY THE SITUATION!!!!!" Nothing. Just "refund or a new one?" like I've annoyed her for not having decided. Anywho, it's still early in my Hiroshima day, so I opt for a new one to be sent out asap.
Now, I've done all of this on my mobile, because shortly before this telephone call I've checked to see if the lan-line is up and running. Is it shite. Nothing, no ring tone, no nothing. That's odd. A quick call to BT, or British Telecommunications, or as it is now known, Bastard Terrorcommunicators. Right, now as you know I'm a liberal lefty, I'm all like "yay ethnics and minorities" etc etc. I'm down with the ethnics. But on a day like this, I am in no mood for Rimjob Sindhianrao from Islamabad sitting in a call centre of 5,000 offices in the middle of the fucking desert asking me how to spell my name - David, a very simple, old, accessible name - and then proceeding to call me Mr Daniel for the rest of the conversation. I've got shelves to put up, bulbs to put in, wiring to sort out, areial points to screw in, and no fucking bed. Put it this way, when I came off the phone, it said I had been on there for 110 minutes. An hour and forty minutes on the phone trying to figure out why a simple home phone line had not been transfered as requested AND paid for. Four Pakistanis, three Indians, 2 Scotsman and an Englishman later, I'm told that the original BT phone person had not transfered the existing line over to me, but had instead cancelled the existing line and re-ordered a new one. This process takes 10 working days - or two weeks and £124.99, not 5 days and £11.99 as promised - and as such I'll be without a phone for at least another week. Not to mention the fact that instead of being able to fill the cupboards with food, as one hopes for, we'll now be eating Tesco Saver's baked beans all week as after the deposit and first month's rent, we only had about 120 quid left anyway!!!
Anywho, persistence, growling, and a crying fit eventually gave me a reduced reconnection charge and the promise that it'll be done by mid-week. Hurrah, I'm a phone-wizard, I'm becoming an expert at handling BIG_CORPORATION_DRONE_01 (not to mention that I have now learnt intermediate Hinudistani)! Nonetheless with a few direct debits I had forgotten about, it seems we are now eating beans all week regardless.
Just when I thought it was stressful enough, I spent 45 minutes in a telephone queue (my mobile bill is going to be fearsome) trying to speak to someone at Sky to inform them of BT's delay in connecting me, only to be told that they tried to connect Sky+ and broadband at 3pm, as arranged, but as they were unable to (due obviously to BT's fuck up) the order had cancelled and if I still wanted it I had to re-order the package with a 5-10 working day wait.
No one once that day apologised, no one gave a fucking blink at my poor plight, so I sit in my lovely flat with no bed (we have since received a letter stating that the originally ordered bed is now out of stock and it will take up to 3 weeks to order a new frame), no phone, nothing to watch, and no internet, because God hates me.
But I thought I'd drop by my parent's place today to say hello to you all, and to share my Nanking with you all!
Be back online soon!