Rant of the Day v2.

[Pontius Navigator]

My town will have to wait a tad bit lot longer for it's by-pass as the discovery of soft ground where bridge abutments are being built means it's back to the drawing board to re-design the structure.

Oh dear.

For those that don't know, the bridge is to cross a fairly deep valley. The road could have been constructed down one side and up t'other except for a river (stream in US scale) and the main east coast rail line.

A single span suspension bridge might have been cheaper. There are pyramid quantities of hard core either side.
A clue might have been the flat bottom and the river.

[4mastacker]

I was talking to one of our local councillors on Friday about this latest delay. They are asking some serious questions about any survey that was done before work started and whether or not there were test borings done to assess the ground stability and what were the findings. He says the council is angry that this latests delay appears to have come as a complete surprise and are adamant that if there has been any omission by contractors then they bear the cost of any rectification/rework.

IIRC, as similar situation arose just a few years back when Waddington's runway was being extended. Work was well progressed when some ground "anomalies" were discovered which delayed finishing and added to the cost.

[OFSO]

Using the estate agent's own photographs and the sellers furniture to provide measurements (sofa cushions are usually consistant in size front to back, kitchen units likewise in height) I discovered their floor plan to be totally fictitious in terms of where doors and windows are located and their size. The end wall of the living room is not wall-to-wall glass as their plan shows, but has a much more useful 1m wide wall each side. Were the bedroom window to be located where their plan shows, opening the end fitted-wardrobe door would be impossible. And doors are hinged on the opposite side to that shown. What a bunch of incompetants...

[4mastacker]

Back in May, I e-mailed the Office of the Public Guardian with some questions about the application for Lasting Power of Attorney - the on-line guide didn't cover what I was asking. The automated reply stated they expected to reply within 25 working days and applications were taking 20 weeks to be registered. The OPG cited the all-too-convenient Covid as an excuse for their tardiness.

It is now 41 working days and still no answer. I have sent another e-mail asking for the reply, and got another automated answer giving the 25 working days reply time.

This time I have cc'd my hastener to my MP (who is aware of the earlier response) in the hope it spurs the OPG into getting off their @r$e$ and doing what they are paid to do.

[OFSO]

We gave up. Our first applications, two people, two applications each, were rejected for some ludicrous reason, a missed full stop, or a mutually-owned cat shared with a blood relative. The middle-eastern-named gentleman at the OPG offered a chance to redo all four at half price. We took him up on it, all four rejected again due to one name, not a signature, having been deleted with tippex. Then, to our surprise, one WAS accepted and sent to us, months later. No idea where it is now. Worthless.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

I get the roads plowed and repaired, sort of, usually, for my property and income taxes. There is usually emergency care at the nearest hospital. It is good if it's available.
That's it.
OTOH, I pay very little for it.
Since it appears all those paying much higher taxes in mine and other countries get little more than that, I suppose I should be grateful.
It's kinda like Luigi the extortionate Godfather sending the boy round, instead of sending The Boys round.

[Pontius Navigator]

Back in May, I e-mailed the Office of the Public Guardian with some questions about the application for Lasting Power of Attorney - the on-line guide didn't cover what I was asking. The automated reply stated they expected to reply within 25 working days and applications were taking 20 weeks to be registered. The OPG cited the all-too-convenient Covid as an excuse for their tardiness.

It is now 41 working days and still no answer. I have sent another e-mail asking for the reply, and got another automated answer giving the 25 working days reply time.

This time I have cc'd my hastener to my MP (who is aware of the earlier response) in the hope it spurs the OPG into getting off their @r$e$ and doing what they are paid to do.

I sense more chance of your canal overflowing tomorrow.

I wrote to our last MP who rather than actually supporting my query simply passed it to the Swiss Des, the MOD at the time, who simply responded with the stock answer. I couldn't be arsed to tell him what he should have done. He should simply have gone back to SD with WHY NOT?

[Rwy in Sight]

Isn't a cause of a rant to read standard stock responses when a specific question is asked?

[VP959]

I've just wasted half an hour trying to complain to an electricity company on behalf of a neighbour. The neighbour had a stroke last year and struggles to speak, but is otherwise fine. The electricity company have no means to communicate with those that cannot speak, they refuse to provide an email address, or even an address for letters, the only way to contact them is via the phone, an option that is useless for my neighbour. To cap it all, when I did finally get to speak to a humanoid on the phone, they refused point blank to speak with me about someone else's account.

Just finished penning a complaint to the regulator about them, not that I think it will make the slightest bit of difference. The complaint relates to the company having taken well over £1k too much by direct debit, so I'm sure they will try anything they can not to pay it back.

[Hydromet]

VP959, in Oz every company must have a registered address for service of notices etc. I'd be very surprised if the same wasn't the case in the USA. If you send your written complaint to the CEO, perhaps with a copy of your letter to the regulator, you may get a more satisfactory response. The CEO will never see it, of course, but it's likely to be passed to the correct person.

[VP959]

VP959, in Oz every company must have a registered address for service of notices etc. I'd be very surprised if the same wasn't the case in the USA. If you send your written complaint to the CEO, perhaps with a copy of your letter to the regulator, you may get a more satisfactory response. The CEO will never see it, of course, but it's likely to be passed to the correct person.

Thanks, I've now managed to get an address, albeit a PO Box rather than a physical address, so the chap can at least write to them. The PITA thing is that they deliberately make it hard to get hold of their address or email, presumably a tactic to try to dissuade people from complaining. Part of the problem is that, like many other utilities, banks, the council, etc, they have gone paperless, so there is no bit of paper with an address on, there is no address anywhere on their website and no address in any of the bits of emailed correspondence about the bill or account. The emails they send come from an email address that doesn't accept replies - when he tried he just got a "message undeliverable" reply from the server.

I've just read through the company's accessibility stuff, where they state that they comply with the laws regarding those with disabilities, but clearly they haven't considered the needs of someone that has difficulty speaking. They will, for example, post out braille documents on request, but only if you phone and ask them (good luck with that).

We shall have to wait and see what happens, but the electricity company concerned (SSE) is one that has a reputation for having a very high number of complaints for poor service, so I'm not holding my breath. Someone else has suggested going on Twitter and complaining that way. Might be worth a try, as the Twittersphere tends to explode when anything related to discrimination or disability gets a mention. Seems crazy that using public social media may end up being the best way to enable private communications with a company that is supposedly providing a service.

[Hydromet]

It seems that SSE sold their electricity business to OVO Energy. Their physical addresses are...

Locations

Country City Address
United Kingdom Bristol Temple Quay, 1 Friary, Redcliffe HQ
Australia Melbourne 120 Spencer St
United Kingdom London 33 Notting Hill Gate, Kensington
United Kingdom Warrington

From Wikipedia...

Regulator action[edit]
In January 2020, OVO Energy agreed to pay £8.9m into Ofgem's voluntary redress fund, after an investigation by Ofgem found instances of undercharging and overcharging, and inaccurate annual statements sent to more than half a million customers between 2015 and 2018. Head of Ofgem enforcement, Anthony Pygram, said "The supplier did not prioritise putting these issues right whilst its business was expanding."[13]

In March 2021, as part of a wider investigation into price protection failings by energy suppliers, OVO's practices were found to have caused detriment to 240,563 customers totalling over £2m, and the company was required to pay redress of over £2.8m – the highest amount of compensation among the 18 companies investigated.[14]

[Pontius Navigator]

stephen.fitzpatrick@ovoenergy.com

If you search for CEO email addresses you will find that and more.

In several instances I have received direct emails from a CEO and action followed

General tip, even if you can't find the address there are still ways and means. If you can find any email address ie name.name@company.co.uk and the name of the MD, CEO, COO then you will probably get through.

[k3k3]

He could approach his bank and invoke the direct debit guarantee to get his money back.

[VP959]

Thanks for the helpful tips above, I will pass them on to the chap, never know he may eventually get redress, although I'm not going to hold my breath. We were with them until around 3 years ago, when I changed supplier as I'd had enough of their incompetence.

Interesting to read their Wikipedia entry, I'd not thought to look there. Supports my view that they are a bit of a shambles.

[Pontius Navigator]

VP, not as much as my previous one who went bust. At least Ovo gives me 3%. Still good deal.

[Smeagol]

Continuing with the subject of energy companies, I have recently had a telephone conversation with the supplier of electricity to my holiday cottage in Cornwall, when I advised them that the electricity meter did not appear to be working ( it has not been working for 8 years but I have not told them that!) and need changing. I contacted them 3 weeks ago and informed them that they had 4 weeks to to effect the replacement as I would not be there after that and they would not be able to gain access. They have 4 days left, with no contact at at all so far.
Their accounting/metering algorithms must be poor for not flagging a zero reading for so long. I have been paying the standing charge on time and only contacted them after constant nagging from Mrs S!
I did contact them some years ago when they used an Indian call centre but nothing ever came of that as a deviation from their standard script seemed to be beyond their comprehension (surprise, surprise!). I will await their response this time, but I am not holding my breath!

[OFSO]

I would like to be able to rant about Ring pulling support for much of their home gadgetry over the next two years but since I never bought any of their stuff I won't. A reminder of how worthless internet/cloud connected smart home equipment is when the manufacturer stops supporting it.

[PHXPhlyer]

Sand filter for the pool was leaking around the pass-throughs for water going in and out.
I had to wait a week and a half to get repair guy over. Everyone backed up. He eventually subbed the job out to another guy. It took him several tries after replacing pass-through parts to get the seal right.
The pool went very green as the salt chlorination system couldn't be run until the leak was fixed.
After the repair I have been running the pump 20 hours a day, only off during 4 hour peak rate period.
Pool starting to show improvement until this morning. I went out to make sure the system was running in turbo mode only to find leaks in the newly replaced pass-throughs.
Of course, now at the weekend, not much chance of getting anyone back out.

PP

Pool repair guy said that he would be out first thing Monday morning to fix the :fixed: leak. Second thing Monday morning the same guy that pool repair guy subbed job out to showed up to fix his fix.
It turned out that he had missed replacing an o-ring when he put things back together the first time. He readily admitted this and also informed me that it was his first time working on a pool system as he was a spa repair guy.
With the missed o-ring replaced leak fixed.
Only two problems:
1. All programing erased form pool pump.
2. No power to salt chlorination system.
Checked that power was applied to controller
Went online and found manual for system and found location of on board circuit breaker
Reset same to a shower of 240 V sparks.
Unit fried.
Searching for replacement unit. May have to buy whole new system as no one seems to carry just the wall unit.
Manufacturer says they are available but must go through distributor.
Distributor won't talk to me because I am a user, not a pool supply store.
Pool supply store have no clue. Awaiting several callbacks.
Meanwhile pool gets greener.

PP

[Wodrick]

Mine has gone green and brown, one is algae and 'tother is the result of the Calima. The normal measures are failing to fix.
I am currently draining the pool to waste by gravity, i.e. slowly as my Congolese* neighbour would not understand.
Takes a good tan though.

* him Belgian from the Congo