E-Bay

I'm a keen fan of on-line auctions; in fact, auctions in general.

Recently I've bought a few items off e-bay, and I thought I'd share one experience with you.

My new van is racked out. The back of the van sports lots of lovely shiney shelving. To help stop all my various bits and pieces getting thrown around, I thought I'd invest in some plastic boxes.

Off to the bay we go. I found just what I was looking for, and bidded away like you do. I wasn't lucky enough to win the items as I was 'sniped' (another pet hate of mine), but after the sale, I was given a 'second chance' (which makes me wonder if it was the seller bidding on his own goods to 'boost' the price). I dutifully paid there and then, and wondered if I was being sensible spending so much money.

Two weeks went by, and despite the fact that I paid the seller straight away, there was no sign of the boxes.

I contacted the seller, who kindly gave me the details of the courier, and told me that they had 'carded' the delivery twice (which was not true). Why he couldn't contact the courier and sort it out for himself is beyond me - in my opinion, it's the responsibility of the seller to ensure the goods get delivered.

Anyway, I contacted the courier on Wednesday, who told me the same lie that delivery had been attempted. When I told them that they were wrong, they suggested that they may have been trying the wrong address, so I gave them an alternative delivery address. "You'll get a delivery on Thursday" they said.

Thursday came and went, and by Friday afternoon I was getting a little cheesed off, so rang them again.

"our fault" they said. "It's still here because the driver forgot it".......

Anyway, to be fair to the courier, they sent the package via Parcel Force (I bet that hurt their pride) for saturday delivery, and at 9am on Saturday it was here.

This whole process took 20 days.

Now comes the rant.....

Whenever you buy anything off e-bay, you have to leave 'feedback'. Options are 'positive', 'neutral' or 'negative'.

Given the fact that I'd had to wait for the delivery for 20 days, and chase the sellers courier myself, I left 'neutral' feedback.

I've just had a message from the seller;

"Hi. Generally they are OK and this is the third different carrier we've used as they all seem to have problems. We're very disappointed you've left neutral feedback as our conduct has never been the problem so it seems somewhat unfair. At least you've eventually got the goods and that should finalise things. It would seem best for all concerned we have no further dealings"


Is it me?

What did they expect?

Little Chef

I've just watched the on-going story of the conversion of Little Chef back into a profitable, and reasonable restaurant by Heston Blumenthal.

I've fond memories of Little Chef back in the good days. You could always rely on them for a decent, reasonable priced meal or just a quick cup of tea. My more recent memories are of a place where quality was non-existent, both in terms of the food, and the service. Worst of all, they pumped the prices up to make the whole experience unpleasant and expensive.

Where did it all go wrong?

Like many people, I've seen dozens of what were popular sites close. The Little Chef estate is a shadow of it's former self.

What's this all got to do with rats? Well, as I just told the Little Chef website; my last visit to the Popham site (which seems to have been transformed since then) was about a year ago. I sat in the car park finishing a phone conversation, and watched, horrified, as a family of rats ran to and from an overflowing bin.

It's not the first time I've seen this; the last time was at Reading services on the M4 motorway. That day, I got some great photos of the rats.

The problem with these companies is that they put all their pest control out to contract, and the over-riding factor when making the decision to award a contract is price. The result is a scramble by national pest control companies to see who can offer the lowest price in the hope of being able to make some money by 'upselling' other services (bait stations, fly control units, bird proofing etc). I've seen contracts worth as little as £6 per routine visit! What sort of service would you get for that price? Very poor.

Pest control technicians also hate these contracts. They are not allowed to spend too long on site, and the site staff tend to treat them with contempt.

So why does it happen?

Because we let it.