WAMT....what annoyed me today!

I bought a pair of headphones for myself a few days ago and they arrived this morning and are so good I've bought a pair for my wife but it wasn't so easy. They were still on offer at £189 from £319.95. I went to pay and the page changed and showed £193.99. I clicked on "pay by this method" to see if that made a difference .It didn't. That was in a small yellow box underneath the large box that has a variety of payment choices including all the cards used over the years with the facility to update expiry dates if applicable. . It also had Paypal and Klarna and the last option was Amazon Prime. I clicked a yellow box..as a last resort..that was underneath all the above and then up came a messaga thanking me for selecting a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime. I had to click another box to action that which I didn't do. I thought, "sod it, I'll just pay the extra"..it's too hard then my wife suggested I call the Amazon help Line which I did. The customer- care lady was Indian and not that easy to understand. She took me through it..twice... and up came Amazon Prime again.. "Why don't you sign up to AP and get them tomorrow ? " she suggested. No point,my wife is signed up to AP. Eventually,it showed that I was being charged for postage/ shipping when it was,in fact, free delivery. Eventually she said she didn't know why that was happening but would refund me the postage after they have been delivered. I asked her for a reference number or her name so if that didn't happen and I spoke to her colleague I could refer him/her to that reference number or her name. I suppose it would be on my account. "No problem", she said a I'll send you an Email, which she did immediately.

I've never had that problem buying from Amazon. It actually had written.."this order qualifies for free delivery" The whole thing took about 15 minutes and was really frustrating. I thanked the lass and told her I'd now have to have a cup of tea and two paracetamol..lol. She laughed too. Maybe it would have been better to just pay it but......

PS. The reason I bought them through my account and not my wife's Amazon Prime ,where I bought mine from two days ago, is that the delivery driver asked for a one-time code that had been sent to my wife's mobile. She won't be home for a couple of days and whilst I do have one of her old mobiles it lives in the kitchen drawer until I go out for the day..photograhing or down town and she insists I take it ,then I have to charge it. It's the first time a delivery driver has used that method. I expect he'll send the code to my Email address so that's ok. Maybe it's because of the value of the headphones.
 
TheFiend said:
Yes, it will be when I finally get it!!! I timed my retirement so that I would qualify for that years pay deal as I was on a final salary scheme, expecting I would receive the pay-rise on my pension.... but when the agreement went through for the first time ever it was only applied to those in post at the date of agreement and backdated to April. I retired in the July and the agreement was made in the August....
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They should be giving you interest on that.
 
JohnC6 said:
I bought a pair of headphones for myself a few days ago and they arrived this morning and are so good I've bought a pair for my wife but it wasn't so easy. They were still on offer at £189 from £319.95. I went to pay and the page changed and showed £193.99. I clicked on "pay by this method" to see if that made a difference .It didn't. That was in a small yellow box underneath the large box that has a variety of payment choices including all the cards used over the years with the facility to update expiry dates if applicable. . It also had Paypal and Klarna and the last option was Amazon Prime. I clicked a yellow box..as a last resort..that was underneath all the above and then up came a messaga thanking me for selecting a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime. I had to click another box to action that which I didn't do. I thought, "sod it, I'll just pay the extra"..it's too hard then my wife suggested I call the Amazon help Line which I did. The customer- care lady was Indian and not that easy to understand. She took me through it..twice... and up came Amazon Prime again.. "Why don't you sign up to AP and get them tomorrow ? " she suggested. No point,my wife is signed up to AP. Eventually,it showed that I was being charged for postage/ shipping when it was,in fact, free delivery. Eventually she said she didn't know why that was happening but would refund me the postage after they have been delivered. I asked her for a reference number or her name so if that didn't happen and I spoke to her colleague I could refer him/her to that reference number or her name. I suppose it would be on my account. "No problem", she said a I'll send you an Email, which she did immediately.

I've never had that problem buying from Amazon. It actually had written.."this order qualifies for free delivery" The whole thing took about 15 minutes and was really frustrating. I thanked the lass and told her I'd now have to have a cup of tea and two paracetamol..lol. She laughed too. Maybe it would have been better to just pay it but......

PS. The reason I bought them through my account and not my wife's Amazon Prime ,where I bought mine from two days ago, is that the delivery driver asked for a one-time code that had been sent to my wife's mobile. She won't be home for a couple of days and whilst I do have one of her old mobiles it lives in the kitchen drawer until I go out for the day..photograhing or down town and she insists I take it ,then I have to charge it. It's the first time a delivery driver has used that method. I expect he'll send the code to my Email address so that's ok. Maybe it's because of the value of the headphones.
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For info John, when I send stuff for delivery to my lad in London, I can put in his address for delivery, plus his phone number for alerts. I don't know if you can do that to your own/default delivery address, or indeed put 2 notification numbers into the account profile, but I will have a look.
It would be useful for us too, as we are in the same boat, the prime account is hers. Shes always forwarding texts regarding delivery times.
 
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TheFiend said:
On this day 12 months ago I posted this :-



I received the backdated pay the following month....Equiniti, who are the administrators of my pensions, on the other hand have not been so quick.... 12 months on and I still have not received the increase owing on my pension.... I've phoned them and emailed them and their reply is "due to the large number of people that chose to retire in the months prior to the pay agreement they've had to put a project team together to deal with the issue" ..... The latest email reply stated they expected to have it completed by April 2025.... :headbang:

Emailed them again 12 days ago and no response yet........ the last reply from then took 2 weeks!!! :headbang:

I reckon I'm now owed around £7.5K.....
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Still no reply to my latest emails to Equiniti.....but I did wake up to find an irregular pension payment into my current account this morning, so it looks as though things are starting to happen.... My last email reply from Equiniti told me I would receive some correspondence relating to them matter when it gets sorted.... but have not receievd any yet!!!
 
TheFiend said:
Still no reply to my latest emails to Equiniti.....but I did wake up to find an irregular pension payment into my current account this morning, so it looks as though things are starting to happen.... My last email reply from Equiniti told me I would receive some correspondence relating to them matter when it gets sorted.... but have not receievd any yet!!!
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Be thankful you are not with Cushion - had a small work pension to transfer to Virgin. Every other time I have done this a simple online form, and done. This time its print off and post them back, lots of questions, mainly pointless. It took them 6 weeks to come back to me with where to send it!! Then nothing happened, needed to resend again. So slow. They now confirmed it's sent but Virgin are chasing me saying Cushon have not done something on the banking system to fully close it!!! On a positive they have offered me 350 in comp!
 
WAMT and any other day I hear the 'heads-up' on LBC Radio about scams from scammers pretending to be from HMRC, is the announcer, a female, pronounces the H as 'haitch rather than 'aitch'. We heard it back in 2008 with the financial crash when reporters were talking about the losses at HBOS. It drove me to distraction. I've seen and heard quite a few complaints in the media about the way 'H' is pronounced .

Another one that grates is the way harassment is pronounced. Rather than 'harrassment' it's often, almost always, pronounced ha - rassment. It wasn't always that way. Who started it ?Michael Crawford in "Some mothers do have 'em ?" or is it the American way ? Did it come from the Afro-Caribbean community ? Eg.. To police.."Don't Ha--rass me, man" There's no emoji for 'annoyance' just anger and I don't get angry about it, just annoyed.
 
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JohnC6 said:
the announcer, a female, pronounces the H as 'haitch rather than 'aitch'. We heard it back in 2008 with the financial crash when reporters were talking about the losses at HBOS. It drove me to distraction. I've seen and heard quite a few complaints in the media about the way 'H' is pronounced .
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H should be pronounced as haitch, not 'aitch, although it can have either a soft or hard her depending on the word. This isn't france, where the H is often silent. Tell you what - I'll put up with you pronouncing it your way and you can tolerate me doing it in mine. ;)
 
ancient_mariner said:
H should be pronounced as haitch, not 'aitch, although it can have either a soft or hard her depending on the word. This isn't france, where the H is often silent. Tell you what - I'll put up with you pronouncing it your way and you can tolerate me doing it in mine. ;)
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Since "H" is spelled "aitch", that's the correct pronunciation.

As pointed out by Dave Gorman, the alphabet isn't spelled in alphabetical order...
 
You're opinions are 'fairly unique'.
 
Is that like "slightly pregnant"?
 
ancient_mariner said:
H should be pronounced as haitch, not 'aitch, although it can have either a soft or hard her depending on the word. This isn't france, where the H is often silent. Tell you what - I'll put up with you pronouncing it your way and you can tolerate me doing it in mine. ;)
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Nope..you's wrong :D Anyway, Toni, you know, well enough, that toleration isn't a strong point of mine.. :)
 
Nod said:
Since "H" is spelled "aitch", that's the correct pronunciation.

As pointed out by Dave Gorman, the alphabet isn't spelled in alphabetical order...
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Thank you Mr Nod. I can't recall when it changed but it annoys the heck out of me and not only me as I mentioned. I've heard callers to LBC moan about it and I recall a reader of The Times writing in to "Letters" about it some years ago.
 
A little research shows that the H is only used in front of Aitch by 12-15% of UK speakers. However, it is far more prevalent in the Antipodes.

Of course it's not just the H sound that irritates people:

www.bbc.co.uk

'Haitch' or 'aitch'? How do you pronounce 'H'?

The pronunciation of common words has changed drastically over time. And, as the British Library begins a quest to record people's articulations, it seems that differences in how we say words could be influenced by age.
www.bbc.co.uk
 
Every now and then ,someone posts here about dog-poo bags.

This afternoon,I looked out out of the front window to see a green bag on the footpath at the top of our drive. I'm the local litter-picker-upper .....no-one else does it.. :rolleyes: ...and went out to pick it up to find it was a dog-poo bag with said contents. I went into the garage and put on a pair of rubber gloves, picked it up and walked 150m to a dog-poo bin.
 
Cockney said:
For info John, when I send stuff for delivery to my lad in London, I can put in his address for delivery, plus his phone number for alerts. I don't know if you can do that to your own/default delivery address, or indeed put 2 notification numbers into the account profile, but I will have a look.
It would be useful for us too, as we are in the same boat, the prime account is hers. Shes always forwarding texts regarding delivery times.
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I remembered your post,Brian.

When I bought the headphones for my wife I was charged £4.16 for postage which should have been free. Cut a long story short,I called Amazon and one customer-care lass said that they would refund me after I receive them. Anyway, three phone calls and four Emails later..lol today's customer-care lass said that I'd ticked for next day delivery. If she said I did, then I did. However, I mentioned that my wife has Prime and I sometimes get her to buy stuff for me as I'm not signed up to it. She said my wife can add me to her account at no extra cost. Easy as that. My wife's away at the moment so I Emailed her this morning and asked if she would do that when she gets back home..ie she can access her computer. Shortly afterwards she called me to say she'd been able to do it .... on her iPad,I assume and I got a welcome Email from Amazon so I can buy my stuff using Prime myself and I will get Email notifications re delivery.

Your wife can do that for you and then you'll get the delivery notifications.
 
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JohnC6 said:
I remembered your post,Brian.

When I bought the headphones for my wife I was charged £4.16 for postage which should have been free. Cut a long story short,I called Amazon and one customer-care lass said that they would refund me after I receive them. Anyway, three phone calls and four Emails later..lol today's customer-care lass said that I'd ticked for next day delivery. If she said I did, then I did. However, I mentioned that my wife has Prime and I sometimes get her to buy stuff for me as I'm not signed up to it. She said my wife can add me to her account at no extra cost. Easy as that. My wife's away at the moment so I Emailed her this morning and asked if she would do that when she gets back home..ie she can access her computer. Shortly afterwards she called me to say she'd been able to do it .... on her iPad,I assume and I got a welcome Email from Amazon so I can buy my stuff using Prime myself and I will get Email notifications re delivery.

Your wife can do that for you and then you'll get the delivery notifications.
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Will do, thanks for that. I never got around to chasing it down myself. Been too busy chasing down BT again, but that's another story.
 
TheFiend said:
On this day 12 months ago I posted this :-



I received the backdated pay the following month....Equiniti, who are the administrators of my pensions, on the other hand have not been so quick.... 12 months on and I still have not received the increase owing on my pension.... I've phoned them and emailed them and their reply is "due to the large number of people that chose to retire in the months prior to the pay agreement they've had to put a project team together to deal with the issue" ..... The latest email reply stated they expected to have it completed by April 2025.... :headbang:

Emailed them again 12 days ago and no response yet........ the last reply from then took 2 weeks!!! :headbang:
Click to expand...

TheFiend said:
Still no reply to my latest emails to Equiniti.....but I did wake up to find an irregular pension payment into my current account this morning, so it looks as though things are starting to happen.... My last email reply from Equiniti told me I would receive some correspondence relating to them matter when it gets sorted.... but have not received any yet!!!
Click to expand...

Finally received correspondence from Equiniti about the retrospective increase to my pension benefits.... According to the letter I have received the additional amount of lump sum that I should have received has now been converted to an additional amount on my pension per annum and according to the figure they gave me for the revised additional lump I will need to live to 79 to receive that full amount.... :headbang:
 
Not usually one to rant but...... WAMT? Parking apps. Why can I not change the payment card unless I'm actually sitting in a car park wanting to pay. Registered card is about to expire, simple as that. That was after I had to revalidate my perfectly valid login. Makes me wonder if they're in league with car parks that give you only minutes to get parked and pay. Thankfully not one I have to use any more, at least locally. The other 3 apps I had to change - no problem :thinking:
 
WAMT - Tyres sent to India for "recycling" are actually just burned! :rolleyes: :headbang:
 
Council tax statement arrived today.
£1,982 pa. :mad:
 
Kitchen chair collapsed while I was sitting on it having my lunch...

Very sore now. Shortage of Paracetamols will follow in TW9.
 
Cockney said:
Council tax statement arrived today.
£1,982 pa. :mad:
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Ours is £2238... a 4.7% increase. The average is 6.1%

Water £954..up £214. That's a 27% increase when the national average is £603 ..a rise of £123 ..ie.. 26%.
 
Visited family down south over the weekend. First time down M1 around Leicester/Northampton for years.

What a mess, deep potholes and ruts along the road where subsurface has collapsed. Lethal condition, on our prime motorway.
 
Cockney said:
Visited family down south over the weekend. First time down M1 around Leicester/Northampton for years.

What a mess, deep potholes and ruts along the road where subsurface has collapsed. Lethal condition, on our prime motorway.
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We avoid the M1 like the plague. In-laws live in Lancashire and satnavs always say M1 then M6, but we use the A5 up to the M6. It's a much more pleasant journey. I realise this won't help you coming down from Yorkshire but sometimes avoiding motorways can improve your journey, or at least part of it, and is not that much slower. Is the A1 an option?
 
Marc said:
We avoid the M1 like the plague. In-laws live in Lancashire and satnavs always say M1 then M6, but we use the A5 up to the M6. It's a much more pleasant journey. I realise this won't help you coming down from Yorkshire but sometimes avoiding motorways can improve your journey, or at least part of it, and is not that much slower. Is the A1 an option?
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A1 is easy for us , were not far from m18 link. If I'm going to Kent I always go A1. For Birmingham its A38.
This journey was to Bicester, so M1 seemed better option. The run was fine, apart from M1S falling to bits.
The pot holes and ruts were horrendous. You can't even stop, photograph and report.
 
I have to regularly travel to Manchester from Gloucestershire so M5/M6. My Satnav frequently directs me away from the M6 which is so often blocked; there is too much traffic. One solution is to build a parallel motorway to the M6 and to disallow lorries on one of them. They have something similar between Baltimore and Washington in the US which seem to work OK. Another option which I am now using sometimes is to travel by train but it means I have no transport when I am in Manchester.

Dave
 
Cockney said:
This journey was to Bicester,
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I hope you waved as you went past - we're only 3 miles from J10 of the M40 and 8 miles from Bicester.

FWIW the M1 has been bad a long time now. Pre-covid, my wife badly bent one of the wheels on her mini because of a pothole on the M1. Northamptonshire seems to have the worst roads of any we've seen, and Oxfordshire is pretty bad.
 
ancient_mariner said:
I hope you waved as you went past - we're only 3 miles from J10 of the M40 and 8 miles from Bicester.

FWIW the M1 has been bad a long time now. Pre-covid, my wife badly bent one of the wheels on her mini because of a pothole on the M1. Northamptonshire seems to have the worst roads of any we've seen, and Oxfordshire is pretty bad.
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I'd forgotten what the area was like. I went around more roundabouts in those 3 days than in the previous 3 years. :D
 
Cockney said:
I'd forgotten what the area was like. I went around more roundabouts in those 3 days than in the previous 3 years. :D
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My brother used to live in Bedfordshire. I once counted 26 roundabouts going there via Milton Keynes, but there's even more now. When we had a Citroen BX the brake discs would overheat after the first 10 or so MK roundabouts, and it would require a lot more use of enginebraking to keep things working enough to stop OK. Now, despite having an SUV, brakes seem to cope much better.
 
ancient_mariner said:
My brother used to live in Bedfordshire. I once counted 26 roundabouts going there via Milton Keynes, but there's even more now. When we had a Citroen BX the brake discs would overheat after the first 10 or so MK roundabouts, and it would require a lot more use of enginebraking to keep things working enough to stop OK. Now, despite having an SUV, brakes seem to cope much better.
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I ordered a BX GTI as a company car once. Had been in pals BX and quite liked it. Saw I could afford the GTI so went for it, no discernable difference in performance, just bloody noisy. Looked cool when 'sat' down though.
 
Cockney said:
I ordered a BX GTI as a company car once. Had been in pals BX and quite liked it. Saw I could afford the GTI so went for it, no discernable difference in performance, just bloody noisy. Looked cool when 'sat' down though.
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Mine was a diesel estate, super practical, economical but non-turbo. As the miles went up it got slower and slower - we had a caravan for a few years, and towards the end it would require second gear for any significant hills. Eventually it was rear-ended at about 180K miles and scrapped.
 
ancient_mariner said:
Mine was a diesel estate, super practical, economical but non-turbo. As the miles went up it got slower and slower - we had a caravan for a few years, and towards the end it would require second gear for any significant hills. Eventually it was rear-ended at about 180K miles and scrapped.
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It always amazed me how Peugeot made the same basic engines into real winners while Citroen, well didn't.
 
Cockney said:
It always amazed me how Peugeot made the same basic engines into real winners while Citroen, well didn't.
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Citroen were too quirky while Peugeot were the dully conventional face of French cars (and Renault were glittery garbage in that era). We had 2 X 406s (1 petrol saloon, 1 turbodiesel estate) and a 307SW after the citroen - all were like French Fords, conventional & functional without any kind of flair or inspiration, while the Citroen was simply so much more interesting. But ordinary people like conventional clocks, levers for switches instead of cylinders and a display like a box instead of something shaped like a flying saucer, and as for hydraulic suspension....
 
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