Why are " routine " tasks such hard work? 😡

Putting a double duvet in a double duvet cover.
Impossible (except by MrsRNP).

I feel your pain. I spent 52 minutes on hold to Royal Mail listening to someone asking me to be nice to the customer service agents every minute only to be told I needed to ring another number. It’s no wonder they get shouted at and need to remind everyone to be nice for 50 minutes first.

RustyNissanPrairie
Full Member
Putting a double duvet in a double duvet cover

You are turning the cover inside out first right?

You are turning the cover inside out first right?

100%. It's still a pain. Mentioned this to my Mum. She's been making beds for 70years and had never even heard of the inside out method. Staggered!

I can’t remember the last time I needed to talk to my bank. What were you trying to do?

Companies generally only want you contacting them for things that directly or indirectly benefit themselves.

Keeping a long queue helps discourage people from wasting company time querying things that aren't terribly important, if you really care you will try again later and get through.

From their perspective, your time is free (zero cost to them), while staffing a support centre is a visible cost.

If your query or problem is complex, many would rather you bugger off and be a drain on one of their competitors.

We could have all these things be good, but we wouldn't pay the required price.

From their perspective, your time is free (zero cost to them), while staffing a support centre is a visible cost.

Except in my specific case this afternoon they clearly have two people doing the job that one could do because they told me to ring another person. The agent I spoke to said I’d love to help but I can’t, which I appreciate is probably what they say to try and avoid being shouted at when they tell someone who’s been on hold for nearly an hour that it was a pointless waste of time. Seriously, I fail to see how that benefits anyone at all, including them. It’s just incompetence really not a sound business decision.

@oldfart I feel your pain. I too find the mundane administrative tasks required to live exhausting. I gave up trying to recover money from Bristol Energy and then “Together” when they went bust, Direct Line when I tried to cancel insurance for my van that I’d sold. Because I’d had a minor my fault accident they said that they were keeping the balance of my premium, and, charging a £50 cancellation fee! I said ok, pretend the van is still mine. They did, I saved £50 (lost the balance of my premium). I got loads of reminders in the post from them and the van was insured with the new owner too, technically impossible. Sometimes persistence pays off though - over an hour to HMRC my self assessment requirement sorted and my fine cancelled. A very pleasant chap who was obviously surprised at me being reasonable with him. The admin involved with death is even worse and has encouraged me to get everything sorted and in one place to help my daughters when the inevitable happens to me! But yes, most stuff is unnecessarily difficult to sort.

Couldn't agree more. Passwords and accounts for everything make me want to scream.

however

Just been through the plusnet to EE switch. Totally painless. Make sure you use the unique plusnet customer login they give you, the discount is substantial

Thought this was going to be about pooing after the age of 55

Putting a double duvet in a double duvet cover.
Impossible

As others said, inside out obvs, but also, if you've got the house for it, stand over the banister rail, holding the corners and jiggle it all about hanging over the stairs.

That way you've got a nice drop without the floor fouling the operation (unless you're well tall anyway) and gravity does most of it for you.

Picton yeah the Plusnet switch was relatively stress free , just getting the PAC Code was the only delay.

robola trust me if I could have avoided it I would have.

oceanskipper yep the fact they have to ask you to not be rude to staff tells you all you need to know 🙄

desperate bicycle zero problem on that score 👍

Just been through the plusnet to EE switch. Totally painless. Make sure you use the unique plusnet customer login they give you, the discount is substantial

Even with the code, it's more expensive than my old Plusnet deal, and roaming is £2.29 a day as opposed to free. I think I'll look elsewhere.

Just try and get BT TV to work. FFS, I've wasted hours and hours on the phone and live chat with BT plus had three home visits. Broadband connection is too slow. Diagnosed at minute 1 and still waiting 3 months later. Have to start a new case every time they completely fail to fix the problem. GRRRRRRRR.

zero problem on that score

Lucky sod!

A new work phone,just connect the old and new together with the supplied lead and all your contacts,apps and pictures will pop across to the new phone.

Will they ########.

yep the fact they have to ask you to not be rude to staff tells you all you need to know 🙄

Indeed, places with piss poor service always have signs saying rudeness to staff will not be tolerated etc. I mean there is no need to be rude to them, they just work there but as you say, it tells you in advance the service will be shit. 🙄

Putting a double duvet in a double duvet cover.

I'll see your puny double and raise you a superking! Chosen by MrsMC, who's only 4'10 and has one working arm, safe in the knowledge it was never going to be her problem....

How even older people manage god knows

It's a real problem. My parents are in their 80s, their frustration as their physical and mental capacity reduces as all this crap takes over what were relatively straightforward tasks is understandable

I can’t remember the last time I needed to talk to my bank. What were you trying to do?<br /><br />

Earlier this year, in fact. Not only do I need to contact my bank every now and then, I also have an actual person I can talk to, I can arrange an appointment to sit in her office and sort things out in person. The reason I can do this is that I have her personal mobile number. She’s my account manager.

As others said, inside out obvs, but also, if you’ve got the house for it, stand over the banister rail, holding the corners and jiggle it all about hanging over the stairs.

That way you’ve got a nice drop without the floor fouling the operation (unless you’re well tall anyway) and gravity does most of it for you.

Now that’s useful! I’ve been doing it by pushing the opposite corners of the duvet into the matching corners of the cover, then holding it up and shaking it it the bedroom - it was my job because Joey wasn’t tall enough to do it, bless her; she ended up standing inside the cover holding the duvet and couldn’t get out! <br />I never thought of taking it out on the landing and holding it over the rail! 🤪

That’s going to save me a lot of fannying around in future.

Why do they always say "we are experiencing high call volumes...."?

If they are permanently that high they are normal call volumes and you don't have enough staff.

I speak as someone who used to run some gov. IT service desks so have some idea about this.

Madmin. Admin tasks that drive you mad.

Closely related to sadmin

Then because Plusnet have decided to no longer be in the mobile game it’s supposed to be plain sailing moving to EE hmmm

I'm going through that at the moment.

Just been through the plusnet to EE switch. Totally painless.

EE seem to think I am already a customer and that is causing an issue. Well yes I used to be - before I moved to Plusnet!!

My inclination is to say sod it and go to Giffgaff.

Count the screens, click and steps you have to go through to get an online refund compare to doing the original sale.

Designed in awkwardness.

Weirdly I have actually had to try to persuade designers and coders that it is okay to be helpful to customers with issues instead of stopping them doing things. I suggested adding labels to buttons once so people knew that the funny squiggle was actually a damaged box which was obviously the button to hit if your goods were damaged in transit and completely different to the squiggle on the button for good that were delivered okay but then found to be faulty once the box was opened.

I was told that 'it looked better with icons' and that 'once the users had done it half a dozen times it would become second nature'. I did wonder how bad the delivery service they used was that they expected people to be sending back half a dozen or more damaged packages.

Last few calls I've made to nationwide have clearly been put through to someone in their bedroom

But thinking about it, nearly every other one has been the high volume of calls palaver. And give up

And why do Churchill insurance always bump up the premium so you have to ring them and say 'is that your best price' for them to knock off 2/3 of the increase or match their own price on the meerkat!
As for the high call volumes they delivered that message and the other usual 'we're listening in' rubbish and then answered in 2 rings.
At least their operators seem to be normal humans.

Even with the code, it’s more expensive than my old Plusnet deal, and roaming is £2.29 a day as opposed to free. I think I’ll look elsewhere

If you're happy with EE coverage then 1p mobile is the way to go, with the benefit of WiFi calling which you won't have get on Plusnet and roaming also included.

And why do Churchill insurance always bump up the premium so you have to ring them and say ‘is that your best price’ for them to knock off 2/3 of the increase or match their own price on the meerkat!

Because they count on X% of people not wanting to bother with sitting on hold for ages before they can have that conversation.

Smarty is your friend for sim only mobile. I’ve got a referral code if you PM me. (Think we both get credit or something.) £10/mth for free. Calls/texts +40GB of data. There are cheaper deals if you use less. 

phone,just connect the old and new together with the supplied lead and all your contacts,apps and pictures will pop across to the new phone.

Made worse when your screen is totally borked meaning you can't unlock the phone.

Sending paperwork away that will be processed within 40 working days and nothing happening for 39. Then finding out you need a long form birth certificate to be returned in 14 days but the registrar will process it on day 14 then give a 28day window for delivery.

I'm trying to some consolidate some small pensions, with one company, it went over immediately, the other want photo I'd and only communicate via their built in email system, which would be doable if their bloody website worked and let you log in. For reference, avoid Nest at every opportunity.

I was 5 hours on Sky's webchat a couple of weeks ago trying to cancel my TV subscription. They wouldn't take no for an answer. Kept coming back with terrible deals, demanding that I phone them etc. Eventually managed to get the thing cancelled but it was infuriating 

Re: the plusnet mobile thing. I assume you guys have actually been told to move? We've been told that they will be stopping mobile at somepoint but never actually been told when. We're still clinging onto our plusnet mobile accounts at the moment. Don't want EE because of the roaming charges, so will go somewhere else when we need to....

Also, Re: the duvet thing. I don;t bother with the inside out technique anymore, just shove the two top corners into place grab them and give it a good flick, thats with a king size. wiggle over the banister does work as well though.

Oh how I wish there was a phone line I could be on hold on.
Glasgow City Council I'm looking at you!

Indeed, places with piss poor service always have signs saying rudeness to staff will not be tolerated etc.

A GP colleague of mine is still recovering from a brain injury after a patient attacked him with a post and literally split his skull, The surgery he works at now has a pretty low tolerance of shouty patients.

First Direct have pretty good customer service teams, proving it can be done I guess, but they're a rare thing by comparison to most companies who have worked hard to make routine contact as cheap to them as its possible. Cheaply employed staff are rarely empowered to make decisions, so they get a script, and once you sound like you're fobbing some-one off...

Fitbit "support".

Mrs 64's watch had died in warranty. Jumped through all the hoops, and they agreed to send a replacement, after they'd received the watch and charging lead (no strap to be sent)

First, they sent a new strap, then a charging lead, and finally the watch.

Each chat session was so long, I honestly thought she would get the newer version

I’ll see your puny double and raise you a superking!

Freezer clips are your friend here. It's too wide to hold both top corners at the same time and wiggle, so I use a long freezer clip on each corner and then hold it further in along the top edge for the wiggle and shake. Then down to the bottom end to sort all that out while the clips are still stopping the top corners from shifting.

Oh and Flooring Superstore in terms of phones and customer service. The online chat tells you it's the stores problem. There is no customer service phone number. Call the store and they say there's nothing they can do, you need to do the online chat. And the loop goes on infintely. I rang the poor store manager 18 times in one day with us both getting more and more wound up. They drag things out for so long I was on the verge of getting in the car and driving to their head office in Durham just so I could talk to someone that could actually do something.

Last few calls I’ve made to nationwide have clearly been put through to someone in their bedroom

Why is that bad? If they have a good internet connection they can do the same as if they were sat in a call centre.

Agreed, getting basic stuff done seems to be such hard work now.

Something like my car insurance renewal has gone up by a daft amount and it auto renews, check online and I can get it cheaper elsewhere but you have to call to stop it auto renewing. So you end up on hold for 40 minutes listening to a message telling you they have a large number of calls at present and I should use the online service (that you cant use for cancelling auto renewals). It gets to the point where I genuinely consider paying £200 over the odds to just to put an end to it.

We could have all these things be good, but we wouldn’t pay the required price the shareholders whose ‘value’ is deemed higher priority than anyone else’s get it.

FTFY.

It’s not about cost. It’s about profit.

Something like my car insurance renewal has gone up by a daft amount and it auto renews

When asked ‘Do you want to auto renew’?
I find hard to avoid 🤣🤣🤣. Auto renewal is a way to almost guarantee ‘madmin’.

I travelled by train at the weekend. Train there cancelled. Twice in succession. Ended up spending over 1 hour waiting on the platform.

Train back. Cancelled. Then the next one delayed by 20 minutes.

Thankfully I saw the ‘delay pay’ signs. Signed up. Went though the numerous clicks and registration and forms. Getting £50 back. Would rather have had timely trains.

I was 5 hours on Sky’s webchat a couple of weeks ago trying to cancel my TV subscription. They wouldn’t take no for an answer. Kept coming back with terrible deals, demanding that I phone them etc. Eventually managed to get the thing cancelled but it was infuriating

Waaayy more patience than me, fire off an e-mail and cancel the direct debit, or just cancel the direct debit and let them call, 5 hours? **** that.