This blog entry is one of the challenges at The Quilting Bee’s ‘Great Bee*mee Derby’.
Blog your handwriting
1. What’s your name/your blogger name?
2. What’s your blog’s name/URL?
3. Write “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
4. Favorite quote?
5. Your Favorite song?
6. Your favorite band/singers?
7. Anything else you want to say?
My answers:
Click to make larger.
There has been a huge lack of updates about my life on here. There are two reasons for this: 1, laziness; and 2, huge lack of life to write about. So here’s a quick summary of my life since I last properly blogged:
And on to the titular customer service. Back in November I read a recommendation for a cheap tablet PC written by the ‘Money Saving Expert‘, Martin Lewis. So I bought one. I didn’t buy an iPad because a) I’m poor, b) I didn’t want one, and c) like most/all Apple products, they’re overpriced (I am going to buy an iPod Touch soon though :p). I couldn’t justify spending a lot of money on something I wouldn’t use that often.
So I purchased it in early November, I think it was the 7th. I was informed that it would take about 28 days to arrive, like most things I purchase online. And like most things I purchase online, I expected it to arrive within about a week, which is fairly generous for an item being shipped from and to the same country. But obviously it didn’t.
On Dec 1st I received an e-mail containing an ‘update’ on my order. This e-mail contained some info on my order, saying that there had been a ‘huge demand’ blah blah blah… and that it should be with me within a week. So excitedly I waited. When the week (seven working days) were up and I still hadn’t received my order I tried to read the e-mail again. Unfortunately the whole thing—images and text—was just one graphic which would no longer load. Despite my best efforts I could not get this image, so I had no information on my order.
I sent them a polite e-mail asking for information and the next day I received a reply saying my order would arrive the following day. Which, to their credit, it did.
Understandably I was very excited and loved it from the moment I opened it. There was a very slight fault on the left side of the screen, which wasn’t as responsive as the rest. But it wasn’t a huge problem—it was only a small portion of the screen and it wasn’t that noticeable. I wasn’t going to attempt to return it as it took so bloody long to get the thing in the first place. So all was well until, in January, I noticed a very thin crack along the left side and the responsiveness got worse and worse until the crack was very noticeable and eventually the whole screen wasn’t working correctly. So obviously, now the thing was completely faulty I thought maybe I could return it and hopefully get it repaired or even replaced, or even get a refund.
Also, from the same website, I ordered a ‘protective leather case’ a couple of days after Christmas. I realised it would probably take a while to arrive, but I was OK with that. Besides, it wasn’t a special offer so I thought maybe it would arrive more quickly than the tablet itself. It didn’t.
So at the end of January, a month after I received the tablet and just under a month after I bought the case, I e-mailed them about the faulty screen and missing case. I didn’t get a reply. So I tried calling them on the only phone number I could find, which was in one of the e-mails. No one answered. I called again and again but still nothing.
On February 18th I e-mailed them once more, explaining the situation again and explaining that I had already e-mailed and tried calling them. And now, six weeks later, I have heard nothing from them. I still don’t have the case I no longer need, and I still have a broken tablet.
Another bad customer experience I had was in February. In December I decided I wanted my tragus pierced. My mum said she wanted hers done too so we went to the tattoo/piercing establishment we’d always gone to for non-ear piercings (I had my navel pierced there, and in my teens they had a service where they stuck a little gem on your tooth (remember that craze? I loved it! :p), which I also had done. We know the guy who owned and ran the place—he’s the dad of an old friend of mine.
Anyway, my mum went first and she made such a fuss about how painful it was I chickened out. But I had said beforehand that if they didn’t freeze the area before piercing I wouldn’t go through with it—which they didn’t, he said they’re not allowed to do that any more.
But in February, armed with a tube of EMLA cream, I plucked up the courage to go through with it. I spent about 20 mins in the shop waiting for him to finish with a customer (during which time I realised the cream hadn’t worked). While I was waiting three other people came in (separately) all wanting tattoos. When the piercer came out he took a look at my tragus and said “It’s too small, a bar wouldn’t go through that.” What he meant to say was “I have three people waiting for tattoos, which cost far more than a piercing. If I spend five minutes piercing your ear they might get bored and go to the tattoo parlour down the road instead. So I’m sorry but I cannot be arsed wasting my time on a five-minute procedure that will earn me £15, I’d rather earn £50+ apiece on these tattoos which could take me hours.”
I knew he was lying because while my tragus is rather small, I know someone with a smaller one who has it pierced; and when I went in December he was prepared to do it.
So we went to the tattoo parlour down the road (the only other one in this town) which I hadn’t been in before. It was quite a bit smaller but had twice as many customers, and far more people working there. I only waited a few minutes before someone came over to look at my tragus, decide it was pierce-able and ask me if I wanted a ring or a stud. Then it was only another few minutes before I was called through to a room out the back and had it pierced within about three minutes.
And here is a (terrible) pic of my newly-pierced ear:
Posted Apr 3, 2011. Filed under Rant, Random. 2 comments.
One of my main online goals has been to own my own forum. Now I have reached my goal. 
I have opened a forum with my good friend, Poonam. 
Anyone is welcome but its main demographic is girls/women aged 13-30. Feel free to join, we’re a friendly bunch.
This has been keeping me busy for most of this calendar year, so I have neglected the rest of my websites, fail. 
I will try to blog more (and write more interesting posts—not likely though 
) soon.
Posted Feb 12, 2011. Filed under Sites, Random. Leave a comment?
