M&S woes.

[Colin]

Hi,

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ayswater-fleetwood-newton-abbot-a8363001.html

Not only has our manufacturing industry greatly diminished even our very long established stores are disappearing at an alarming rate; is there going to be anything left for future generations here in the UK.

Bron's just informed me that after ten months of heavy rain and two months of snow and sleet every year here in Yorkshire there's now going to be an hosepipe ban because we've had a rare few days of warm sunshine; I've just ordered an heavy Police crew neck jumper which I'll be using a great deal shortly. Is there any good news in the media?

Kind regards, Colin.

 

[roadrunner]

The media is in the business of making money; there's no money in good news

 

[Silentrunning]

I don’t pay too much attention to the media any more. They are all doom and gloom. My life is good and my few acres are fine. That is what matters to me. I have a few friends I enjoy and pets I adore. My plate is full at every meal. I am able to stay cool when it’s hot and warm when it’s cold. I have dirt under my fingernails calluses on my hands. I have people on this site that I consider friends and they can help solve almost any horticultural problem I bring to them. Like you Colin, I fear for the world but only at a distance. I won’t waste the remaining years I have left being concerned. Right now my biggest worry is if my sweet corn will survive all this rain.

 

[marlingardener]

Like Silent, we are content, happy with our little farm, adore our three cats, and rely on folks on this forum for gardening/cooking/general information. I don't have dirt under my fingernails because I wear gloves. For some reason folks don't want to eat the bread I've kneaded if they see dirty fingernails!
Considering the political disarray our state and our country are in, I vote my conscience and hope for the best while preparing for the worst.

 

[Gardening Girl]

I have dirt under my nails, but I bought a little nail brush for something like $2 at Walmart. It does the trick, once I use it my nails don't even look like I know what a garden is!

 

[Sean Regan]

M&S in crisis?

"It's not just a crisis, it's an M&S crisis."

 

[Colin]

Hi,

What a truly sad species the human race are roadrunner.

Well said Silentrunning. I stopped watching the news a few years ago because it made me start the day feeling suicidal. You've got your priorities right and I couldn't agree more with you.

You too know what true happiness is Marlingardener and it doesn't come down to money.

When big companies like Woolworth and M&S get into difficulty it's very easy to close the stores; I'm as guilty as most these days doing more and more buying online because it's just so much hassle to visit stores due to using our car as transport where we are treated worse than criminals if we dare drive into town where bus gates now have priority and having to face endless speed cameras and traffic calming; just sit at the keyboard then wait a couple of days for delivery; this takes about the same length of time as trying to find a parking space in the town? I'm Huddersfield's top ambassador.

Kind regards, Colin.

 

[Sean Regan]

I'm really naffed off with M&S.

They had a range of Orkney crab in little pots, they weren't cheap, between five and six pounds. My wife likes one now and again as a treat. But our local M&S has been out of stock for months. The shelf-edge label was always there when I went in every week, but had an "out of stock" sticker on it. Last week even the shelf-edge label had disappeared and the staff couldn't tell me if it was ever coming in again. So I tried the M&S at White City, on Tuesday morning. They had the shelf-edge label but no stock. The assistant to whom I spoke said they'd never seen any.

So I went on the M&S website and related the problem to them.

This was the reply today, Wednesday.

Hi


Thanks so much for getting in touch with us about our Orkney Crab meat.


I think I've found the product you've mentioned, its barcode number is (00334853) for reference. It's still an active product and part of the range in our Sale and White City stores.


White city has plenty of stock available at the moment, it's currently out of stock in Sale, but should be delivered again soon. We have most of our stock available in the mornings, straight after our delivery. However, if you still struggle to track this down, ask for the food commercial manager and they'll be able to help.


I hope you can soon tuck into some lovely crab! Thanks again and enjoy the rest of your week.


Kind regards


This of course was a load of nonsense and I could have done without the "bonhomie."

So I e-mailed back.

Thanks for the response, but I was in White City yesterday, they were out of stock and an assistant said they hadn’t seen it for some time.


In Sale, the shelf edge label has been removed, probably because they can't get it, so how are they going to order it now?




Regards,


Well that's the e-mail I tried to send. But I hadn't noticed the e-mail they'd sent me was from a "no-reply" sender, so it bounced.

What sort of customer service is that?

So I went back on the website, cut and pasted the e-mail, tried to send it, but got a "The web page you're looking for is unavailable,"... Twice!

So they'e "'avin' it!" over the phone tomorrow.

 

[DirtMechanic]

Let me, as an elemental force of hate against tax, decry the symptom of a failure of supply to be placed fully upon the government and their intentional misdirection as they propose their fees have nothing to do with your inability to procur that which you could procur save their as(s)inine interference for their benefit over your ability to eat what you choose. Of course this goes back to WW2 and the structure that won the war but they must be forced to evolve at this late date.

 

[Colin]

Hi,

Oh dear Sean; by the time you've been given the run around you could have popped up to Orkney it only being 529.4 miles each way and 11H 10 mins via the A9; I'm sure it would be a lot quicker. Just a thought though; is Orkney crab now from China?

Yesterday morning I received a letter from Virgin Media and expected it to be the usual special mobile phone offer; lo and behold it was to inform us our TV box is shortly to be obsolete and we need to upgrade to a brand new shiny TV V6 box it being smarter; faster and free. No problem at all just login and register; I did this then ran into a brick wall; please enter your mobile phone number; sure I would if I used a mobile phone as an alternative please enter your landline number which I tried a number of times but the wall remained; I could have phoned but at 70 I wondered if I would live long enough whilst awaiting to be contacted with the living all the while being blasted by loud music and a voice at times saying thank you for waiting and agent will soon be with you; you are only number 18 million in the queue?

I'm made of strong stuff though and have tackled bigger people than these so I opened up a chat line and it only took an hour to arrange for the new box to be delivered; in spite of this though I'm not complaining because Bron and I have enjoyed around 30 years of cable and its benefits firstly with NTL and now Virgin Media; they keep putting up the price of our bundle which I think is now around £54 per month but Bron watches TV whilst I'm a keyboard warrior and we have our landline which we very seldom use; compared to paying the council tax I believe in comparison the Virgin Media bill to be good value. I did stress on the chat line to please keep it a secret I don't own a mobile phone otherwise I'll be wearing my shredder out and I've managed now being 70 without a mobile phone welded to my ear. I do own a mobile phone bought years ago costing a fiver brand new and I don't even know how to accept incoming calls or texts and I don't care; I've sussed out how to phone Bron whilst I'm at Rufforth Auto Jumble the first Saturday of each month weather permitting just to let Bron know I'm on my way home; my mobile at most gets used for less than one minute per month.

I was just heading to the computer when I saw Laa Laa in his day glo jacket approaching our front door; it was the guy from Yorkshire Water wishing to read our meter? We pay on rateable value and don't bother with the meter in fact at the end of March we paid both the water a council tax bills in full to get them out of the way for another year; perhaps he was sent to see what kind of people actually pay the bill in full up front especially in Huddersfield?

Time I got off my backside and go Cleaver hunting again; I've never seen as many of these invasive weeds pop up before; we're being invaded by them and I've declared all out war on them ripping them out of the ground or hoeing them; they pull out very easily but then trying to let them go is much more difficult because of their clinging nature.

Enough rambling for now; wishing you all a wonderful day.

Kind regards, Colin.

 

[Sean Regan]

Hi,

Oh dear Sean; by the time you've been given the run around you could have popped up to Orkney it only being 529.4 miles each way and 11H 10 mins via the A9; I'm sure it would be a lot quicker. Just a thought though; is Orkney crab now from China?

Yesterday morning I received a letter from Virgin Media and expected it to be the usual special mobile phone offer; lo and behold it was to inform us our TV box is shortly to be obsolete and we need to upgrade to a brand new shiny TV V6 box it being smarter; faster and free. No problem at all just login and register; I did this then ran into a brick wall; please enter your mobile phone number; sure I would if I used a mobile phone as an alternative please enter your landline number which I tried a number of times but the wall remained; I could have phoned but at 70 I wondered if I would live long enough whilst awaiting to be contacted with the living all the while being blasted by loud music and a voice at times saying thank you for waiting and agent will soon be with you; you are only number 18 million in the queue?

I'm made of strong stuff though and have tackled bigger people than these so I opened up a chat line and it only took an hour to arrange for the new box to be delivered; in spite of this though I'm not complaining because Bron and I have enjoyed around 30 years of cable and its benefits firstly with NTL and now Virgin Media; they keep putting up the price of our bundle which I think is now around £54 per month but Bron watches TV whilst I'm a keyboard warrior and we have our landline which we very seldom use; compared to paying the council tax I believe in comparison the Virgin Media bill to be good value. I did stress on the chat line to please keep it a secret I don't own a mobile phone otherwise I'll be wearing my shredder out and I've managed now being 70 without a mobile phone welded to my ear. I do own a mobile phone bought years ago costing a fiver brand new and I don't even know how to accept incoming calls or texts and I don't care; I've sussed out how to phone Bron whilst I'm at Rufforth Auto Jumble the first Saturday of each month weather permitting just to let Bron know I'm on my way home; my mobile at most gets used for less than one minute per month.

I was just heading to the computer when I saw Laa Laa in his day glo jacket approaching our front door; it was the guy from Yorkshire Water wishing to read our meter? We pay on rateable value and don't bother with the meter in fact at the end of March we paid both the water a council tax bills in full to get them out of the way for another year; perhaps he was sent to see what kind of people actually pay the bill in full up front especially in Huddersfield?

Time I got off my backside and go Cleaver hunting again; I've never seen as many of these invasive weeds pop up before; we're being invaded by them and I've declared all out war on them ripping them out of the ground or hoeing them; they pull out very easily but then trying to let them go is much more difficult because of their clinging nature.

Enough rambling for now; wishing you all a wonderful day.

Kind regards, Colin.

We're in the same position with Virgin. We have a Tivo box which they want to upgrade. But my wife has some three year-old recordings on it she hasn't got round to watching yet and it took her long enough to work out how to use this box. So we're in no rush to change.
We've a Humax HDR on the other TV.

We've had no end of boxes since the mid eighties. We're with Virgin, which used to be NTL, which used to be Cable & Wireless, which used to be Nynex and before that we had a "squarial," with BskyB.