Smart Meters

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by monkey hanger

dave, i,ve always found if a workshop has a receptionist its best to avoid main agent or not..

Didn't really have a choice MH, it was the A/C that had gone, tried my local backstreet garage where I know the lads & them me, been going there for years, but as the van was a 2014/15 model, eu laws decreed it must use a specific polar bear (norm) friendly coolant in the system.


All nice & green like, but as there are only 2 Workshops in the Osnabrück area that have the kit to fill this particular, treehugger moist making juice, into said vehicle & both of them are major Ford Wkshps, see the dilemma?

[monkey hanger]

[QUOTE=DaveinGermany;


All nice & green like, but as there are only 2 Workshops in the Osnabrück area that have the kit to fill this particular, treehugger moist making juice, into said vehicle & both of them are major Ford Wkshps, see the dilemma?[/QUOTE]

yes, i understand now. it just annoys me when you have to do this when the vast majority of vehicle owners have no interest in all this rubbish being foistered on us. taking this a step further a garage near me sells second hand cars and does cheap repairs. was talking to the owner when i took my car in for a new window regulator fitted. do not like taking door cards off as i never can get them back right. the immisions word came up and he said he,s waiting for his first customer to ask him what they are in any vehicle they came to look at.

[Less]

The industrial revolution would never have started if all this 'green' and health and safety palaver had existed back in the day, good grief, Stevenson's Rocket didn't even have brakes and yet it was considered the best loco to have been built back then.

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by Less

good grief, Stevenson's Rocket didn't even have brakes

The man was the Clarkson of his day "Yeass ...... Speed!"

[monkey hanger]

Originally Posted by Less

The industrial revolution would never have started if all this 'green' and health and safety palaver had existed back in the day, good grief, Stevenson's Rocket didn't even have brakes and yet it was considered the best loco to have been built back then.

good job facebook and twitter didn,t exist then as stevenson and his rocket would have been cancelled in favour of wind power.

[Less]

Originally Posted by Less

Well back in March I switched to smart meters had absolutely no problems, much more convenient for prepaying both gas and electric.
However a case of left hand not knowing what right hand is doing has occurred with British gas my supplier.
I got a letter today saying that they had paid my warm home discount to me twice last year, once by voucher and once direct to my meter. I had received only a voucher nothing to my meter.
After three attempts to contact them I was shifted from pillar to post given different online sites that i was assured would deal with this, 'wrong' none of them were the right department.
I eventually used an old fashioned telephone number and spoke to a young lady and explained my problem, at first she assured me nothing could go wrong and the details were correct. I asked her to check the date that the overpayment went to my meter, (put on hold at least 5 minutes) when she finally got back to me she said, ' you didn't have a smart meter last year did you, so we couldn't have credited your meter, terribly sorry for the mistake we won't charge you the extra, is there anything else I can do?'.

Yes, I replied, you can put that in a letter and send it to me if I have to waste another hour and a half of my life on your companies inefficiencies I want proof that I owe you nothing and that I'm up to date.

And so the saga continues, my smart meters are still working fine and behaving themselves, nothing hacking my finances or checking up on my comings and goings just sitting there and performing as smart meters (in fact they look a little bit smug rather than just smart).

No, the problem is British Gas not knowing left hand from right testical and causing me pain. It started Friday Morning a letter arrived from them with this years home heating allowance and telling me to go the Post Office to put the allowance on my meter.
Well, no, British Gas you don't seem to have got the hang of it yet do you? With a smart meter I do nothing and someone in your central office tells a computer to credit my meter AUTOMATICALLY!

I grabbed my mobile and rang their helpline displayed in the letter,

in a queue...

...

...finally through to machine informing my that landlines are only to be used at moment by new customers because of some other company going bust and could I go online and use the chat helpline?

This I did, logged into my British Gas account, was then asked by a machine what my enquiry was about:-

It went a bit like this:-

I typed heating allowance.
Was sent to a site to apply for warm heating allowance.
Struggled to tell machine I had heating allowance already just wanted to get it put on my smart meter.

One moment I'll transfer you. (another automatic machine)

Good morning, please enter the address that you would like us to fit new smart meters.

struggled to tell machine I had smart meters already could I talk to a person (finally got that choice).
Operators busy You are 28 in queue
this message repeated decreasing the number until 20 minutes later in touch with person.
Went through it all again from being asked if I wanted to apply for heating allowance to having my meters upgraded!
Finally I had the person at the other end realise what I wanted unfortunately I had been put through to wrong department they would transfer me.

Operators busy You are 33 in queue

this message repeated decreasing the number until 35 minutes later in touch with person.

This person knew what I wanted told me I had smart meters and that it was a clerical error they would fix immediately thank you for calling goodbye
I was then directed to a questionnaire about BG's help team and my experiences They even had a section where I could tell them in my own words!
I didn't swear, but I did enjoy telling them some home truths which will no doubt be used to ensure my next visit is even worse, was very complimentary about the last operator after all he/she actually was capable of doing their job under what must be horrific circumstances.

I then headed to the pub for some calm down juice.

[Margaret Pilkington]

Less, I feel for you.
I don’t think there is anything more irritating than number crunching or not being able to speak to a human(without a long wait…or the blah blah about their website which invariably solves nothing)
I got a phone call from my energy supplier on Friday….telling me my energy readings were due.
I had read the meters that morning(I have it on reminder)….submitted my reading and paid the bill within, oh less than five minutes.
Nae bother!

[dotti34]

Been there, done that, Less, a few times. Very frustrating, listening to the same messages, same music, hanging on to the phone for ages while waiting to be answered and then no satisfaction at the end of it.

I have a further problem and that is even though I have lived over here many years I still have an accent, have never tried to change it. When the automated voice asks me to ‘say in a few words…..’ whatever I say either can’t be recognised or is interpreted incorrectly. ‘Do you mean….’ the voice says, saying something completely different to what I have said. Even after several attempts to make ‘it’ understand, the suggestions it makes are still not what I am asking about. I am then told the voice doesn’t understand my request and to phone again. Good manners though as it always says ‘thank you for calling’.

I wonder how people with really strong foreign accents get on - or is just my Lancashire one. I wish they would bring back real people, preferably without accents that I can’t understand.

[monkey hanger]

Originally Posted by dotti34

I wonder how people with really strong foreign accents get on - or is just my Lancashire one. I wish they would bring back real people, preferably without accents that I can’t understand.

well the call centres i use seem to all have accents from anywhere but great britain. all accents sound much stronger on the phone than they do face to face which just adds to the problem we all face.