General Chat

I agree Dermot.
That's half the reason I left my previous job.
We used to contact venues to book them - then we were expected to use a Yorkshire-based firm (I'm in Hampshire), which not only meant we lost contact with the venue providers (and we managed to get reductions), but increased the workload for booking a room!

THEN, instead of venues/lecturers sending their invoices to us for payment, they were sent to a central 'depot', we were then e-mailed (through the new 'automatic payment system') and 'instructed' to pay the invoices. All well in theory, but if we had fewer refreshments than initially ordered, it was difficult - no, impossible to deduct them.
Invoices went astray and systems failed with tedious regularity

Hampshire County Council then got desperately behind with the payments (minimum of 3 months so far), and we were being called by the venues about the non-payments - but could do nothing for them. Previously, if an invoice hadn't been paid, it was our fault - and we rectified it.

So, autonomy and personal contact was removed form us, workload was increased, in a 'you are an automaton' way, and we were at the beck and call of a bl**dy computerised system - in fact 3 'new' computerised systems - that didn't work :-|

We are moving inexorably closer to a world without human contact, where you can carry on most of your day-to-day business without ever laying eyes on another face.

It’s all down to the internet of course, the device that has turned our lives on their heads, the tool that has opened up frontiers that we could never have imagined.

But does that mean we have to shake off lifelong habits as though they were something unpleasant stuck to our shoes?

When gran went into a home15 years ago, we had to clear her house (we knew she wouldn't be coming out). One morning, a letter arrived stating that the bailiffs were calling. Initially we thought 'Great - they can take everything' (gran was more than a 'bit of a hoarder', but then we wondered why the bailiffs would be calling!
Looking through the bread bin she used as her 'letters received' receptacle, it appears she hadn't sent back a new council tax form.
Gran was in her 90's, had lived in New Milton since being evacuated during the war (so, over 50 years) and had lived in the bungalow since being moved from the prefab some 20 odd years before.

We contacted the council, and asked why she had to fill in another council tax form. They said it was a new format, Council Taxes were being assessed and Mrs S (gran) hadn't sent her form back.
They were asked: 'Did you say she could come in and you'd fill it in with her?'
Reply: 'No, we sent another form out, and when she didn't bother sending that in the computer indicated she wasn't paying and we started proceedings'.
Us: 'So, you didn't at any time offer to help her'
Reply: 'No, we're too busy - we sent out the second form'
Us: 'Do you have any idea how old Mrs S is?' Is this information on the computer, did anyone bother looking? Please look now.
Reply: 'It says she was born in 1904'.
Us: 'In case you can't work that out, that makes her 96. Mrs S has had her council tax paid by the state ever since it came into being, yet you've been harassing her and are now sending the bailiffs around for non-payment of something she didn't need to pay!!'
Reply: Silence for 10 seconds. 'We're very sorry, we never realised..... The system was changing and we needed extra information.'
Us: Okay, you're only admin, a letter will be sent to those in charge of the department, and an apology is expected.

I wanted to take it further, mum and my sister didn't.
We never got an apology.

When I lived in Rustington the baliffs turned up looking for the previous owners. Took some time to prove I was not the person they were looking for and that the car in the garage was mine.

Ah but DIZZI they are helping the British economy by being there, I know it's true because those at Westminster told me so! :-D :-D :-D ;-)

BAILIFS KNOCKING ON 2 DOORS DOWN
THEY WILL HAVE A RIGHT OLD JOB THERE.ITS GOT
AT LEAST 4 FAMILIES IN A TWO BED HOUSE,LOL
WAIT TILL THEY ASK WHO'S HO,,THEIR ALL MR WHO'S
NO SPEAK ENGLISH,