On my BlackBerry 9000 Bold diary of crashes and misdemeanors

Hobbes, you must know by now that my crackberry addiction (1, 2 and 3) keeps me off Nokias, Samsungs, SonyEricssons and Motorolas (well, in this case is just Motorola who keeps me away from Motorola), but since I am a bit mad at RIM trying to play cat and mouse with the wrong crowd (BB [...]

Barclays going at it again. Account on credit, and returned cheques

I don’t normally insult or use swear words, but I think Barclays deserve to be called Bastayrds out loud.
The reason is no other than the fact that the Bastayrds did it again. A while ago I had a go for their twisted ways of playing the hours in a day and poor product knowledge at [...]

On Vodafone and how to live off a brand name and nothing else

Calvin Ltd. has had a small business account with Vodafone for a few years now. We tried first with Virgin, then T-Mobile but they proved pretty deficient in terms of service and signal coverage, so in the classical crowd wisdom, we signed up with Vodafone. Surely a mammoth of telecommunications would know how to do [...]

Evita a Delti.com al comprar neumáticos online (X)

30abril09
Y hoy, después de reenviar mis emails en los últimos dos días a todas las direcciones de @delti.com desde donde me han contactado Natalia Sima, José Hernández, Olga Vorkum y demás, me envían un formulario de reclamación (finalmente en español, los que seguís mi odisea ya sabréis que ya me habían enviado uno… en alemán).
Adjuntado encontrará un formulario [...]

On how not to run a bank, don’t trust Barclays online banking to work every day

There was a time when if your competition made a fool of themselves, you would storm in and get their customers. Market mistakes translated into a drop in market share.
But that was in the old days, my friend. We have reached such a level of mediocrity, that not only businesses don’t learn from their own [...]

On HSBC fighting ferociously against online banking convenience

Hobbes, I guess by now you must know I try to keep my paws away from the planned incompetence and limitations of nowadays branch banking.
In a number of occasions I have denounced how by planned sheer incompetence banks are pushing us towards online and telephone banking while making online and telephone more and more difficult [...]

Evita a Delti.com al comprar neumáticos online (IX)

El sábado finalmente recibí un email de José Hernández, de Delticom (www.neumaticos-online.es):
Estimado Señor calvin,
Disculpe que no le haya escrito tan rapido como usted lo necesitaba, no estaba laborando estos dias por cuestiones personales.
Vamos a ver usted nos indica que los neumaticos reclamados fueron recogidos por GLS del cual no tiene algun comprobante de recogida, sin [...]

Evita a Delti.com al comprar neumáticos online (VIII)

Desde luego, esta gente de Delticom (www.neumaticos-online.es) son lo peor de lo peor del servicio al cliente, la organización empresarial, los contactos con sus propios proveedores y una comunicación interna digna de las peores pesadillas empresariales.
Hace ya meses que la empresa GLS recogió los famosos neumáticos defectuosos, y cuando digo “meses” me refiero a que Delti.com [...]

On what not to do with your customers: Post Office and sales pushing

Hobbes, I just came back from the post office. Like an American supermarket, an English Post Office is a cathedral to human nature, although in this case, a cathedral to lack of custumer service and savvie.
Have you notice they sell travel insurance, phone cards, credit cards and many other things? Well, they do. Nothing wrong [...]

On how not to run a bank, don’t trust HSBC online banking to work every day

Hobbes, I think I have already mention it before, but it beggars believe the sub-standard online service that HSBC offers.
I cannot handle banking staff at any branch of any bank (someone told once that Barclays trains their staff not to make decisions, not to think, I cannot say it is true, but surely is very [...]