Anyone who has visited my blog before may remember the earlier entry about the 123-Reg auto renewal issue that we had. They basically automatically renewed a domain name we didn’t want renewing. If they were gonna automatically do it then why send us emails every week telling us to renew it?

Anyway, following on from that same issue, we basically got our money back from the bank, then it got sent back to them, and then we got it back again. They have now totally shut our 123-Reg account down, we cant access any domain names to make changes, we have two sites we cant publish as we cant edit domain name details.

They even told Dave they had deleted our account!

We are waiting to hear back from the people up high apparently, and the only way to contact them is by email. They are probably on their sun lounger in the Bahamas replying to emails on their blackberry. Tossers.

We’ll update you as things progress!

What really gets to me (and probably her) is that Mansfield seems to want to ride off the back of her success and rise from the ashes into the spotlight! Im sorry mansfield, but surely thats something Mansfield should achieve by itsself? If Mansfield brought up and trained some great swimmers who all went on to win at something like the olympics, then great - well done mansfield! But that aint the case is it. As far as im aware Becky Adlington didnt even train in Mansfield as the facilities were not good enough - iirc she said she now trains in Nottingham.

I live in Mansfield, i was born here, and have been raised here. We once had things to be proud of, the brewery.. err.. the brewery.. and now all we have to be proud of is a young girl who totally off her own back (with the help of friends and family of course) has trained and gone on to become the most successful female swimmer in great britain. We can only be proud that she was born here though. Not that Mansfield made her the olympian star she has become!

Anyway, rant over - let becky have all the spotlight as she deserves it.

The wheelbase project is;

“an innovative project based in Nottingham working with young people aged 14-25 years old who are at risk of crime and social exclusion”

The kids who they interviewed on the news were all boasting about how they “dropped out of school” or used to “always get into fights” - one kid even confessed to setting his teacher on fire…

HOLD ON A MINUTE

So let me get this straight, these kids have dropped out of school becasue they were dragged up rather than brought up, and in payment for being a wart on the arse of society they get to play about with cars instead of sitting in a boring classroom listening to some boring teacher drone on about boring subjects that are, well, boring?!

Well thats it then!

KIDS! If you want a career in the motor trade or you just cant be arsed to work hard at school, all you have to do is set your teacher on fire, smash a few school windows and kill any farm animals your school may keep! Simple! And as a reward you will be able to tinker about with cars, build grass track racers and even race them!

WHAT THE FUCK?!

These kids chose their own path, they chose to be scumbags, so why waste money on them? Yeah sure, a few of them have reformed, a few of them no longer wish for all their teachers to be dead, but that doesn’t change the fact they once did, and it certainly doesn’t make all the things they have done wrong, right.

About ten years ago me and my mate timmyroob went on something very similar, called “The Wheels Project” - you never know, the wheelbase project could be a spin off from that? And we spent our entire 6 weeks holiday visiting scrap yards, making a off road buggy and learning to drive a transit van round a field.

All sounds like fun doesn’t it? Well we had to pay (cash money) to go on it, and the miscreant that was on it with us was one of these oxygen thieves, and he got to go on it free.

I remember it boiling my blood back then, and today seeing that the Wheelbase project is set to roll out nationwide - well lets just say boiling point has been reached, and its bubbling over the sides.

I cant possibly be the only person in the world that finds this both unfair, and a complete piss take. Genuine hard working kids get nothing like this and have to PAY OUT OF THEIR OWN POCKETS to do cool shit like this, but little bastards that set teachers on fire get it free.

Its bullshit!

Basically before Bex left we got a letter from the electricity company, saying our current direct debit of x amount was not enough, and they recommend that we change our direct debit, as it was not covering the amount of electricity we were using.  Without giving it a second thought I left it at that.  Now I’ll admit to one thing, I hardly ever pay any attention to my bills, and as long as there is a direct debit set up making sure the bills are covered, and that I have enough money in my account to cover this I leave it at that.  Anyway, by chance I happened to notice my Electricity bill whilst looking for something else in my file of bills and random things.  Basically over x amount of months I’ve managed to get myself nearly £300 in credit with them!  The cheeky thing is they dont send you letters telling you!  They just sit there watching your money fill up! Cheeky twats! Anyway I decided enough was enough, and that I wanted to lower my payments and also wanted the money back, as it would serve a better purpose in my bank account rather than theirs!  Rang them and explained that I’ve been paying far too much over how ever many months it’s been, and that I wanted to lower my payments.  All OK according to the bloke, but lets see how easy it is to get them to part with my money! Hmmmm.  Anyway that was on Monday.  Thursday I walk through the door, and they had sent me a bloody letter.  Claiming that as part of their REGULAR REVIEW of my account, THEY have come to the conclusion that x quid a month is far too much, and that they suggest Y quid a month instead! Which just so happened to be the same amount that I TOLD THE ON THE PHONE I wanted to pay! :?  So do they only review peoples account if they ring up and want money back?  Also I’m due another bill later this month, so not gonna chase my money, until I know what they next bill is, and how much I’m in credit with them!  IF it’s a substantial amount, and it takes forever to get the money out of them I’ll just visit uswitch.com, and change my supplier!  I just couldnt believe the cheek of the letter!!

We bought the domain name a while ago for use with a similar idea, but it was forum based. It was a big hit with people, and the site poddled along for a while.

Due to a lack of time we couldnt keep moderating the forum, so have sat on the domain name until something else has been thought of to fill its boots.

Both dave and myself are avid complainers, we love to moan when things are not quite right, push the boundries of customer service and see what we can squeeze from the local and national businesses we deal with as we go about our lives.

If your a blogger, and you like to rant, then make a special category for your rants and give us the link. We’ll add it to our site, and you will be sharing your rants with a much wider audience!

Get heard!

FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!

I was coming off a roundabout the other day, when some prick in a fiesta st overtook me doing a stupid speed, i stayed clear so that he wouldn’t kill me in the process. After 3 sets of lights, i caught up with him (and i was doing the speed limit!) So i gave him some “parked in the boot” action and followed him up the road. He went to turn off, and i stopped at the side of him and suggested he wind his window down so i could call him a prick.

He drove off. Of course.

When will these losers learn?

Will it take a death? Or should i say more deaths?

I went back to the doctors who decided to give me even stronger pain killers, he felt the area where the pain was coming from, poked and prodded it and came to a decision that the muscle was tight and the cause was due to being sat at a computer for too many hours and not doing enough exercise. So, the story continues………

I was now taking 30/500 co-codamol which were making me drowsy and caused a loss of apetite. Another trip to the doctors and another set of tablets. I had been given some anti inflammatories and told to take them with paracetamol. So, I left again and started doing as he asked. Within a few days I had a bad stomach pain and had problems going to the toilet, not to mention the drowsiness again, not to mention the pain was getting worse by the day.

I went back to ther doctors again, who referred me to a physiotherapist. Six weeks later I had my first appointment and we went through a few basic exercises. I was told to do them as often as possible and try and stay active and then go back once a week. Over a period of about six weeks, the pain just got worse and the physio could not understand what was happening so referred me back to the doctor who then referred me to the hospital.

More time went by and the pain got worse and worse, there became times when I could not stand up without being in severe pain, walking became difficult, sitting down at my desk was painful, nothing seemed to be getting any easier and the pain killers were not working in the slightest.

Within a few weeks a letter from the hospital dropped through the door with an appointment date, in the meantime I saw the doctor again who gave me some diclofenac which he claimed “would help this time”. By the time the appointment came round the pain had moved into my right leg and was affecting my sleep.

Due to Kings Mill Hospital waiting list being too long I was sent to Bassetlaw. The doctor there was fantastic, he did a few checks on my back and leg and soon found out that I had a slipped disc and requested that I have a MRI scan to see how bad it was. I was told to wait for a letter which would confirm the date. This came within a few days and told me that I could go back in about four weeks time.

Ok, next was the MRI scan, nothing to it, went in, laid on a long bed and stuck some earplugs in and laid there for about 20 minutes whilst the machine scanned me and made some strange noises.

A few weeks later I went back for the results and as the doctor thought it was a slipped disc, and a bad one at that. He said the disc was quite big and sticking out quite a bit which is what was causing all the pain. Stronger medication was prescribed and an appointment to come to the hospital for a caudal epidural was made for a few weeks time.

This diagram shows exactly what happens:

I was now on Gabapentin, a large orange capsule. After a fews days of taking these the pain did not ease at all, I just became really drowsy and spaced out. Following two trips to A&E as the pain became unbearable they tried me on some different tablets, which again have not really had an effect. They did give me some crutches though which were helping with walking until they too became useless.

Next was the caudal epidural, the idea was to inject steroids into my spine which could take away some of the pain, the doctor said that it may not work because of how bad the slipped disc was but it was worth a try. Failing this, he would need to operate. I went to Bassetlaw Hospital @ 7.30am one morning and was in the operating room for about 11am. After giving me a local anaesthetic they proceeded with an injection into the spine, which was the most weirdest feeling ever, I felt pressure along the bottom of my back and down my right leg, it was horrible. A few hours later I was back at home, feeling numb and drowsy, as for the pain, it was still there. The doctor has now prescribed me with some morphine patches and told me to carry on taking the pain killers. One patch was applied to my shoulder and within a few hours the pain had eased off a little.

The following morning came round, and the pain was still there but was not as bad, as instructed I rested and spent a few days in bed and tried to stay as still as possible. The following couple of weeks went by and the pain became unbearable which meant an increase in painkillers and another morphine patch. I went back to the hospital and was told that an operation was needed to cut away a part of the disc, first I must go for a pre-assessment then the main op a couple of days later, at the time I was told that the waiting list was not that long. A few days later I got a call and was asked to go in for the pre-assessment then if that went ok could have the operation two days later.

Thats where I am at at the moment, this Monday for the pre-assessment and the operation on Wednesday, fingers crossed that it goes ok and that I can get back to normal. What a long wait it has been.

BT Internet was also provided and from day one we had problems with the router, to which we complained straight away. They have tested the line on various occasions, sent us a new router but still we had the problem. Throughout the working day the router would reset itself upto ten times a day, sometimes even more. When it eventually flicked back to life the PC’s would have to be reset as there was normally an IP conflict.

For over a year, this caused a massive interruption to the business. It is only now that we have managed to get away from BT, even though they have threatened us with more charges for leaving a contract early, even though the broadband was on a one year contract, they now claim that it was a two year contract. We have had no choice but to make an official complaint but as usual we have not heard a whisper. Now onto the house phone line. A phone line was ordered online, a call from BT came through asking for a deposit. This was paid and an installation date was given. So, the day that they were coming we called to see where they were.

To our amazement, they had a problem. For some reason they had cancelled the order and not told us and had no explanation, the only thing they could tell us is that the engineer would not be coming out today and a new order must be placed. After being on the phone for over an hour, being passed from person to person and probably from country to country we get put through to the sales department who decide to keep us on hold for even longer. By this time, enough was enough. We hung up and filed a complaint through their website.

Why does BT have the whole country over a barrel?

Why is everyone forced to have a BT line and put up with the useless call centres and systems they have in place?

If only something could be done?

Maybe if enough people pulled together the Government could do something?