On mending broken fences

I think I need 4 pieces of 4x1in, about 18 inches long, and one piece about 5 foot long plus a tin of cuprinol (or similar external wood treatment) and some 3 inch nails.

The building maintenance contractors employed by the council (or to be more precise the scaffolding sub-contractors employed by them) have broken my garden fence twice this year so I've got to fix it.  I don't want to spend much on it as they'll probably be back next year to break it again.  Fences aren't typically built to have hulking great scaffolders climbing over them because they can't be bothered to put a note through the door a couple of days before they need access to ask me to leave the back gate open for them so they can put up scaffolding to fix the damage done by the family on the top floor.

One more reason we need more funding of research

Cancer needs its arse kicking, hard.  Fortunately there are people doing their best to find better ways of doing that.  Unfortunately funding of research has been cut and cut and cut for over 20 years now.

Sales Calls and Wrong Numbers

Just had a call, on my land line, from a company called Summit asking if I wanted my guttering and fascias done. I pointed out that this is a low rise council block so the council deal with that. Telesales person was not happy about this.

I then noticed that I had 11 messages on my answering machine so I listened to them. Four were automated sales calls, 2 were hang ups and the rest were all wrong numbers. Worryingly one wrong number was a GP's surgery trying to set up an appointment, one was a school wanting a parent to come in and talk about Karen's progress and two were Kingsheath job centre reminding Mrs Kaur that she had an appointment with them last Tuesday.

This phone number has been registered with TPS for nearly 2 years now.

As they called me on my landline I didn't get their number on my phone and when I dialled 1471 I got a message that they had withheld their number any how.  I did some Google searching and the only number I could find is their 0800 sales line.  I think their address is:

Summit Cladding
Summit House
Loughton
Essex
IG10 4DX

Although there is a company in Birmingham called Summit Roofguard at:

21 Sovereign Road
Kings Norton Business Centre
Birmingham, B30 3HN  

But as the person who called me only identified the company as Summit I can't be sure which of these it was if it was either.

More Canals than Venice

Silent Calls from 08000727732

Just had a call from 08000727732.  Picked up, said hello.  Line was silent for a few seconds then the other end hung up.  Looks like another round of marketing calls.  Phone number is registered with TPS.  What else can I do??

I Googled the number and found a page that indicates it's from British Gas but some of the comments say that British Gas deny all knowledge of the number.

British Computer Society launch site aimed at recruiting managers/HR recruiters

BCS have just launched a microsite on their website aimed at recruiting managers and HR recruiters: http://www.bcs.org/recruiters

They are pushing for hirers to add ‘Member of BCS’ to their candidate requirements, look for FBCS, MBCS or AMBCS after candidates’ names, look for CITP (Chartered IT Professional, the chartered status for IT and computing) after candidates’ names and to ask for evidence of Continuing Professional Development (MBCS and above grades of membership and CITP are required to maintain a log of CPD).

Personally I have been asking internally within the membership for BCS to demonstrate the value to me of membership by demonstrating to employers the advantage of hiring and MBCS over someone who is not a member.  In the current issue of the members magazine they have stated that the average salary for someone with CITP is £92,000pa, but that just makes me wonder if they earn that because they have CITP or they can justify that salary as an IT professional independent of having CITP.

Some key questions I have (as an MBCS and MIET) are:

• What do BCS need to do (other than increase marketing spend) to convince employers to class membership of BCS at least desirable if not mandatory for IT workers?
• What do BCS need to do to convince employers that funding BCS membership fees for those employees who qualify is a good investment?
• What do BCS need to do to convince employers that sponsoring an employee through CITP is a good investment?

I suspect that a big part of the answer to those questions will be in convincing the customers of those employers that buying from a company that employs members of BCS and promotes advancement through the levels and attainment of CITP is better than buy from one that does not.

The Gagging Law in 5 minutes

There's got to be a better way to handle budget cuts than more cuts.

I cannot help but think that the way many local councils are handling the budget cuts (or planning to handle them) is backwards.  Rather than shedding staff and outsourcing services to companies that will have to cut standards to turn a profit, surely it would be better to look at how they can save through local shared services and increase income by offering more services to local businesses for a fee.

Banned TED Talk: Nick Hanauer "Rich people don't create jobs"

This is pretty much what I've been saying since politicians started saying that we should give tax cuts to the rich to create jobs.

Silent calls from 01612127801

Recently I've been getting a lot of silent calls from 01612127801.  Silent as in when I answer there's just silence on the line for several seconds then a voice says "Goodbye!"  This I gather is what happens when a company uses an automatic dialer to call numbers.  Basically to minimise delay and not have their agents listening to dial tones whilst waiting for someone to answer the automatic dialer calls and waits for the person to pick up then assigns the call to the next available agent.  If there's no agent available it hangs up.

As I recall John Hemming MP had a bit of campaign against these some years ago.  I am writing to him to see if this campaign is still on going or might start up again.

This is the same as was happening most of the times I got calls from 01618149905 which turned out to be 'Versatile' trying to sell PPI claim assistance, when there was finally someone to take the call at their end.  Even the voice saying 'GoodBye!' sounds the same.  So what are the odds of two different companies, both in Manchester, both calling the same number (which has been registered with the TPS pretty much since I got it) with an automaic dialer and both not having enough staff to handle their automatically dialed calls?

This new number seems to be quite new, when I googled it I could only find one site that listed it and that only had four entries going back just under 2 weeks.  But I did find a page on WhoCallsMe about this number.

ETA:  had a response from John Hemming.  He said he'd have someone look into it and confirmed it's OFCOM's responsibility to deal with silent calls.

ETAA: Had a response from the person John Hemming had asked to look into this.  They said that they had spoken to OFCOM who had said that as they have no details of who that number belongs to they can't do anything about it. I'd had a similar response direct from OFCOM as a result of my contacting them directly.

Nuisance call from 08435600125

Just had a call.  Guy identified himself as being from 'Pension Aid' and said it wasn't a sales call, he then asked me if I was aware of the 'pension crisis'.  I explained that I was but as I was in a final salary scheme to which I was making 18% of gross salary contributions I should be OK.  He agreed I should be OK and said he'd update my records.  I asked for a 'Do Not Call' note to be put on my records.

Number has been on TPS for over 10 years.  Submitted complaint to TPS.  Suggest others do the same if they have calls from this number or similar: https://complaints.tpsonline.org.uk/Consumer/

Let's get this economy started!

Watching the news about the Cypriot plans to tax savings got me thinking that that's something that might actually work, but maybe not in the way they expect, so long as they are careful about which savings to tax (or at least tax most).  The thought actually started with Tory (and US Republican) claims that the tax breaks for the wealthy would help the economy as they are 'job creators'. 

That claim makes me hope that they are lying, or at least being disingenuous, because I'd hate to think that people so devoid of knowledge of how business works are running this country (although looking at the backgrounds of the Tory front bench makes me fear that they may be).  Anyone who has run a small/medium sized business (say 10 - 300 employees), or even just worked in one and taken an interest in where their pay comes from, knows that (with the possible exception of family members) you don't take someone on (i.e. create a job) because you can afford to.  You take someone on because if you don't you can't meet the volume of production your customers demand.  You have the fewest number of jobs that you can get away with, no more.  If you want to create jobs you first need to create the demand for the output of those jobs.  The great thing is that properly managed this becomes a positive feedback model where as more jobs are created they also create more demand.

Here comes how taxing savings, so long as the right sort of savings are taxed, might help.  Most savings are essentially dead money, the bank may leverage them to fund investments (if they were investing right now) or bolster reserves but other than that they sit there earning small rates of interest.  If Low Interest/High Liquidity savings were taxed (especially at the 40% rate proposed in Cyprus) that would incentivise the savers to stop sitting on them and spend them.  This would prime the pump for extra demand leading to job creation.  The difficult part would be keeping the demand in country so as to avoid the money simply going to China, India &c so helping create jobs there and to keep the keep the demand flowing long enough.

Nuisance calls from 01618149905

Had a number of silent calls from this number.  Just now they called again and I got a woman with a strong Manchester accent who told me that the company name was 'Versatile'.  In the background I heard typical 'call center' noise. I said I'd never heard of the company.  She said that the company did exist and was based in Manchester.  I told her I'd guessed that from the accent.  She acknowleded that she had a Manchester accent.  She said that they were regulated by the Ministry of Justice and the National Credit Database had shown that I was owed money from a credit agreement I had taken out.  I said "Please stop calling me.  Please remove my contact details from your system.  If you or anyone from this number calls me again I WILL contact the Information commissioner, I WILL get you fined." then hung up.

The number they called has been registered with the Telephone Preference Service for well over a decade.  I have made a complaint via TPS./

It seems that quite a few people are getting such calls and calls for different reasons.

ETA:  Had an email from TPS yesterday.  They have been unable to make contact with Versatile, they can't find any contact details.  They have parked the case.

Vocational training in schools

Yesterday the CIPD published an article on their site about a call for an alternative to A-Levels following recent results.  I posted a comment which they moderated (edited for length) but I feel they lost the link between the first two paragraphs they published, below if the full comment:

During the Olympics I saw a number of people questioning why a disproportionate number of Team GB and, in particular, Team GB medal winners were former Independant school kids. This reminded me of my own school days.  From age 10 to 14 I attended an Independent school on a scholarship.  when that school went bust I returned to the state school system attending a Secondary Modern.

At the Secondary Modern the school day ran from 09:00 to 15:30 with a 10 minute break mid-morning and an hour for lunch either 12:00 to 13:00 or 13:00 to 14:00.  The only sports were one hour of PE a week for half the year (the school didn't have the facilities for a whole year group to do PE at the same time).  The choice was Soccer or 10 pin bowling for the boys and netball or ten pin bowling for the girls.  The only vocational training was art, woodwork, typing (which was only open to girls, although I landed up doing it due to having Dyspraxia) and child care (again, girls only).

At the Independent school the school day ran from 08:30 to 17:30 with a 15 minute break at 10:30 and an hour for lunch at 13:00, 4 days a week (Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday), 2 days a week (Wednesday and Saturday) it ran, with the same breaks from 08:30 to between 16:00 and 17:00.  In terms of academic lessons we probably did a little more than a state school but not much.  The bulk of the extra time was taken up by sports (upto 11 hours a week), Combined Cadet Force (CCF, boys only) and vocational studies (all boys did at least 3 hours of woodwork a week and 3 hours of art/craft (which could include cookery, although in my time there only 3 boys (including myself) took the option); all girls did at least 3 hours of Cookery, 2 hours of typing (whilst the boys were doing CCF) and 3 hours of art/craft (which could include woodwork although in my time there only one girl actually took the option that I know of) a week).  Additionally there were compulsory hobby clubs for 2 hours every Thursday (during which boys could take typing, although in my time there I was the only one to take the option).  I understand that this was fairly common in the Independent sector.

Is it any wonder that Independent schools turn out more Olympians and people with more rounded skill sets?

Based on my experience I think we should look to extend the school day, certainly in Secondary schools, keeping the academic hours basically the same and filling the extra hours with more sports and vocational studies.  Eleven hours of sports a week is, perhaps, excessive for most pupils but 5 or 6 hours a week would allow for a greater variety of sports to be tried and fitness to be improved.  Offering a variety of vocational studies, along side the academics, from the start of secondary would give all pupils (even those who eventually go the academic route) a firm grounding in useful work skills and allow those who prefer vocational to academic work to get a taste of the options.  Some time could also be allocated to developing cross subject skills such as debate, study skills, critical thinking, time and priority management, project management, basic finance &c.

The main thing from my experience that I would seek to avoid having repeated would be the gender divide in subjects.  Girls should learn at least the fundementals of woodwork and/or engineering and try Soccer and/or Rugby.  Boys should learn at least the fundementals of typing (or rather it's modern equivalents) and/or cookery and try netball and/or hockey.  If CCF (or similar) is on offer then it should be open to both genders.

If I'd won that £148million on the Euro lottery last week I'd be looking to set up a Free School based on just those aims.

Of course, another advantage of the longer school day is that parents don't have to scabble to get into work after doing the school run only to leave pretty much straight after lunch to pick the kids up again.

Spam sales call from 07720590063

Called, hung up when I answered then called again.  Asked to speak to the Three network account holder.  Identified company as 'Sprint Communications'.  Tried to sell me a renewal on my Three contract (which is up in November) and a new phone.  When I said I wasn't interested in renewing my Three contract he offered to transfer my number to a different network.  I pointed out that I already have a phone on a different network (some years ago my sister chenged to Three and I worked out it would be cheaper to have a phone on that network than to call in from my normal phone, she's now going back to the same network as my normal phone) and wasn't interested in keeping that number.  He tried to sell me a contract on another network again.  I repeated my reasons for not wanting to move to another network and after a while he accepted it.

I pointed out that the number was registered with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) so, as I have no relationship with Sprint he should not be calling me.  I asked him to have my number removed from their systems and from any lists they sell on or use.  He said he'd try.

Also reported this on Who Calls Me.

Now I'm off to shop them to the ICO.  I suggest others do likewise if they get a call on a number they have registered with TPS.

Giving bad news at work

Just listened to a podcast from Manager Tools called "Giving Bad News" about what to do when something goes wrong at work andyou've got to tell your boss.  Reminds me why I stopped listening to them.  Should have called it "The Career Suicide Podcast".

One of the key points they make is that when things go wrong you should own the responsibility and not blame anyone else, even if they're the guilty party.  They say your boss will understand.  Not any boss I've ever met, they probably don't have time to try to understand.  If you're standing in front of your boss and 'owning the responsibility' then you are responsible.  That's responsible as a synonym for 'to blame' and 'at fault'.  Other phrases that go with the word responsible in that sense are 'poor review at annual performance review time' and 'dismissed for under performing with predjudice and no references'.

About the only saving grace I heard in the podcast is that if someone's failure to do something is the cause of your work being late or incomplete then you should do all you can to make sure that the othr person doesn't fail.  True, but there are limits to what you can do.  You can remind people and chase them up but, unless you have role power over them, you cannot instruct them.  You certainly cannot countermand an instruction from the person who does have role power over them.

Here's an example:

I was working on a project where I had a task to do.  It wasn't on the critical path but the task that followed it was so I had a firm deadline.  Before I could start my task a colleague on another team had to do another task on which my task was dependant.  Both tasks were a few hours each.  I couldn't do his task for him so ewas dependant on him doing his task.  As neither task was on the critical path there was a significant period between when we were assigned the tasks and the deadline.  In the time between when we were assigned the tasks and the deadline on his I'd periodically ask him if he'd had a chance to do it yet.  He'd responded not to worry it would be done on time.  A week before his task was due to be complete I reminded him of the deadline and asked if he'd had a chance to do it yet.  He just came back with don't worry it'll be done on time.  I spoke to my line manager and pointed out that I was concerned that he hadn't done the task yet as leaving it to the last minute ran the risk of something else coming up and preventing him from completing his task.  My line manager said to see him again if the task hadn't been done the day before it was due.  I also fired opff an email to the project manager, who didn't respond.  Each day I prodded my colleague with a reminder of the due date and askign him if he'd had a chance to look at it yet.  Each day I got a don't worry it will be done on time.  It got to the day before the deadline, still no joy so I tell my manager and email the project manager.  The dealine passes, I raise it again with my manager and with the project manager (who was, for a change, in the office and responded "What do you expect me to do about it?").  2 days after the deadline on my task my colleague finally does his task and notifies me right at the end of the working day so I have to stay late to do my task. 

Roll forwards about 9 months.  After a restructure we're all reporting to different managers and my colleague somes up to me and tells me what the situation was.  He had been specifically instructed by his line manager to not do the task until after the deadline.  Apparently she had had an arguement with my line manager and wanted to cast his team in a bad light by making us late on tasks.

Should I own the responsibility there?  Heck no!  That's an extreme example but it's rare a week goes by where I don't see or hear of a situation in our company, one of our suppliers or one of our customers where someone has failed on a task due to circumstances beyond their control.

In the podcast they say that bosses like it when people own the responsibility.  Of course they do, I expect lions are quite happy when a baby zebra wanders into the middle of the pride and lays down for a nap.  the bosses need someone to blame but are too busy to go looking, fortunately for them there's someone standing in front of them saying "I'm to blame.  It was me."

Differing prices of goods bought at different times

I use the excellent TheyWorkForYou site operated by MySociety to keep abreast of  what my MP, John Hemming, does and says in the House.  Today I got a notification that he had recived a petition regarding the purchase of a Citeron car by a constituent.  The situation, as I understand it, is that the constituent had ordered a car from Citeron before 1st April but collected it after.  On first April Citeron reduced the price of the car, the petitioner seems to feel that they should have refunded to him the difference between what he had paid and the new, lower price.

Whilst this appears to be very bad customer service by Citeron I suspect that the legal question here is when the contract between him and Citeron was formed as it is in that contract that the price will be set.  Is the contract formed when the order is placed?  When payment, or the initial part payment, is made?  Or is it when the goods are picked up.  I seem to recall that the normal milestone is when the payment, or initial part payment, is made, at that time a contract is formed.  If he paid a deposit ahead of 1st April and based on the higher price then the constituent probably locked in that higher price then.

Consider the reverse situation, if the price had risen on the 1st of April.  Would the constituent have claimed that he should pay the new higher price or, had Citeron tried to charge him the higher price, would he be claiming that as he'd ordered at the lower price and paid a deposit he should only pay the lower price?

Spam calls from 02034762589

Got a spam phone call from 02034762589 about 14:10 today to a number that has been registered with Telephine Preference Service for years, I checked and it's still registered.  The call is a recorded message saying that if I've been in a road accident I should press 1.  It doesn't identify the company it's from at all.

I Googled the number and found they seem to have been bothering quite a number of people today.

I went to the Telephone Preference Service website to complain but they won't deal with it because it's a recorded message.  They suggest contacting the ICO but the ICO website says that for phone calls you should contact the TPS.  Looks like there's a hole in the system that telemarketers are exploiting.  My MP, John Hemming, used to have an interest in combatting silent calls so I'm wondering if I need to write to him and see if he can suggest who would handle this or kick the appropriate person to make sure there is someone who will handle this?

Just sent this to my MP in the hope that he will vote against the Healthcare bill.  I used 'Write to Them' so he should have received the email by now (well, presumably one of his people will have and will hopefully be putting it with the many other messages he receives on the same subject, hopefully all politely asking him to oppose the healthcare bill):

FOR THE ATTENTION OF:

John Hemming MP
Birmingham, Yardley

Monday 12 March 2012

Dear John Hemming,

please vote against the healthcare bill. If passed this will set the stage for the destruction of the NHS and decent healthcare in the UK. The NHS is the envy of people in many countries, pretty much all of them except those that have a similar system themselves. Something this good we need to keep.

It is apposite that it be called the Healthcare bill as the end result will be that we get bills every time we access healthcare. Also, please near in mind that the bodies that represent those working in healthcare oppose the bill, as do the rank and file of your own party, and there is no voter mandate from any election to pass this legislation. The only ones who seem to be in favour are the Tory party (and not even all of them).

We have seen from the US the horror that is marketised healthcare. Please keep us off that road. Please oppose the Healthcare bill


Yours sincerely,

Stephen

Recent behaviour by the Tory party does make me wonder if they've realised that they will lose the next election and they want to mess the country up as much as possible and make as much cash as possible so they can push off somewhere else and leave Labour to clean up their mess.

Pains of Moving House

I'll be moving house soon so I've been notifying the various people who need to know my new address of this and when I think I'll be moving.  Mostly it's worked out OK.  Gas, Electric, Insurance &c all no problems, over the phone, done.  Bank want a written form but I could request that over the internet and they'll change my details on all their systems.  Local council is a different matter.  I called their call centre and got through to someone who told me I'd come through to the wrong section (I'd selected for general enquirers as there didn't seem to be an option for change of address) and told me to try a different option.  I did and got the same person again.  Third call I got through to the council tax who could change my council tax details but nothing else.  They tried to put me through to the switchboard who they said might know who I need to talk to but they just put me through to a message saying the office is now closed.

I've written to the councilors for the ward I'm moving to, via Write to Them,  hopefully they'll be able to explain the problem and get it dealt with.

Dear Paul Tilsley MBE, Sue Anderson and Mike Ward,

I shall be moving to your word in the next couple of weeks (not sure of the exact date but the 19th is looking hopeful) from South Yardley.  This lead to the genesis of my query.

As I'm moving house obviously I have to notify the council of this so that council tax records, electoral roll &c can be updated.  I had understood, from publicity material I have seen, that a major goal of the Customer First transformation programme was to provide a single point of contact so that when a citizen's details changed they would just have to call the council once and all affected systems would be updated.  However, when I called yesterday I was notified by the call centre that I would have to call each department and notify them individually.  I have, so far, notified council tax (which took 3 calls to finally reach the correct team) but have not yet been able to find the combination of key presses to get through the IVR to the teams for electoral roll or libraries.

Was I misinformed as to the goals of the Customer First programme?  Was I misinformed by the call centre yesterday?  Is it just that the programme hasn't gotten around to joining things up yet?

Specifically on the updating of my council tax records I was disappointed that when I changed my address I had to give my bank details, twice!  Once to prove my identity and again to set up a new direct debit to replace the existing one paying the council tax on my current home.  I can understand having to prove my identity but given that I'm moving from one band A residence to another band A residence in the same city (same constituency even) so will be paying the same amount each month from the same bank account to the same local authority to have to set up a new DD seems nonsensical.

Yours sincerely,

Stephen