The Grumble Thread - No energy for a full on rant.

[hellymedic]

I've been trying to book myself a wheelchair bay on the trains and received this as part of a an email from SouthWestern Railway.

<<All our trains have wheelchair spaces, with a companion seat adjacent to them, however, seats on our trains are non-reservable, this includes the wheelchair spaces. >>

WTAF?

I reckon that's either "Computers are hard, so we're not bothering."  or  "Running a train service is hard, so we're not making any promises."

It'll be like bike spaces and indeed any seat. On some trains, determined mostly by what rolling stock is being used, nothing is bookable, although it all exists.

Bookable seats require the intervention of a Real Human Bean ™ to place tickets in booked seats. This is a cost to the business and any extra charges levied for booking seats won’t be sufficient to cover. Shareholders ROI MUST be protected and maximised.

Quite a lot of seats have an electronic display now.
I think the real reason they are ditching the booking is because it enables them to switch around rolling stock more easily. If you have some carriages with 50 seats and one wheelchair space, some with 60 seats, then taking bookings forces you to ensure the right number of carriage type X are at the right place at the right time. That is expensive, both in planning terms and logistically.
No bookings, you can use any carriage.

This wouldn't stress me if *I* could use any carriage; point is, there are very few wheelchair spaces and I need one to be available if I'm joining a train originating elsewhere.

[Tim Hall]

6 years ago we paid 12,000€ to have an electric chair put in to hoist the Inlaw Paw to his bedroom of an evening. He used it exactly once before a heart attack put him in bed for his last months.  Since then we've been taking the thing for a trundle every week or two to maintain the batteries, and dusting and greasing it sort-of regularly.

Today the bloody thing went clunk halfway up, its pilot lights went out and it's immovable.  I called Stannah (rot their knickers) and they want 300€ to come and look at it - after Christmas, leaving our stairs half-blocked until then.

No help to you, sorry, but when we put a stair lift in for my mum, the first time she descended the stairs with an air of grace and majesty, I played the Thunderbirds March on my phone to herald her arrival.

[Mrs Pingu]

My Wiser central heating system has 2 'smart modes:
Eco - which is suppose to use an algorithm to work out the heat capacity of your home to decide whether it can turn the heating off earlier than scheduled to save energy (I think)
Comfort - which seems to do the same sort of thing but works out how long it takes your home to get up to temperature and turns the heating on earlier so that it's at your desired temperature at the scheduled 'on' time, rather than just starting heating at that time.

So fine, I decided to just turn 'Eco' mode on so that it decides when to turn off.
Except there seems to be a bug and it's either running Comfort mode or it's just turning on randomly.
Which is bloody annoying because when the heating comes on Pumpkin thinks it's breakfast time.
Cue me getting a load of pointy claws poked in my face at 0415 the other morning.

Guess I'll be turning that off.

So last night, as I was not getting to sleep I noticed that the heating was on at 0030. WTF?
After some more poking about in the app eventually I found that the smart TRV in my office (the only one we have) was calling for heat. So I went and poked around in the settings for that. The heating was scheduled to be off at that time in that room. More heard scratching. Eventually I found though that the TRV setting was not set to follow the schedule. So it was just calling for heat any time it got a bit chilly.

Looked at my usage in the Octopus app this morning and it transpires that since last week the heating has been coming on every hour or so during the night. So something weird happened last week that made the schedule be turned on for that TRV.
Bloody annoying but at least I've got to the bottom of it now, somewhat.

[T42]

6 years ago we paid 12,000€ to have an electric chair put in to hoist the Inlaw Paw to his bedroom of an evening. He used it exactly once before a heart attack put him in bed for his last months.  Since then we've been taking the thing for a trundle every week or two to maintain the batteries, and dusting and greasing it sort-of regularly.

Today the bloody thing went clunk halfway up, its pilot lights went out and it's immovable.  I called Stannah (rot their knickers) and they want 300€ to come and look at it - after Christmas, leaving our stairs half-blocked until then.

No help to you, sorry, but when we put a stair lift in for my mum, the first time she descended the stairs with an air of grace and majesty, I played the Thunderbirds March on my phone to herald her arrival.

I must ask the service bloke if he can plumb that in.

[ian]

I've been trying to book myself a wheelchair bay on the trains and received this as part of a an email from SouthWestern Railway.

<<All our trains have wheelchair spaces, with a companion seat adjacent to them, however, seats on our trains are non-reservable, this includes the wheelchair spaces. >>

WTAF?

I reckon that's either "Computers are hard, so we're not bothering."  or  "Running a train service is hard, so we're not making any promises."

It'll be like bike spaces and indeed any seat. On some trains, determined mostly by what rolling stock is being used, nothing is bookable, although it all exists.

Bookable seats require the intervention of a Real Human Bean ™ to place tickets in booked seats. This is a cost to the business and any extra charges levied for booking seats won’t be sufficient to cover. Shareholders ROI MUST be protected and maximised.

Quite a lot of seats have an electronic display now.


I think the real reason they are ditching the booking is because it enables them to switch around rolling stock more easily. If you have some carriages with 50 seats and one wheelchair space, some with 60 seats, then taking bookings forces you to ensure the right number of carriage type X are at the right place at the right time. That is expensive, both in planning terms and logistically.

No bookings, you can use any carriage.

I don't think any of the train operators south of the capital have seat bookings (Southern/Thameslink, Southeastern, South West) - certainly not on routes in the SE network. I suppose for the longer routes (Exeter etc.) they might, but to Surreyshire they don't.

We don't even have first class, which is good, because that means you can sit in the first class section and enjoy the luxury of, erm, marginally less dirty seats and the stale bouquet of earlier dope smokers.

[mrcharly-YHT]

I've been trying to book myself a wheelchair bay on the trains and received this as part of a an email from SouthWestern Railway.

<<All our trains have wheelchair spaces, with a companion seat adjacent to them, however, seats on our trains are non-reservable, this includes the wheelchair spaces. >>

WTAF?

I reckon that's either "Computers are hard, so we're not bothering."  or  "Running a train service is hard, so we're not making any promises."

It'll be like bike spaces and indeed any seat. On some trains, determined mostly by what rolling stock is being used, nothing is bookable, although it all exists.

Bookable seats require the intervention of a Real Human Bean ™ to place tickets in booked seats. This is a cost to the business and any extra charges levied for booking seats won’t be sufficient to cover. Shareholders ROI MUST be protected and maximised.

Quite a lot of seats have an electronic display now.
I think the real reason they are ditching the booking is because it enables them to switch around rolling stock more easily. If you have some carriages with 50 seats and one wheelchair space, some with 60 seats, then taking bookings forces you to ensure the right number of carriage type X are at the right place at the right time. That is expensive, both in planning terms and logistically.
No bookings, you can use any carriage.

This wouldn't stress me if *I* could use any carriage; point is, there are very few wheelchair spaces and I need one to be available if I'm joining a train originating elsewhere.

For 'you', read 'the ToC'.

Sorry, brain context. I used to write instructions for software that was used to plan this sort of timetabling.

Yes, it is infuriating, and completely down to cost-saving by the ToCs.

[TheLurker]

...software that was used to plan this sort of timetabling.

You mean they actually *plan* things?  Wonders will never cease.  Mind you, if they can sink to the current piss-poor levels of service *with* planning what they'd be (in)capable of if they left things alone defies imagination.

[De Sisti]

A local company has just fitted some blinds in my bathroom. Before the fitter left, I noticed that
one of the bathroom wall tiles had a crack on in (in line with where he drilled a hole to fit the blinds inside the window frame. The crack was not there before he started the installation.

The fitter said he didn't cause the damage (and there was no point in arguing with him). I have sent an email of complaint to his office, along with a picture of the crack. If they further deny it
I will use the legal protection I have in my home insurance to help me settle the matter.

I think I will ask them for their insurer's details and see if that prompts them to sort out my complaint.

[ElyDave]

I think it's usually a neutral question. It can of course be used in an exclusionary way, just as many questions can, and yes it's more likely to be used that way to a black person, as well as more likely to be perceived even if the intent isn't there.

So we could do with a non-exclusionary way of asking the same question. "Where do you live" might cover it at least in many cases. "Where you're from" can of course be the place you live or any/many of several other places.

Depends who's asking, could be TEH FENZ, about 20 miles North of Cambridge, Wiltshire, The UK, all over the place.  Each of which is contextually defendable

On wow! Not just a cool dude but The Actual Fonz!

ISWYDT 

[Bledlow]

I've been trying to book myself a wheelchair bay on the trains and received this as part of a an email from SouthWestern Railway.

<<All our trains have wheelchair spaces, with a companion seat adjacent to them, however, seats on our trains are non-reservable, this includes the wheelchair spaces. >>

WTAF?

I reckon that's either "Computers are hard, so we're not bothering."  or  "Running a train service is hard, so we're not making any promises."

It'll be like bike spaces and indeed any seat. On some trains, determined mostly by what rolling stock is being used, nothing is bookable, although it all exists.

Bookable seats require the intervention of a Real Human Bean ™ to place tickets in booked seats. This is a cost to the business and any extra charges levied for booking seats won’t be sufficient to cover. Shareholders ROI MUST be protected and maximised.

Really? Still?

I'm trying to remember when I first saw electronic displays above seats saying whether they were reserved or not. It was a long time ago. Yes, there are old carriages, but surely, there must be very many which don't need someone to walk along the train putting tickets on booked seats.

[barakta]

Helly, the train company not allowing bookings may be in breach of their "Accessible Travel Policy (ATP)" The intrepid Mr Doug Paulley reported his local train company to the Office for Rail and Road (ORR) very recently.

The ATP is there precisely so wheelchair users can guarantee a seat as there's very few places you can travel.

Problem is complaining takes a lot of time and energy as even pointing out "you're breaking your legal mandate" doesn't work cos the frontline numpties don't understand and they'll stall you for time.

[rafletcher]

Bloody power interruptions: “Beep” goes the clock radio, followed closely by “bleep” from the bedside phone wanting its time and date settings checked, then “beep, rumble rumble” from the printer rebooting, then whatever is on the TV, as it and the digibox turn on. And of course the cooker and microwave need their clocks resetting. And the shonkily refurbished iPod my wife’s using (she listens to audiobooks all night, every night) loses its WiFi connection. Sigh. All at 2am of course.

[Basil]

Still no water. 🌵
This is now getting rather serious.

[robgul]

Still no water. 🌵
This is now getting rather serious.

If you saw my other thread last week - when it comes back on, if there's been a leak involving a digger in a muddy hole, run an outside tap to clear any possible debris and avoid the risk of clogging cistern inlet valves and mixer taps.

[Basil]

Thanks Rob. 
A property near me has a broken gutter. I put a bucket under the cascade and 10 minutes later went back to get it.  It was full.
That's the bog flushed. 

[Mrs Pingu]

Good idea
The advantages of having a water butt for such an eventuality I guess...

[Peter]

Bloody power interruptions: “Beep” goes the clock radio, followed closely by “bleep” from the bedside phone wanting its time and date settings checked, then “beep, rumble rumble” from the printer rebooting, then whatever is on the TV, as it and the digibox turn on. And of course the cooker and microwave need their clocks resetting. And the shonkily refurbished iPod my wife’s using (she listens to audiobooks all night, every night) loses its WiFi connection. Sigh. All at 2am of course.

First world problems!  Makes you hark back to the days when all that went off was your dialysis machine or the iron lung ...

[hellymedic]

Bloody power interruptions: “Beep” goes the clock radio, followed closely by “bleep” from the bedside phone wanting its time and date settings checked, then “beep, rumble rumble” from the printer rebooting, then whatever is on the TV, as it and the digibox turn on. And of course the cooker and microwave need their clocks resetting. And the shonkily refurbished iPod my wife’s using (she listens to audiobooks all night, every night) loses its WiFi connection. Sigh. All at 2am of course.

First world problems!  Makes you hark back to the days when all that went off was your dialysis machine or the iron lung ...

Power restoration in these parts is usually accompanied by the simultaneous activation of all the neighbourhood burglar alarms...

[Kim]

Power restoration in these parts is usually accompanied by the simultaneous activation of all the neighbourhood burglar alarms...

Indeed.

It's worse in the summer, when you have the windows open and there's an alarm or two that aren't deactivated until September.

[matthew]

Bloody power interruptions: “Beep” goes the clock radio, followed closely by “bleep” from the bedside phone wanting its time and date settings checked, then “beep, rumble rumble” from the printer rebooting, then whatever is on the TV, as it and the digibox turn on. And of course the cooker and microwave need their clocks resetting. And the shonkily refurbished iPod my wife’s using (she listens to audiobooks all night, every night) loses its WiFi connection. Sigh. All at 2am of course.

First world problems!  Makes you hark back to the days when all that went off was your dialysis machine or the iron lung ...

Power restoration in these parts is usually accompanied by the simultaneous activation of all the neighbourhood burglar alarms...

And as Kim would no doubt attest it is worse in studentville during the holidays as there is no one resident to reset most of them out.

* and whilst I was typing.... *

Indeed.

It's worse in the summer, when you have the windows open and there's an alarm or two that aren't deactivated until September.

[The Family Cyclist]

Tis the youngests birthday today. Due to working a lot in retail I've rarely been about for the birthday fun. Today had loads planned and got the f ing lurgy cold that's going round so they've all gone off for lunch and cinema and I'm stuck at home feeling grim

[barakta]

That's maddening! I hope you feel better soon and tomorrow goes well.

[ElyDave]

Good idea
The advantages of having a water butt for such an eventuality I guess...

I suggested that to Mrs ED last week when we were interrupted for about 14 hours

Didn't go down well

[The Family Cyclist]

That's maddening! I hope you feel better soon and tomorrow goes well.

Thanks. Feel so much better today, didn't think I would be making Christmas Dinner today. Have wisely decided against church this morning especially as was meant to be on welcome.  The lurgy has been doing its rounds of family I'm seeing today but taking it elsewhere isn't the right thing to do.

[Mr Larrington]

Installed Windscribe VPN on my fondleslab so's I could pretend to be French.  Got their welcome e-mail, containing a “random fact”

All swans in England belong to the queen.

Wrong.  Doubly wrong, in fact.  I shall unsubscribe immediately.  FUMMIN'