david the designer

things that make me grumpy #3

The farmer who thinks it's perfectly acceptable to plough up the South Downs Way. Just how f***ing mean spirited can you be?

dinga-ling-along ding dong ding

Dear Mr Tesco, Dear Mr Sainsbury

I give up. I won't shop again until you shut that f***ing Christmas music down.

Funny how such seemingfully cheerful music can make your customers so miserable - or are you too busy calculating your takings to notice what's going on down on the shop floor?

Until next year - yours with sleighbells on,

davidthegrumpydesigner

hey twitter, thanks for the emails - just something you might like to note, though...

...I'm not Scottish, I don't live anywhere near Scotland, and I don't have even the faintest interest in any form of sport - especially football.

So maybe you could just take me off your list, eh?

things that make me grumpy #2

This is my BT landline phone. You probably can't see what it says on the display, which is part of the reason for showing it to you. Let me tell you what it says: "1 NEW CALLS".

Now, dear BT. How your customers love to hate you. But you've no idea, have you? Absolutely none at all.

So let me explain. Is there any point in me knowing how many calls I might have had in a day? Not for me, there isn't. But if you want to give me information that YOU might think is useful, then do me a favour and make it legible. And while you're about it, bloody well tell me in ENGLISH.

I would have phoned* you to explain this. But then you're a telecoms company and you won't allow your customers talk to anything but machines, will you?

*From my iPhone, of course. Therein lies a clue.

things i've seen enough of, thank you very much #1

Graphic designers' wedding invitations.

Now I really do try not to be negative on this blog (it's one of my unwritten rules). But sometimes I think it's best just to face up to the facts: that there are some things that graphic designers didn't ought to be allowed anywhere near. Top of the list being wedding invitations, especially if they're for themselves.

Forgive me if you think I'm being a killjoy here, but I don't know these people, I'm never going to meet them, the wedding's already happened anyway - so I don't need to see the invitation, thank you very much. Not that I don't wish them all every happiness, mind.

I'd just rather not see their invitations cluttering up the interweb.

oranges aren't the only fruit, fortunately

Free wi-fi from orange - which turns out to be not so free after all.

this made me cross-eyed #4 (and rather grumpy, too)

Thanks to Dave for this one (see comments).

Unfortunately it reminds me of the song "three wheels on my wagon", which I now can't get out of my head. Thanks a bunch for that.

this makes me rather grumpy

"Open 1 Documents" - what sort of English is that?

southbank centre celebrates mastercard

Welcome to austerity Britain, but this time on credit. And no Abram to guide us.

name and shame

The good news is that I've eventually managed to get those two domains transferred. So now I can reveal that the company that's managed to turn a two-minute job into a two-week saga of frustration and mishandled 'customer care' is NewNet. And the winners of the competition are therefore Joshua and Martin. Well done guys. Now all I have to do is think of some sort of prize that I can send you. I'll do that in the next couple of days.

Actually though, Joshua isn't quite so sure that he deserves a prize, as he admits to doing a 'who is' search on my domain name - which led him more or less there. Especially after the clue that I gave you. But no matter - it's the taking part that counts around here.

But look at the other guesses. And the sad thing is, I'm not the least bit surprised to see any of them there (nor, I suspect, are you). So it's a Wednesday raspberry to AOL, Virgin, Orange, TalkTalk and, last but not least, BT. If only all that 'customer care' bollocks were true. The pity is, the customer experience is so very often at complete variance with what's been promised. Shame on you.