Category: Things That Annoy Me

For the last month or so I have allocated a “category” to each day and done my best to schedule in advance a post in that category.

I thought that I was getting more “Victor Meldrew” in my old age and getting annoyed by trivial daily occurrences. When it came to actually documenting them – I’m coming up dry. I’m obviously much more placid than I thought I was.

So – you may know me better than I know myself – what topic of posts would you like to see from me on a Friday going forwards?

I don’t know if you have seen the QuickQuid advert for short term payday loans. The premise is – some unexpected condition crops up, time stops, they consider what to do, then get a loan.

In this advert the car breaks down, time stops, he grabs someone else’s phone and fires up the QuickQuid app.

Identity theft ?

When I last changed Gas and Electricity supplier I got a “free” smart meter. No more meter readings to be sent in, instant display of your consumption and costs – fantastic!

I have just changed provider again and shock horror my existing smart meter is not compatible with my new provider! I will need to get another “free” smart meter.

In all the adverts for switching, they make a big point about it being the same gas coming down the same pipes so it’s no big deal to switch. However, surely it’s the same data going up the same “wires”? What this is indicating is that the national roll out of smart meters obviously didn’t have any standards in place to ensure that each providers smart meter systems used the same data in the same format to ensure interoperability.

<irony>At least the smart meters are “free”, with their costs coming out of the company’s profits and not being covered by increases to my bill.</irony>