Work

“It Just Works”

| Richard

Yesterday, I was reminded about just how good technology can be when it all works together. This can, of course, be a rare thing and nothing is more frustrating than kit that doesn’t work as it should.

But two things – OK, three – reminded me of how lucky we are these days.

It started with iTunes Match: I updated the iTunes software on my work laptop and then enabled iTunes Match and watched as it increased the number of songs from simply those I’d previously purchased from the iTunes Store (available since a previous release of iTunes) to all of my music collection currently stored on my iMac back at home but now backed up to iCloud.

I was then able to download a track I wanted on my laptop from my music store back home.

I’m working away from home at the moment and saw that there was nothing much worth watching on the telly. So I fired up my iPad, tethered it to my iPhone – thanks to 3’s All You Can Eat data plan – and did a bit of social networking before starting up Sky Go.

I then watched a couple of films from Sky’s Anytime+ feature: new or classic films that are available to you, depending upon your Sky TV package. Streamed over 3’s network at no additional cost to me.

“It Just Works”…

Thorntons Delivery Fail

| Richard

Another year ordering some expensive chocolates from Thorntons and specifying a delivery date.

Another year when they fail to deliver, due to their using that complete shower, Parcelnet/Hermes/Home Delivery Network/Yodel/Any Other Name We Can Think Of for so-called Premium Delivery.

Last year, they “lost” the packages of chocolates I was having delivered to my London office for the receptionists and Ops Director and Thorntons had to re-order.

This year, I paid for premium, next day delivery, so that delivery was due to take place on Tuesday, 13th to our SE1 offices. Guess what?

Out for delivery 15/12/11 16:30 VAUXHALL SERVICE CENTRE
In transit but possible delay 13/12/11 17:30 VAUXHALL SERVICE CENTRE
Arrived At Depot 13/12/11 04:33 VAUXHALL SERVICE CENTRE
Departed Depot 12/12/11 20:54 WEDNESBURY HUB
Arrived At Depot 12/12/11 20:50 WEDNESBURY HUB
Parcel data received awaiting coll. 12/12/11 SHEFFIELD SERVICE CENTRE

He must be lost.

Here’s the second package’s current tracking details:

In transit but possible delay 13/12/11 17:30 VAUXHALL SERVICE CENTRE
Arrived At Depot 13/12/11 04:31 VAUXHALL SERVICE CENTRE
Departed Depot 12/12/11 20:58 WEDNESBURY HUB
Arrived At Depot 12/12/11 20:56 WEDNESBURY HUB
Parcel data received awaiting coll. 12/12/11 SHEFFIELD SERVICE CENTRE

Crap, eh?

Goodbye Sofia!

| Richard

So that was an interesting last night out in Sofia: at the end of the Hearing, wine and snacks had been laid on for the Arbitrators, lawyers, experts and the stenographers, so we did our best, finishing the (decent) red wine and the chilled white as well.

We then asked the ‘opposition’ lawyers where we should go for dinner and ended up going eating and drinking with them. My suit got doused by a bottle of beer that decided to blow out the glass bottle base: dripping wet sleeve and more beer over my shirt… which was nice… Fortunately, it is going to be cleaned anyway as a week working with chain-smoking Greeks has left me with a filthy, smelly suit!

200 leva later and ‘our’ lawyers rang to tell us they’d moved to the more comfortable Sheraton – thanks for leaving us! – and to meet them there for drinks. Who were we to say no? So we walked to the Sheraton – going past a Fetish club that looked interesting – and went downstairs to the “Scandal” bar for drinks. The general low ambient light levels and red upholstery rang some alarm bells; the pole dancers more so! Funny how the hotel website doesn’t seem to list this ‘facility’.

Katy, the English stenographer, and I then spent the next hour or so being bitchy about the pole dancers and more particularly their poor choices in lingerie before being asked by our lawyers to mark them out of 10. Very few got over 5/10 though one did have a nice bum and another clearly used her pole for exercise! The Greeks seemed to rate them somewhat higher…

At this point, I did the News of the World reporter bit: made my excuses and left. Somewhat underwhelmed by my first visit to such an establishment – I clearly lead a sheltered life…

CIOB Selling e-mail Addresses?

| Richard

Well that’s very disappointing: I’ve today received a Spam e-mail from Karnack Books sent to an e-mail address I set up and use solely for the Chartered Institute of Building.

I’ve checked my profile on the CIOB website and have specifically opted out of third party mailings, so no consent has been given.

So either their membership records have been hacked or they’ve gone against my wishes.

Bid Rigging and Price Fixing in the Construction Industry

| Richard

As usual, it’s the construction industry getting a hard time for dodgy dealings: first there was the issue about cover pricing that was then somehow translated into bid rigging in the media. A lot of hot air over what was practically nothing…

Now there’s news that the OFT has fined six recruitment agencies £39M for fixing fees.

I wonder when we’ll see similar fines for agencies working in other business sectors?

Or how about some massive fines to the banks for price fixing both in relation to bank charges and interest rates?

Or what about members of the BPI for price fixing? You’ll remember they sued online retailer CD WOW! for daring to sell legitimate CDs in the UK that had been sourced from Hong Kong for less than the prices they were being sold for in the UK. Much the same as the lengthy dispute between Levis and Tescos over parallel importing.

I won’t hold my breath.

Cover Pricing

| Richard

So the OFT has fined construction firms £129.5M for cover pricing.

Contrary to what was said on BBC Breakfast this morning, “cover pricing” is not telling other firms what your price is to enable them to price higher – that’s bid fixing or price rigging and is what record companies, banks and insurance companies and the like continue to do.

No, as “Building” magazine succinctly describes it:

“Cover pricing is when a firm tenders for a contract with a high price in order to avoid winning the job. The aim is to remain on the client’s future tender list while avoiding taking on work it does not have capacity for in the immediate term.”

So not as bad as everyone is making it out to be, surely?

Tony Bingham also sums it up quite nicely in an article he wrote here:
http://www.tonybingham.co.uk/column/2008/20080516.htm

But of course the OFT and others need to be seen to be doing something, even if that means driving hard-pressed builders to the wall. One that someone else might have put a cover price in for…

Nokia N95 8GB and Exchange

| Richard

I have resisted buying a BlackBerry – or strictly speaking having one bought for me by the company I work for – for the following reasons:

  1. If I want a phone, I’ll use a phone – the smaller the better, so it fits in my pocket.
  2. If I want to check or send an e-mail then I’ll fire up a laptop and do it on proper hardware.
  3. I don’t want “Sent from my BlackBerry” added to my e-mails!
  4. My Nokia N95 8GB does everything I want: camera, phone, texts, e-mail (I have a special e-mail account set up to be checked on it) and satellite navigation using Co-Pilot software.

But when BlackBerry introduced their Storm, I thought “at last, a BlackBerry that might fit my requirements!” So I spoke to the MD and he said I should go right ahead and get a BlackBerry. I dug a little deeper and found that Orange - who we are switching to – don’t offer the Storm: it’s Vodafone only. And besides, the BlackBerry Storm on Vodafone may not work with Exchange (or it possibly might … for an extra £26 a month on top of your price plan!).

Now as our company e-mail runs on Microsoft Exchange, that rather means that the Storm is as useful to me as a chocolate teapot. And it was slowly becoming apparent that being able to access my e-mail or be advised that e-mail has arrived on the go without needing to fire up a laptop with the Orange 3G dongle was becoming more and more of a requirement, it seemed I was stuffed.

So back to square one. I thought. I asked the IT bods to set up mail forwarding for me, so that incoming e-mail would go to my Exchange account and a copy would be forwarded to an e-mail address I had set up especially for this. I had set up my Nokia N95 8GB to fetch e-mails every 30 minutes and it worked.

Except that replies would appear to come from my own address and wouldn’t be properly synchronised with my work e-mails. So I Googled for “Nokia S60 exchange mail” and found this link to Nokia’s Mail For Exchange.

Downloaded, sent to the phone, installed and set up in a few minutes. Then a few more minutes tweaking the settings so it worked and voila! My Outlook Calendar and Exchange e-mails were sync’d to my phone. I’ve set it up to be connected during my working hours (8.00am to 6.00pm Monday to Friday) and then outside those working periods every four hours – I could have made it more frequently, but one last check at 10.00pm and then once every four hours over the weekend is more than adequate.

And It Just Works!

So I now have my Nokia doing what I want as I want it done.

ORLY?

| Richard

And the award for Most Pointless Text Message today goes to Vodafone:

“We continually invest in our network to provide a reliable service & you’ll be pleased to know we’ve now improved coverage in an area where you use your mobile.”

Excellent! Which area is that? Given that I live in South-East London during the week, work in South London, visit clients in Central London twice a week and travel home to Norfolk each weekend, wouldn’t it have been an idea to tell me which area had been improved?

Sent from my Blackberry

| Richard

I just received a delivery receipt for an e-mail and at the end of the message, before the sender’s contact details it reads “Sent from my Blackberry”.

Who gives a toss?

Maybe I should end all my e-mails with “sent from a computer using Outlook”. Or maybe I should end all my letters with “signed with a ballpoint pen and sent in the post”.

Why am I so disgruntled*? Well apparently my new job brings with it a Blackberry of some sort, so presumably I’ll be telling everyone and their cat that I’m contactable this way all the time too…