- Taken at 8:15 PM on July 03, 2009 – uploaded by ShoZu
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Westminster Hall
Walked past this today on the way to the MEM event. There’s been a hall of some kind here since roughly the year 1100 or thereabouts.
– Taken at 5:15 PM on June 23, 2009 – uploaded by ShoZu
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£5 haircut barber opening
Hotshots, bound to be popular in Billericay… the High Street is increasingly sporting only hairdressers, estate agents and building societies.
– Taken at 6:46 PM on June 22, 2009 – uploaded by ShoZu
Read moreWelcome back to Shitty Service UK
I arrived in at Heathrow yesterday and headed over to the official London taxi stand.
I expected this last bit of my globe-trotting journey to be reasonably run-of-the-mill.
There was an officious looking chap in a high visibility jacket holding some kind of electronic gizmo at the top of the queue. He asked me for my destination.
“Chiswick,” I said, thinking it was rather cool Heathrow Airport had finally implemented some kind of taxi master / wrangler to organise things.
The taxi driver at the top of the queue got out and asked me, “Where to mate?”
“Chiswick,” I said again, whilst the officious chap fiddled with his machine.
“Where in Chiswick?” the taxi driver asked. I gave him the name of the road.
“Where’s that?” he asked.
“Well,” I replied, “I don’t exactly know, but I have it on Google Maps.”
Stupid.
“Yeah, it’s just I’ve been waiting here for quite a while,” the taxi driver continued, “and that’s not a big fare you see.”
I looked at the guy.
I waited for him to say something.
“It’s just, if you actually want to go to Chiswick, I don’t get a ticket right.”
I gave him another stare.
“But if where you want to go is a bit further away, I’ll need to come back and join the end of the queue.”
What a total arse.
Here I am, waiting to give the guy no-doubt ridiculous amounts of money for a short taxi ride and he’s really concerned with losing his spot in the taxi queue.
Total arse.
Once again, a brilliant example of the self-serving couldn’t-give-a-toss-about-you service culture in Britain.
I eventually got out Google Maps, pointed to the exact location and the Taxi Driver jumped with glee.
“See,” he said, thrusting my iPhone at the official with the gizmo, “That means I get a ticket to come back to the front of the queue, right?”
The official nodded.
The taxi driver grinned and walked round and jumped in the front of the cab.
Meanwhile I lifted my own sodding bags into the taxi and we headed off.
Bollocks. Total bollocks.
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The power of PayPal… why I couldn’t be arsed to sign-up to Spotify (yet)
“Ah hah,” I thought, “That’s what I’ll do, I’ll upgrade Spotify to the premium version.”
I’ve been meaning to this for a while. I’m about to go to bed — I’ve got it playing me some seriously relaxing classical and the ’shit, let’s upgrade!’ thought came into my head.
I clicked the upgrade button.
Arse.
They want a credit card number.
My credit card is… 9 steps away.
So I’ll do it tomorrow.
If it was PayPal, I’d have click-clicked and been a premium subscriber.
I find this insight absolutely fascinating. Obviously in the time it’s taken me to write this post, I could have stood up, walked over to my wallet, took out my card, typed in the number. But the fact I didn’t speaks volumes.
It’s a stunning service, Spotify. I will definitely become a premium subscriber. Indeed I’m feeling a bit guilty that I haven’t actually done so yet, I get such value from it.
The point of this post, though, is more a note-to-self. If I’m ever going to do an online service that requires you to buy via the web, I’ll aim to make a PayPal option — every single time. Whatever your view of PayPal, it is literally two clicks and you’ve got my money — and I’ve got my login/software/whatever.
I wonder how many other people visited the Premium Upgrade page and reacted in the same way as I did?
Is it really that bad? I’m rather shocked that I’m reacting in this way. I just can’t be bothered to go and get my credit card right now…. and that’s all that’s standing in the way of me subscribing? Dangerous. Very dangerous if you’re an online business.
Anyway.
If you haven’t checked out Spotify, you should. Right now. It’s at www.spotify.com.
Me? I’ll sign-up tomorrow.
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