106, Trailblazer!

Recently I have realised that I have been doing a lot of things that no one else has ever done before.  I have become a Trailblazer! 

I became aware that I was worthy of the “Trailblazer” epithet a month ago when I took my one year-old car in to the dealer for its first ever service, first thing on a Monday morning.  The Service Manager asked me what I thought of the car, now that I had driven it for a year.

“Very nice,” I told him, “I’m very pleased with it, although there are a couple of things that are a bit irritating.”  Of course, he asked me what they were.

“Well, the satellite navigation system is ridiculously complex,” I told him.  “It’s so complicated that the sat nav manual is 410 pages long.  That’s larger than the owner’s manual for the whole car and that’s just silly.”

“Really?” he said.  “No one’s mentioned that before.  Anything else?”

“Yes, when the sun is shining on the dashboard, it is impossible to see anything displayed on the instrument panel and that could be dangerous.”

“You’re right, that’s not good but you’re the first person to tell us that.”

“There’s one other thing,” I told him. “When the fuel tank is nearly empty, the symbol on the gauge that tells you which side the filler cap is on is covered by the needle, so you can't see it.  If that symbol were positioned higher on the gauge it would only be covered when the tank is full and then there wouldn’t be a problem.  I don’t suppose anyone has ever mentioned that to you before?”

“No, no one has.”

Now, I don’t want to suggest that the man was lying but I find it very hard to believe that I am the only one of several thousand drivers of this model of car who has experienced these frustrating niggles.

After the service was completed, I went to the car and immediately made a discovery that made me quite angry.  I put “Home” into the sat nav and nothing came up.  After a minute’s investigation I discovered that my entire Address Book had been wiped.  I went back into the garage, confronted the Service Manager and then had to wait while he went off to make enquiries. 

He returned after ten minutes to explain that two days earlier they had received a system update from the manufacturer and I was the first customer to have it installed.  I told him that there had been no problem before and I wish they had asked me before they did the installation. 

He said he was sorry, that didn't know until now that the update would clear the memory and I was unlucky to be the first customer affected.  But, on the bright side, they would know in future. 

“Am I the unluckiest customer you’ve ever met?”  I asked him.  “I seem to have problems that no one else has ever had.”  He just shrugged.

The day after the car service I went to a local garden centre that also has a very good food hall. I shop in the food hall a lot (I don’t do gardening).  I was astounded to find that piles of plastic sacks of compost and topsoil had been placed to cover the four disabled-parking bays close to the entrance.  Hundreds of them!

“How long is that going to last?” I asked the manager.

“It’s permanent,” he told me.  “It’s a much more convenient location for customers.”

“But what about disabled drivers like me?” I asked him.  “What about our convenience?  You’re treating us with contempt.” 

“No one else has said anything,” he told me as he turned to walk away.  “You’re the only one to have complained.”  Another first!

Maybe all managers go on the same course where they are told that the best way to diffuse the situation when someone complains is to feign ignorance of the existence of the said problem.  It certainly seems so.

Caroline and I booked into a hotel on the North Norfolk coast last Saturday afternoon.  We had paid in full before we arrived and it was not cheap at £125 a night but we checked out fifty minutes after we arrived.

The first problem we encountered was that on that cold February afternoon the room was uncomfortably cool with the temperature at around 15°C.  The radiators were only lukewarm and the supplementary heater we requested began to gurgle and it crackled noisily. 

The hotel had advertised that there was “Free Wi-Fi” available but we couldn’t get a connection in our room.  Added to that, the decor was shabby with peeling wallpaper and the décor was more like a room in an old people’s home than in a hotel.

We decided to leave and asked reception for £125 credit to be put on to the card.  Reception called the manager and of course, as soon as she arrived, she tried to persuade us to change our minds but we were adamant that we were leaving.

“No one else has ever had difficulty with Wi-Fi before,” she said.

“I find that difficult to believe.  Am I really the first?” I asked her.  She assured me that I was.

“I expect I’m also the first person to tell you that there is peeling wallpaper under the window in Room 18, I suppose?”

“Yes you are.”

“Then I imagine that this is another first for you:  We would have checked out fifteen minutes ago, but the toilet flush is so feeble that it took six attempts to clear the bowl.”

“Yes, you’re right,” she said somewhat sniffily.  “No one has ever told me such a thing before.”

“Well, I’m not surprised to hear that,” I said.  “I don’t usually talk about turds with strangers either, but if anyone ever refers to it to you in future, you’ll be able to say that it has been mentioned before.”

“Please don’t tell them it’s the first time you’ve heard about it.”

[A week after that conversation with that garden centre manager I sent the company an email telling them of my “distress” at the way disabled customers have been treated with such indifference and disdain.  I had a phone call from them this morning to tell me that the sacks have been moved and the bays are back in use.  I really feel I have achieved something worthwhile.]