I'm really quite cross.

so it’s a shame that the ranty icon appears to have got lost somewhere in recent upgrade/ server move behaviour. :rant:

Yesterday, as mentioned previously, we went to M’hell to spend vouchers for the children. I also potentially bought some shoes – they didn’t have the size I wanted in the shop, so they’ll deliver them direct to the house, and if I don’t like them, then I just have to take them back. I didn’t buy some trousers, as the size 12 were just a tiny bit tight (and almost completely the wrong shape, but we’ll gloss over that) and the size 14 were enormous. I must lose some flab. It’s not weight (although I could do with ditching some of that too) it’s the pointless extra flesh not quite decorating where I used to have an almost waist line.

But that isn’t why I’m cross. Oh no. As I wandered up the mall looking for Tim I took my phone out of my pocket and tried to call him. It didn’t want to turn on. It’s given excellent service, but is now over 4 years old, as I bought it in the run up to having Small (also approaching 4 now, unbelievably). We drank coffee while watching the kids in the play area, and I eyed up the Carphone warehouse shop conveniently opposite us.

I should know better, really. I should know by now that no relationship you are planning on lasting 4 years or so is easy to get set up and running in the first place. I was in the shop the better part of an hour at a guess, although I wasn’t keeping track of time. The guy identified very quickly that I did want a new phone, and I didn’t just want a cheapo fashion accessory. We flirted with the E50, but he didn’t have it available on TMobile, one of the few networks that actually work in our house, so he brought out a Blackberry Pearl. Ooh, it was nice. It has a qwerty keyboard, and a trackball, and supports all sorts of activities like email and websurfing, while also having a camera and actually being quite nice to use.

I was suckered. It was an easy sell, although I did balk at the branded Blackberry accessories, easily solved when we discovered that it’s a Motorola under the covers, and you can use their bluetooth headset (which has an in car charger, thus saving the cost of a separate one of those). While I say easy, it wasn’t quick, not helped by TMobile deciding that as they’d never heard of me, they were going to want a £100 deposit. I ask you, I can get credit cards by clicking my fingers, and I’ve got to pay a deposit to get a phone? Not impressed. But we pressed on, to the disgust of other customers waiting less than patiently in the shop, and eventually I had a new phone, a new contract and even a new much catchier number.

We went home happy, and very late, and stopped at McD’s drivethru, to discover they’ve added something to the happy meal menu that Small will eat, so eventually we were all home and fed, and could spend the evening catching up on Doctor Who and playing with my new phone.

First catch, the TMobile website didn’t recognise the phone number. The phone didn’t recognise the internet. Reasoning that this could just be a delay in processing paperwork, I went to bed, fully intending to stay there for a very long time, which I did.

Today, after a lie in, and a bath, and some pampering, I came down and resumed battle with the phone set up. Found a section on TMobile’s website where I could enter phone details, at which point they told me that this device was registered to a separate network. Eh? It’s got a TM badge on it for pity’s sake! Getting slightly irritated, I rang in. I was then told that to register for instant email would cost me another £5 a month. Grr, mutter, never mind, I’ll just set up internet and use a pop box I thought. But no, apparently you have to have instant email to be able to set up internet access. Right, by now I’m fuming. This wasn’t a cheap contract I’d gone for – looking at the carphone warehouse and extrapolating slightly, I’d have been just as happy on the one down, and I’d have paid off the difference in the upfront phone cost from the cheaper tariff in a few months time. But the cpw didn’t seem to know anything about the instant email charge that the tm website said was mandatory, so I rang them up.

You know where this is going next don’t you? They can’t sort it out over the phone, if it’s been missold, I need to take it back to the shop. Absolutely wonderful, a trip to M’hell on a bank holiday monday, and what’s worse, I’m going to have to go through the rigmarole of choosing a whole new phone, ‘cos I’m not buying one that has an extra charge required just to use the internet, on top of the whole w’n’w thing.

And the worst thing of all? I’m sitting here at the media centre typing all this up, and Tim looks over, and says “you are going grey aren’t you?” See, this whole consumer lifestyle just isn’t good for me. 🙁