Cutting edge technology

Cutting edge technology has got me on the edge all right. Yesterday was going to be a good day. I was up early because, yes, I had to go to work, but I was finally going to get the fences fixed. Mend the fences, heal the wounds. I was really rather glad to have that thought the rickety old fences would be gone. History. I had waited and waited because the fence people had bigger jobs to do. How much were they charging for those, I wondered because this was costing me big time. At 11, no fence guys. Ring them, said I from work. Message back. Can’t do it, next Friday. Not again. I rang home. “They left a message on our answering machine on Tuesday but we didn’t know!” Great. I have a lovely answering machine, I thought, which keeps me in touch with the heartbeat of my life. My classy looking gadget was happily recording messages but not showing them. Apart from the fencing one, there was another from the newsagent. Yes, I did have to pay cash. No, I have already paid on the phone by credit card!!! Central control of the newspaper I subscribe to couldn’t tell me, when I had organised this all on the phone 3 weeks before, if I had paid by credit card!! Look it up on your statement. But don’t you keep a record of whether I have paid or not because you took the details over the phone?? So I waited till I got home, got out the trusty account and there it was…the charge for my subscription. Ring central control. Ah, you have paid the money to Sydney and in Adelaide you pay cash to the newsagent. Can you tell them I have already paid? No, Sydney has charged the money. Aren’t you central control? Did they expect me to be impressed with this lightningly fast delivery of service improved by cutting edge technology? I rang the newsagent. Well, if they haven’t sorted it out soon you can have tomorrow’s paper but that’s it. Fine, lovely. Pay by credit card then I have to pay cash to get my paper. Fine. We are all on computers. We have peer to peer, B2B, connectivity, bandwidth, more efficient delivery of goods and service. I don’t think so. I solved it because I had my account. I can now add trouble shooter and customer service to the ever growing list of things I now do thanks to the new, more efficient technological age.