I arranged for this company to re-code my Avocet ABS locks (very good locks by the way), they quoted a reasonable price and seemed pretty helpful. I shipped my locks to them, paid for the re-code and waited. When I got my locks back, they were different sizes to the ones I’d sent. I produced the boxes my original locks came in, the orders for those locks all stating clearly the size of the lock. I sent up 2 Euro Profile locks (E45/I50 & E50/I45), what I got back were 2 locks sized 50/50 & 45/45. Rather than accepting all the proof I supplied, they all but accused me of lying or trying to commit some kind of fraud. I must be mistaken about the sizes - even though I had the original boxes for these locks. The mistake could not have happened they said, and yet it had. The manufacturer got involved (as this is where the re-coding takes place) and asked me to ship the wrong locks to them. All Lock&Key kept saying was “prove what you sent us”. Well maybe they should have checked them in when they arrived noting the sizes. How can I prove what I put in the post ?! Video me wrapping them up and posting it ?!, if I’d have known the issues that were going to occur I’d have done it!. I invited them to come and see my 2 only doors so they could see I had no reason to deceive them. This company was stubborn and pig headed to the end, completely failing to provide any semblance of customer service. Should it ever have gotten to the point where I had to speak to a solicitor and prepare to take legal action to get my property back ? Luckily the manufacturer wanted to provide the required customer service and shipped new locks of the correct size down… I fitted them yesterday, and guess what, they are a perfect fit - that would be because I know how to measure a lock, and I know what size it needs to be and I know what size I originally ordered and what size I sent to them. Will never be using this company again.
Just for calrity, the first company I dealt with regarding these locks have a policy of not discussing online orders on the phone, and can only be emailed. Perhaps if the original company had responded to all but one of them, there would not have had to be so many (4-5 in total ?!). They also did not consider security to be a high priority - which is at least one area Lock&Key did excel.
Perhaps if a companies first response (and indeed continued response) was not to say the customer is wrong then the customer wouldn’t be so irate. For anybody interested, I’m happy to share my communication with Lock&Key and their responses.
With a smile on my face, nobody knows.
The sadness behind, that goes untold.
Appearances are kept, putting on a show.
These thoughts are private, nobody must know.
A happy voice will keep them from guessing,
The things I’m feeling, my secrets oppressing.
But if they stopped for just a second, and looked in my eyes,
Then with a shock realisation, they would see it’s all lies.
Britain is one of the most affluent countries in the world.
Why then are food banks more prevalent and necessary than ever, the demonisation of benefits claimants becoming mainstream and homelessness increasing to endemic levels?
I began sleeping rough at 17 and would do so for 3 years. I was little more than a child when forced from an outwardly comfortable middle class house to the uncertainty and terror and uncertainty of the streets. Nobody cared about the violence I was suffering there and I had only one way to escape. Once I managed to though, still nobody cared.
Physical threats, attacks, abuse, cold, hunger and constant fear defined my homelessness. My last teenage years were spent completely alone. Each evening was scarred by wondering if I’d be able to eat or be beaten up again. I had no choice but to resort to begging, shoplifting and even prostitution just to stay alive. In a moment of desperation, suicide was only a few seconds away but I couldn’t bear to take the final step. Despite what everyone had told me my whole life, I actually felt I deserved more.
Blind luck gave me the chance to start again and I grasped it. Since that day, I’ve been immensely lucky but I can never forget those 3 years. Nor would I want to.
It tears me apart to see what’s happening in this country now. Since when did it become acceptable for human beings to be turned out of their homes with nowhere to go? Why is it remotely permissible to have whole families, let alone individuals, reduced to feral animals on street corners pleading for money and help to survive?
This country’s GDP is £1.6 trillion. Take a moment to understand how big that number is and then give up when you realise you can’t. Despite interminable waiting lists for social housing, there are an estimated 94,000 houses standing empty. It would take 0.004% of GDP to bring those properties up to code and provide for everyone who urgently needs it. Forgive me for being naive but why the hell is this not happening?
Perhaps the government prefers to consider these people, as I was, invisible. Lose your home, lose your vote and thereby your significance? This seems spectacularly short sighted. House a family and that would probably be a guaranteed vote for life and don’t try and pretend no government has ever bought votes. Every single manifesto and budget is a grand bribe, scrounging for every possible cross in a box.
If the first priority of any government is care of its citizenry, this and previous administrations have failed miserably and heartlessly. In 21st century Britain, this is nothing less than a national disgrace and tragedy.
Every single night, over 6000 people sleep rough on the streets of London alone. Tonight, for the first time, a young, terrified boy or girl will join them. Can you possibly imagine how that feels? I’ve been there and honestly hope you never have to go beyond imagining. The simple security of having somewhere to spend the night being ripped away is a terrible experience and yet each day, many more find themselves in this intolerable position, deprived of dignity, respect and basic humanity.
The media’s approach is frustratingly incoherent. A few papers and broadcasters try to highlight the issue but for the majority, it’s a non story which is exactly how the government and councils treat it. This may be a result of ‘charity burnout’ but every single time I’ve contacted my MP, the prime minister, a television station, magazine or newspaper, no response has ever been forthcoming. A persistent problem is the perception that homelessness is primarily due to self inflicted addiction or personal failings which are naturally factors. However, this is to confuse the cause of the problem with its consequence.
We may not like to admit it but most of us are only a couple of paycheques away from this horrifying situation. I simply refuse to stand by and witness the fall of thousands into the metaphorical and literal gutter. We have got to do more, from each of us to the government en masse, as we certainly don’t deserve to call ourselves a civilised country otherwise. Compassion isn’t a weakness, especially when its only outcomes are increased happiness and productivity. I beg those in power to help end this terrible modern blight now.
Homelessness can happen to anyone. Believe me, I know.
You need the following :- Raspberry Pi Model B (I have not tried this on a B+ or Pi 2) NTPI GPS Addon Board Puck antenna for the GPS board Battery for the GPS board (This makes start up times quicker)
1) Install the board onto the Pi
2) Get the latest Rasbian image from http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads/ Install it to your flash card and boot the Pi (Set any language options you need and expand the disk to the full size of your SD card)
Use root !
3) Disable the serial console :- By default, /dev/ttyAMA0 is a serial console for the kernel and also runs a getty process for logins. Disable the serial console in /boot/cmdline.txt: remove console=ttyAMA0,115200 kgdboc=ttyAMA0,115200 (There may only be the console section in your file) Disable the serial console in /etc/inittab: disable the line T0:23:respawn:/sbin/getty -L ttyAMA0 115200 vt100
4) Add dtoverlay=pps-gpio,gpiopin=18 to the end of the /boot/config.txt file on a new line
8) Configure GPS :- dpkg-reconfigure gpsd start automatically NO to USB receivers device is /dev/ttyAMA0 Options to add to gpsd : -n All other options are defaults
9) Reboot the Pi (init 6)
10) Verify that pps works dmesg | grep pps You should see something like [ 4.768550] pps_core: LinuxPPS API ver. 1 registered [ 4.798023] pps_core: Software ver. 5.3.6 - Copyright 2005-2007 Rodolfo Giometti <giometti@linux.it> [ 4.860481] pps pps0: new PPS source pps.-1 [ 4.883237] pps pps0: Registered IRQ 412 as PPS source [ 78.686468] pps_ldisc: PPS line discipline registered [ 78.688523] pps pps1: new PPS source ttyAMA0 [ 78.688857] pps pps1: source “/dev/ttyAMA0” added
11) Build NTP that supports PPS cd /root/cd ntp-4.2.6.p5+dfsg/ (substitute for whichever version you got) Edit the debian/rules file and add --enable-ATOM to the configure invocation so that it looks like :- ./configure CFLAGS=’$(CFLAGS)’ CPPFLAGS=’$(CPPFLAGS)’ LDFLAGS=’$(LDFLAGS)’ \ –prefix=/usr \ –enable-all-clocks –enable-parse-clocks –enable-SHM \ –disable-debugging –sysconfdir=/var/lib/ntp \ –with-sntp=no \ –with-lineeditlibs=edit \ –without-ntpsnmpd \ –disable-local-libopts \ –enable-ntp-signd \ –disable-dependency-tracking \ –with-openssl-libdir=/usr/lib/$(DEB_HOST_MULTIARCH) \ –enable-ATOM
Note the the line before --enable-ATOM ends with a backslash symbol (\) to indicate a line continuation symbol. Change the debian/changelog file so that the version number between parenthesis is increased to just below the next number. E.g. change 4.2.6.p5+dfsg-2 to 4.2.6.p5+dfsg-3-pps1 Recompile # dpkg-buildpackage -b
Remove the old NTP Server and install the new one apt-get remove ntp cd /root dpkg -i the new deb packages you have created update-rc.d ntp defaults
12) Configure NTP edit /etc/ntp.conf Comment out all the server lines and add :-
# gpsd shared memory clock server 127.127.28.0 minpoll 4 maxpoll 4 iburst prefer # PPS requires at least one preferred peer fudge 127.127.28.0 refid GPS fudge 127.127.28.0 time1 +0.130 # coarse processing delay offset
# If no syncronisation server 127.127.1.0 fudge 127.127.1.0 stratum 10
13) restart ntp
14) Verify that your ntp works :- ntpq -p remote refid st t when poll reach delay offset jitter ============================================================================== oPPS(0) .PPS. 0 l 14 16 377 0.000 -0.002 0.001 *SHM(0) .GPS. 0 l 13 16 377 0.000 -15.761 3.893 -kvm1.websters-c 193.67.79.202 2 u 366 1024 377 9.636 0.200 1.167 +ntp0.cis.strath 193.62.22.74 2 u 282 1024 357 19.207 -0.264 0.148 -dns1-ha.uk.syra 192.93.2.20 2 u 324 1024 377 10.048 -0.076 0.172 -ns2.c-it.co 195.66.241.10 2 u 284 1024 377 10.868 0.248 0.067 LOCAL(0) .LOCL. 10 l - 64 0 0.000 0.000 0.000
If you aren’t seeing the settings its possible the NTP server is picking up the NTP information via DHCP which is over riding your settings above. Do this :
It would appear that the answer is when you order from RS Components.
I was excited to hear that there was a new Raspberry Pi out (The Pi 2), so I rushed over to the Raspbery Pi website and clicked to buy one. You’re presented with a number of suppliers that can fulfil your order. This time I chose RS components. This was a company I had dealt with quite a lot in the past, indeed I used to work just around the corner from their Leeds store.
I looked up the Pi2 on their website and to my surprise they still had them in stock! so I clicked and placed the order. My email confirmation arrived quickly saying “Next working day (despatch Mon,2 Feb 2015) – applies to stocked products only” It also listed “Your order (stocked products)” which detailed the items that I had ordered. I was overjoyed as I knew the product had been in stock when I purchased it, and listed my product as a stocked product.
Imagine my dismay when at 17:16 on the day of delivery I received an email to say there would be a “delay”. I called them… The nice lady that answered the phone whilst apologetic stated that my order wouldn’t be dispatched until 21st Feb - over 2 weeks!!
It would appear that the idea of online and real time stock levels for your customer ordering system is something that has passed RS components by. What annoys me more is that the delay email should have been sent out on Monday, not at the end of the day I was supposed to get delivery. Whilst it isn’t the case (and for legal reasons I won’t state that this is the case), but in my “honest opinion” (see http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/26/section/3 ) for a legal definition of honest opinion), it seems like RS components have deceived me into ordering with them when they clearly did not have stock.
They asked me if I wanted to retain my order, well given that so much time has now elapsed that none of the other suppliers have stock, I have no choice unless I want to start the whole process off again somewhere else.
So the moral of the story… Just because RS components say something is in stock, and your order confirmation says it will be delivered, don’t expect that to be the case. My suggestion would be to use a supplier whose ordering system is aware of actual stock levels. This way your expectations will be appropriately set.
Update 05/04/2015
I decided to cancel my order at RS Components, and have gone to https://cpc.farnell.com/ instead. Their online system said they had stock, so I rung them, and they confirmed they had stock, so I ordered from them. They have fulfilled my order and it’s just awaiting shipping.
So, there are 2 issues with the Vauxhall pricing, firstly, their website can’t add up when you configure your car, and secondly some of the pricing is distinctly unfair. Lets look at these in order…
So, looking at the picture, I’ve added the premium Forward Lighting pack, which includes the LED daytime running lights, however, the LED Daytime Running Lights are still available as an tickable item. If I tick them, sure enough, they show up as £0.00 on the right, but hold on a minute.. what happened to the total ?! That’s right, despite them now being a free item (because they are part of a pack already selected) you’ll notice you have been charged £145.00 for them. A pure case of not being able to add £0.00.
So, for the second item, and this one is a little more complicated…
A couple of things you need to know.
If you upgrade to the Navi650 sound system, your going to be charged £855.00 Not unreasonable as it’s quite an upgrade from the standard system. If you chose to upgrade to the Navi950, then you’re looking at £1200.00 Maybe a little on the high side but still nothing to worry about really. Here is where it gets good…
Lets add in the Rear View Camera pack. This is some £1095.00 but this includes an upgrade of the sound system to the Navi650 as it needs the colour screen in the dash area to display the image on (the same price appears if you already had the Navi650 selected as an upgrade, it just turns to a free item). The astute mathematicians amongst us will have worked out that in real terms you’re paying £240.00 for the camera and wiring.. ok, it takes a while to run the wires and such so this is pretty reasonable.
Here is the Doozy….
If we had the Navi950 selected as an upgrade option (Remember our £1200.00), then we go and add in the camera, we get charged £1095.00 on top of our £1200.00 Now I approached Vauxhall with this information and ventured that if I’m paying for a Navi650 in the camera price then along with my Navi950 and camera I’d like the Navi650 as a spare… Apparently it doesn’t work like that, you just get to be screwed over to the tune of £850.00
At the time of writing this post, Vauxhall had been informed 2 months about the error on their website but so far have been unable to fix it.
It’s also taken around a month to get an answer on the Camera kit.. you’d have thought somebody in the know could have given an answer a little quicker than that.
All this is a little side show really, as I’ve already ordered my car and ultimately I’ll pay what has to be paid. The more dark and concerning thing is what I’ve been reading recently about the very poor service that some people have been receiving from Vauxhall. The one that springs to mind immediately is this plea from a Vauxhall motorist :-
“
Hello,
I recently leased a 14 plate Vauxhall Corsa. It’s a Diesel EcoFlex model.
I’ve had the car for 5 weeks. On Sunday, I noticed the car was failing to accelerate properly (I now know that it had gone into ‘Limp Mode’). An engine warning light came on. After about 500 yards, as I turned a corner, there was a loud bang and a hissing noise coming from under the bonnet.
I called out the AA and got taken to a local Vauxhall Garage as I got free breakdown as part of my cover. The garage got back to me on Monday and said that a pipe had burst and had been ordered. They said the car should be on the road within two days again at no cost to me.
However, I got a call today to say that they now believe the problem is linked to the DPF filter becoming clogged and this has caused the pipe to burst. As a result, this is due to 'the manner the car has been driven’ and is not covered by warranty and parts will cost £480 to fix.
I’m absolutely devastated. I get married next week and really can’t afford this. The DPF light has only come on once since I got the car. I did the sharp burst down the motorway in low gears as suggested and it went off. I do a fair bit of short distance driving at the moment but am also on the motorway and dual carriages fairly regularly as well.
I’ve looked online and seen similar issues with DPFs going awry but they all seem to be much further down the line (1yr-18months at least). I’ve only done 1,000 miles and had the car only 5 weeks as I said.
Does anybody think I have a decent case to make with Vauxhall that this issue shouldn’t be occuring so soon into ownership? If so, what is the best route to go down?
Any help greatly appreciated!”
It seems everybody is blaming this guy for the way he’s driving and as he says, there are many stories of the DPF’s going but none he can find within the first 1000 miles. I did my own research on this when I read something similar on the Astra Owners Network Forum. Everybody is getting the stock answer of it’s your driving style.. I wonder a) if there is some sort of design flaw in the Corsa, or even worse the entire Vauxhall Range, and b) if when something goes wrong with the car that I’ve ordered whether I’m just going to meet brick walls with customer service as so many others seem to have done.
As the pictures are a little hard to see when uploaded here, if anybody wants copies of the originals to inspect, just raise an “Ask me a question” with details of where you’d like it to be sent and I’ll send it over.
Update 05/08/2014
So, I chased the build of my car today, just as I had on 21st July, and whilst I was told :-
It seems that’s not the case at all. In fact, my salesman has just informed me that the build has been stalled and so now instead of getting a shiny new car at the beginning of September, I’ll be lucky if I even see it beginning of October! To say I’m annoyed is an understatement.
One thing I did do though, having read a number of forums questioning how recent their satnav maps were, I’ve insisted that my satnav has the very latest maps on it.. lets see how that one turns out.
Update 07/08/2014
So, I have a little good news. after emailing the MD of Vauxhall, it looks like there might be a resolution in the offing. They agree the pricing for the Navi950 seems wrong and they *should* be changing the system so that it removes the value of the Navi650 from the total when you have a Navi950 selected !!
I’m still not going to get my car for the 1st September as expected which really disappoints me. Especially as this was the first New car I’ve ever ordered and was looking forward to getting it on New Reg day. But I have been assured that they will expedite the delivery to the dealer so I should get it in September - albeit late on in September.
After months of blood, sweat and tears, Helen’s Story has been picked up by The Observer & will be a cover feature in the New Review THIS Sunday 9th March !!!
I’m so unbelievably happy – I never dreamt when Matt first approached me with the idea for the project, it would ever come this far.
