Making me an offer I can easily refuse

Mail received in one day started with good news and went downhill.

One letter informed me I was to receive a winter fuel allowance.

Another was a threatening letter demanding I pay a licence fee to receive a service I never watch or listen to and reminding me that if I’m blind and can’t see TV I get a 50% discount. How generous.

This demand was, of course, more than the winter fuel allowance.

Another was from Premium Bonds, not to let me know I had beaten the odds and won a prize but to inform me that they would be requiring details of my bank account (assuming I even had one).

National Savings is a government agency so what could possibly go wrong if I gave this information? For the answer to this, just look around you.

Yet a fourth was from a building society offering a fantastic interest rate of half of one percent if I left a sum of money with them for a fixed period of years which was probably longer than I am likely to live.

It stated that I was not to worry if I didn’t have access to a computer as I could arrange this account by telephoning my local branch offices.

I could find this telephone number by logging onto the society’s website.

In today’s world, the person who wrote this nonsense will doubtless shortly be promoted to a higher position.

Pete Trow