My smart meter signals money stress – but the kittens both love it
THE DEFEATS
SOME companies are nigh impossible to contact. For them, quality customer service is dispensable.
Step forward 3 UK, an offshoot of Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison Holdings. Earlier this year, I tried to extract myself from a mobile broadband deal with 3 UK I no longer required. But wherever I turned I couldn’t make progress. I rang, only to be met with either a wall of silence or automated requests for details I couldn’t provide. As a last resort, I cancelled my direct debit.
A couple of months went without hearing a thing. Then the letters started coming, requesting back payments. Of course I paid up, by cheque, but the whole experience was deeply impersonal. BT, my new provider, couldn’t have been more helpful. UK 1 Hong Kong 0.
RACHEL RICKARD STRAUS Not getting smart soon enough
‘GET a smart meter’ has been on my to-do list for years. But it took me until this month to have one installed. I know people are wary – and we’ve highlighted their concerns in these pages – but I wish I’d got round to it sooner.
It’s all so handy. For example, I know that yesterday I used 51p of electricity and £1.22 of gas. It makes me think twice before over-filling the kettle or turning the heating up when a second jumper will do.
Another unexpected upside is that our two kittens seem to love it. I’ll regularly find one curled around it fast asleep. Strange, but adorable. When the novelty has worn off, I can imagine having a smart meter could get stressful.
Seeing the energy bill rise in real time is a bit like watching the meter in a minicab when you’re stuck in traffic.
TOBY WALNE Failing to have breakdown cover
NOT having emergency breakdown cover when my daughter Sophia, 21, broke down on the hard shoulder of the M6 motorway was a big defeat.
If only I had bought her cover. First, there was the £150 recovery charge to get the car off the motorway. Next came a fee to get the vehicle towed to a garage. At £1.50
a mile and a journey of 60 miles, it seemed OK, but I did not know before it was too late that the charge would include the return trip for the tow truck. So, £ 180 instead of £90. Ouch. A week later, there was a £550 bill for getting the clutch replaced. Oh dear. Cover is now in place for 2021.
LAURA SHANNON Missing out on a savings deal
LAST month I advised readers to snatch a better savings rate while stocks lasted. Did I take my own advice? Sadly not. So I missed out on a one-year fixed rate bond paying one per cent interest. I should have acted sooner.
While in the mood for confessing, I have failed to transfer the Junior cash Isa belonging to my threeyear- old daughter Orlagh to a stocks and shares alternative where I t hi nk i t bel o ngs. And I ’ ve neglected to open an account for my youngest child, one- year- old Maddie. Poor Maddie.
SARAH BRIDGE Paying too much for broadband
A CHANCE remark from a Sky broadband engineer who had come to solve the mystery of my nonworking internet informed me that I’d been ‘out of contract’ for months and had resultingly been paying over the odds.
I phoned up to complain and while I was tempted to ditch Sky I stayed – but at a future lower cost and faster broadband speed. Prompted by this I then tackled my mobile phone provider and discovered I was about to be out of contract with it too. As a result, I’m moving to a rival with greater data allowance.
Similar value for money exercises are about to be conducted on my breakdown cover, travel insurance and utility suppliers.
From the jaws of defeat, victory is snatched.