Month: July 2018

Calcutt Boats -> Flecknoe

It’s amazing the power a little post on social media has…

Imagine.

My little problem with invoicing at Calcutt boats magically disappeared! Simply paid the bill and left.

Social media and complaining

I was discussing this with my respondents the other day. If you’ve got a grievance with a company these days, often the only way to get someone to take notice of you is posting some nasty stuff about it and spamming it out on social media.

They no longer man the phones any more. You’ll be lucky to get a response by letter.

Working for people like Amazon, I know this to be true.

They will just ignore you till the cows come home. Nothing you can do.

Once you start blowing them up on social-media, it’s a different story, you get a response pretty quick.

Same with this Calcutt Boats thing. One day there’s a problem. Post it on social media and it disappears.

Magic!

Flecknoe

I’ve moved the boat a little further down. To Flecknoe.

This is out in the wilds.

The nearest real shops are Daventry, which is 5 miles away. Continue reading “Calcutt Boats -> Flecknoe”

Weedon -> Calcutt Boats

Calcutt Boats

Supposedly to get a Eberspächer fitted, which on arrival, they claim to know nothing about.

As well as that, they’ve given me an invoice with a cost from my last visit. That was on the 8th July 2017.

An invoice that was paid at the time. On my querying it. The guy Matt, went off and brought out another invoice.

This time the invoice, which was again paid at the time, had been “entered it into the system wrongly”.

For this reason. It was up to me to pay it again.

Calcutt Boats dodgy invoice
Calcutt Boats dodgy invoice

Whether they’re trying to scam me out of money here, I don’t know. I do have eyes. That’s certainly what it looks like to me.

Blacking

Apart from that I’ve had some blacking done.

Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Hull Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Hull Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Hull Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Hull Blacking at Calcutt Boats
Fitting Anodes at Calcutt Boats
Fitting Anodes at Calcutt Boats

This and a service, which, to be honest, I could have done anywhere.

Eberspächer

The main reason for bringing the boat here was to have it priced for the fitting of an Eberspächer.

Something which was agreed in emails months before.

When I arrived. They claimed no knowledge of it.

Amazon tried to charge me postage on a free postage item

I’m hoping it’s an isolated incident, but I’m writing a blog about it anyway.

Amazon tried to charge me postage on a free postage item

So, I’ve been a member of Amazon since 2007. Over 11 years on the current email address.

I’m used to the way they do business, as I also work as a ‘Flex’ driver.

I know that you don’t get anything for not calling these people out. That’s what I’m doing.

Buying a postage free item

It may only be in a small way. It may only be an isolated incident, but yesterday, Amazon tried to charge me postage on a ‘postage free’ item.

£1.99 postage to be exact.

Here’s the item.

Item clearly says Free delivery in the UK.

When I get to check-out. I can see that they’re trying to add the postage, so I go back and check the ‘Delivery Details’, or terms and conditions.

 

[su_quote cite=”Delivery Details” url=”https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=mk_sss_dp_1?ie=UTF8&pop-up=1&nodeId=201910160″]Any item with “FREE Delivery” messaging on the product detail page that is dispatched by Amazon is eligible and contributes to your free delivery order minimum. Items sold and fulfilled by Marketplace Sellers do not contribute to your free delivery order minimum.[/su_quote]

Despite this having ‘Free delivery’ messaging on the product, it is not eligible according to Amazon’s own rules.

Rang support agent

I rang them and told them that they had displayed the item wrongly. From the conversation I had with the support agent, I got the impression that this wasn’t a big thing to them.

Amazon counts on people’s ignorance and laziness to make tax free profits.

Heads up if you get this. Take a screenshot. Ring them up and tell them the item has been mis-labelled. They are obliged to give you the postage back as they are mis-labelling and mis-selling the product.

 

Adding to narrowboat battery bank

Over the course of the last few weeks, I’ve been planning to upgrade the electrics of Bonnie Lady narrowboat.

One of the first jobs has been to add to the battery bank

Battery Bank

Is a collection of batteries which feed the boat and all the appliances on it.

Currently, we have 2 AGM 120ah leisure batteries in the bank. (There’s a starter battery, since none of the appliances run off this, I’ve not included it. It starts the engine. End of).

agm-leisure-battery-lp120
Due to the ‘live-on’ nature of the boat, this really isn’t enough:-

  • If you want to watch telly
  • If you want to be able to charge your computer, run printers, charge hoovers etc.
  • If you’re planning on having solar panels fitted

Solar panels will charge 4 leisure batteries during the course of a sunny day and less on more covered, cloudy conditions. The more batteries in the bank, the more cushion you have to soak up and store excess energy when it’s available. This may be through running the engine, or through the solar panels. When it’s raining, and you end up sitting around the boat all day with the lights on using the internet, you’ll really appreciate the difference!

Adding batteries to the battery bank

Major considerations are:- Continue reading “Adding to narrowboat battery bank”