The Housing Association has installed a 'new and improved system for contacting them for repairs.  Tis is to replace a truly functional and reliable email or phone system.

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"The number of people ahead of you in the queue is 42."

This is the so- called emergency number, which I am using because their new and 'vastly easier' way of communicating via a pig-shit stupid 'chatbot' which doesn't understand the simplest language.

'Window won't shut' offered me a link to window cleaning services.

If I was truly vulnerable, which their website tells me I am because I'm over 65, or if water was pissing into my bungalow through a broken pipe or similar, I would be truly and comprehensively 'shafted'.  Speaking of which it would be quicker, and easier, to tape a note to an arrow and fire it through their office windows about half a mile away.

Unfortunately, although I have the necessary equipment and skills readily to hand to take such an old-fashioned but unequivocal route, it would probably trigger a lockdown and an emergency evacuation of the building under their 'duty of care to our staff.'   So there'd be no-one left in there to read it.

"The number of people ahead of you in the queue is 25."

The 'holding tune' is - of course - designed for maximum annoyance.  Not even music, just a series of mindless beats which would be outlawed under the Geneva Convention as 'cruel and unusual punishment' if it was used through headphones as an interrogation aid.

"The number of people ahead of you in the queue is 20."

I  strongly suspect there is now only one person answering the real phone, because the firm selling them the 'new chat system' will have told them they only need a phone line for 'real emergencies'.

The complete obliviocy of the 'chat system, is, of course, not an emergency.

Just as well the 999 police, fire, etc, calls don't use a chat system and a 'holding pattern.'

"The number of people ahead of you in the queue is 12."

The reason for all this hassle is that the housing association have shut down their email system in order to offer a 'better and more modern way of communicating with their tenants.'

Funnily enough the email always worked flawlessly.  I could tell them what the problem was and they'd book me in for a repair.


"The number of people ahead of you in the queue is 4."

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I finally had a very nice lady, who told  me she would would raise the repair as an emergency and someone will be out to fix it within the next 24 hours.

 I may end up sleeping in the living room tonight.  But on their previous record  a man will be out today because once you get hold of someone stuff happens.

If I do end up on the sofa woe betide any bugger who tries to break in.  I'll take a stick to them, and I don't mean just waving a walking stick and bleating 'Bugger off."  See picture at the end.  left click if you feel a morbid desire to see it bigger.   

I say this because an elderly lady in her late 60s, a few bungalows up the road had an intruder a couple of weeks back.  It shook her up to find 'a man in black' creeping around indoors, so much so that she's currently living with her Mum.  I think we can safely assume it wasn't the 'Milk Tray Man' secretly delivering chocolates.

I also think, knowing her family, the MIB is lucky she just called the police.  She was always the quieter one of her clan , who tended to be fiery and belligerent.   Shows how age can make some people timid.    Poor Girl.

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UPDATE:  A  man came and replaced the dodgy top and bottom hinges less than two hours after my eventually successful call.  Said it was a routine repair, and all the existing wooden windows on the estate will be replaced with UPVC in the fullness of time.

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The trouble with these new systems is that they aren't properly stress tested before going into operation. A bland routine package doesn't allow for individual issues. But I bet it cost a lot of money!

They probably offset it as a tax loss ;-)

The odd thing is that out Housing Association is officially a 'charity'.  If they make too much money they legally have to plough it back into improvements of the system.  Even when they're not needed.

I don't doubt the chatbot, and all the extra time to gt it working properly is a glorious black hole for swallowing any surplus.  In the meantime the tossers in suits - The Policy Makers -  rather than the real people who come out with toolboxes and fix things, can tell themselves they're doing a good of brining the association into the 21st Century.

Gyppo