I have nothing to say about council cunts
...but I will add my tuppence about BT.

About seven years ago, me + Mrs RWN moved into a rather nice rented flat in Harpenden. On our arrival, we found a BT ISDN box had been installed and, not wanting to pay for the service (which was expensive and shit), asked BT to come and remove it. "Of course" they said, "that'll be £50 please." £50 to remove something that we hadn't asked for and didn't want? But it was that or pay even more per month for the ISDN, so we agreed (then got the landlord to pay for it -- bargain).

Anyway so the guy came and did the work. After he left, I went to make a 'phone call and the line was dead. Odd. I was in the bedroom, so I tried the one in the lounge and it worked. Very odd. I then tried the other two sockets: also dead. Very odd indeed -- four sockets, all but one dead, when they'd all been working the day before.

I called BT and they said, "Oh yeah, the engineer who removed the ISDN box also deactivated all but the main socket. It's standard practice." Right, said I (starting to lose my cool just a little), can you please ask him to come back and re-activate them? "Oh yes, of course. That'll be £52." £52 to reactivate something that was working just fine before your man broke it? "Er...no, it'll be £156. It's £52 per socket."

Take a moment to imagine my response.

After spending several hours over the next couple of weeks trying (and failing) to get some sense out of BT, we told them to disconnect the line immediately, and switched to NTL. NTL might not have been perfect, but for the same price as a single BT line we got 'phone, cable TV and broadband. And when the engineers came to fit the kit (for free) they also re-activated all the disconnected 'phone sockets (for free).

I don't know about the council, but BT is a bunch of cunts and no mistake.
( reallywittyname veraciously conspues lexiphanicism on, Fri 27 Jul 2007, 9:50, Reply)