[Misc] Companies you hate, and will avoid using/buying from if you possibly can

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keaton

Big heart, hot blood and balls. Big balls
Nov 18, 2004
9,972
I'm going for the general label of people that knock on my door to sell me stuff. Indundated with the last year of people telling me how old my windows are and what prices they can give me. Also charities, fish sellers (wtf?) ,JWs, Virgin, Utilities etc.
 




Herr Tubthumper

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Jul 11, 2003
62,724
The Fatherland




The Clamp

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Jan 11, 2016
26,206
West is BEST
 


The Clamp

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Jan 11, 2016
26,206
West is BEST
Arcadia were one of the worst companies I worked for. Owned by Philip Green.

I think they are gone now though?
 


Westdene Seagull

aka Cap'n Carl Firecrotch
NSC Patron
Oct 27, 2003
21,526
The arse end of Hangleton
PurpleBricks

Truly truly awful.

I'd read really good things about them and the reviews were good. Our house was clearly a first time buyers house and should have been a simple sale. I paid the extra £99 or whatever it was to have the local agent/expert conduct our viewings for us to maximise time slots. You can do the viewings yourself if you want but we were both at work.

Our 'agent' or whatever they call themselves was cancelling our viewings and pretending the viewers were the ones cancelling them.

I had a 'portal' where I could see all the viewings. One day I called a few of the viewers directly (they submit their contact details on there) and they all told me it was cancelled by us saying it wasn't a good time.

Took a lot of arguing to eventually get my full refund. They argued the basic fee was still payable and only the additional cost paid to have the agent do our viewings should be refunded. I argued that agent not doing their job made the rest of the fee completely redundant. Got there in the end.

Went with a proper estate agent the next time and they were great for us.
That's what happens when a company appoints Paul Pindar as CEO. At Capita, which should be profitable given all it's government contracts, he drove redundancies through the roof and profits through the floor. How he ever got another job is beyond me.
 




pb21

Well-known member
Apr 23, 2010
6,689
Regarding Apple, I know quite a few folk who swore blind by Android/Samsung, always with an emphatic “I’ll NEVER touch the devil that is Apple”. One was p-d off they his daughters had chosen iPads for Xmas. Three or four later, they all use Apple. Daren’t ask why.
I've got an Android personal phone and an Apple work phone, so use both on a regular basis and have done for a few years now. My next phone will definitely be an Android!
 


jcdenton08

Offended Liver Sausage
NSC Patron
Oct 17, 2008
14,563
Ticketmaster - just about as cynical as a business model can get.

Evri - absolutely appalling customer service, numerous “lost” packages, absolutely zero vetting in recruitment of their drivers - they’ll take anyone. So bad they had to rebrand from “Hermes”.

TikTok - a new low in social media, where self obsessed Zoomers do stupid dances/pranks in public, in a desperate bid for approval from other cretins of the mind.

Air Canada - so bad it has to be intentional. All their staff are angry, no doubt due to being overworked, underpaid and completely short-staffed. Flight cancelled, no text, email, phone call - nothing. 300 person queue to customer service desk - one staff member. Queue for three hours, told to phone their customer service department… which is closed. Horrific.

Activision/EA - completely transformed video gaming in a bad way. Loot boxes, micro transactions, horrible working conditions, price gouging and constant lies.

Southern Rail/Fail - inept from the bottom to the top. Solely for the shareholders and **** everyone else.
 


Gwylan

Well-known member
Jul 5, 2003
31,830
Uffern
Southern Rail/Fail - inept from the bottom to the top. Solely for the shareholders and **** everyone else.
The question was "what companies won't you use". If you're travelling across Sussex by rail, there's no choice
 




jcdenton08

Offended Liver Sausage
NSC Patron
Oct 17, 2008
14,563
The question was "what companies won't you use". If you're travelling across Sussex by rail, there's no choice
I will avoid using them “if I possibly can”.

I.e. I try and avoid using trains altogether due to their incompetence and unreliability.
 


Screaming J

He'll put a spell on you
Jul 13, 2004
2,403
Exiled from the South Country
Open Reach for me. Constantly digging up the village for no apparent reason whatsoever and their reinstatements when they (finally) finish are utter cr@p. And whenever you see roadworks with temporary traffic lights you can bet your backside it'll be caused by 2+ OpenReach vans and several safety hatted employees gazing down a manhole cover..........
 


CheeseRolls

Well-known member
NSC Patron
Jan 27, 2009
6,233
Shoreham Beach
Bah I can't even give a straight answer to a simple question this morning.

Hate is not too strong a word, when it comes to Southern Water. Obvious criminal behaviour and exploitation of a local monopoly, quite literally a shit service. There is no choice or alternative.
Strange day just had a visit from Southern Water asking to test my tap water. I put on me best Rick snear flicked the Vs at her and said you are not coming on my property fascist!!!

Actually I showed her into the kitchen, where she filled a load of sample bottles before departing. Apparently next door think their water smells of petrol.
 










happypig

Staring at the rude boys
May 23, 2009
8,179
Eastbourne
Open Reach for me. Constantly digging up the village for no apparent reason whatsoever and their reinstatements when they (finally) finish are utter cr@p. And whenever you see roadworks with temporary traffic lights you can bet your backside it'll be caused by 2+ OpenReach vans and several safety hatted employees gazing down a manhole cover..........
To be pedantic, Openreach don't do dig/reinstatement, that's done by contractors and some of them are truly shocking. When I worked in the field (in the 80's) if a fault was identified underground it would be the same feller who would dig, fix and reinstate; some of them took a real pride in making the reinstatement as good as it had been.
Then the accountants came....
 




borat

Well-known member
Jul 16, 2003
655
Amazon (more recent thing but try to buy direct where possible) even if paying a fee quid more.
Most of mainstream UK journalism
Israeli, US, Saudi, UAE products. Almost impossible to avoid many of those products but where there is a choice choose the alternative.
 


Poojah

Well-known member
Nov 19, 2010
1,881
Leeds
In my late teens, following a series of decisions which were both seemingly stupid and yet would turn out to have been 100% right in the long run, I had hit upon hard times and found myself living in a 1987 Peugeot 309 in the outskirts of Middlesbrough, a town I was not familiar with. For context, the year was 2003, November / December, and said Peugeot was an absolute heap of junk with a manual choke, wind-up windows which would not wind-up all the way and a dashboard which was held in place by a strategically placed chunk of cork.

I had burned a lot of bridges at this point, and found myself as good as penniless. What little money I did have went on food; I had long run out of the kind of cash to fuel the car I was living in, so it would remain stationary and without heating.

One dark and grey mid-week morning I found myself beside a branch of Baker’s Oven when the skies suddenly opened. By this point, I had been living in a car for some weeks and though I had fresh clothes and a place to wash, I was still looking somewhat unkempt and dishevelled. And that was before the torrential rain.

I was aware I had some change, and by some I mean very little, in my pocket, so I dived into said branch of Bakers Oven to see if I had enough to score some food. Now, I remember this distinctively, I had 28p. A 20, a 5, a 2, and a 1. In these times of hyper inflation that seems the most miserly of sums, but 20 years ago it was sufficient to buy me a delicious sausage roll. 26p. I got change.

I’d barely eaten in a day or so, so I was determined to savour this paltry meal meal while the rain subsided, so I sat myself down on an uncomfortable plastic seat on a table for 4, by the door. There were 2, maybe 3 other customers in there. And a more than enough space for all.

Then I hear this voice; “sorry, that’s 35p”. Eh? You talking to me love? The woman who served me has come from behind the counter and stormed towards where I’m sat. Imagine a thick Middlesbrough accent at this point, if you can. “Your sausage roll’s 26p to take out - you need to pay another 9p if you want to sit in”. I pointed to the outside, where the apocalyptic rain had ceased to abate, and pushed my remaining 2 pence across the table. “That’s literally all I’ve got”.

“I’m sorry, but I need another 5p or you’ll have to leave.” I genuinely didn’t have 5p, which I pointed out, as I reminded the lady that Noah’s Ark would surely soon be on its way. I made it clear I wasn’t leaving, and that she was being unnecessarily pedantic.

“I’m sorry, you either go now, or I’ll have to call the security team”. Middlesbrough, then as now, had a pretty serious jerkin problem so instances of petty crime and disorder were quite common, and you’d often see both police and blokes in blazers and walkie talkies patrolling the high street.

I need to emphasise that I wasn’t being cocky or difficult in anyway - I was 18, virtually penniless, living 150 miles from home in a conked out car with no petrol - I was down and out. I didn’t even have the energy to argue.

But I stayed where I was. And then these chaps in wet blazers and walkie talkies rocked up. As perplexed as I was. “You’re arguing about 9 pence”? Another, more pressing matter came through, and they had to leave, by which time I had finished my sausage roll, the torrent had turned to light drizzle and I followed them out of the door.

No harm done, perhaps, but I’ll never forget how that woman tried to treat me. I was on my arse at the time, and it’s served as a reminder as I’ve got older and got a grip on my life that it’s imperative not to look down on people or judge them based on their appearance in that moment. Rather than help or show understanding, that lady chose to judge and chastise. Over nothing.

I never set foot in a Bakers Oven again, nor Greggs who bought them out. Except for one exception, when I tried to help a homeless girl in the midst of the beast from the east 5 years or so ago, only to find their staff similarly condescending.

Fúck Bakers Oven. Fúck Greggs.
 


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