Ben’s Musings

Yesterday was Father’s Day. It wasn’t a great day for me - it didn’t feel like a day to celebrate my fatherhood and it grated a bit when Mary-Lou wished me a “Happy Father’s Day!”.

In the afternoon we went to watch “War On Democracy“, a documentary by John Pilger about the American Government’s interference with Latin American Governments over the last 60 years.

It is a brilliantly put together documentary which clearly explained the hugely negative interference that Washington has had which has cost thousands and thousands of lives.

It’s focus is Venezuela and Hugo Chavez, it’s leader. The American Government were involved with a coup in 2002, led by the rich elite of Venezuela which was illegal and staged using the media. Within 72 hours the Venezuelan poor surrounded the Government Palace and demanded Chavez back. A wonderful example of true democracy and people power.

Pilger then goes on to look at other South American countries and how they have been damaged by the intervention of the American Government. One guy he interviews who worked for the C.I.A. was so arrogant and dismissive about the thousands of deaths they caused, it made me so angry. He declared that these deaths, and the many more beatings, tortures and rapes were acceptable for the national interests of the United States. He epitomised everything many people think about American Politics.

The film exposes Washington’s fear and hatred of true democracy when it threatens their economy and their extreme idea of capitalism. Some horrific stories are told but there is great hope in this film. This is a definite for my BARF nights and I highly recommend it to everybody. Here is the trailer to inspire you to watch it:

After my Formal Complaint to Orange about the mis-selling of a service which led Mary-Lou and myself to take out new 18 month contracts with them, I got a call today offering a compromise.

Their new offer means that together we only pay £30 in tariff fees which is a welcome compromise since the deal we were led to believe Orange was offering would have led to us paying a similar amount.

Thank you for rectifying your mistake, Orange.

Blogged with Flock

I didn’t sleep at all on Saturday night.

My parents and my brother came up to see us for lunch on Saturday. Just before they arrived, I started getting blurry areas around the right side of my vision. I hoped it would disappear, but it didn’t and I realised I had a migraine coming on. I have migraines around once every 2 years and have learnt to take paracetamol as early as I can when I notice my vision going odd.

During our lunch, my head started hurting and I wasn’t able to concentrate on much, so I ended up going to bed and sleeping for 4 hours leaving Mary-Lou to entertain my family! I woke up later feeling much better but still groggy so I missed a friends birthday meal which I was looking forward to.

Sunday was the 9 month anniversary since Amy died and the days in the weekend were the same as the weekend when she died, Friday being the 8th and Sunday being the 10th. We decided last month that we wanted to try for another baby but on Thursday Mary-Lou got a period which we were both really disappointed about. I think that these things and the fact that my grief is growing made me feel the lowest I have felt since Amy died.

When Mary-Lou and I went to bed, I couldn’t sleep and just played on my laptop and phone until about 3am, then watched TV from 4 – 5am and eventually went for a walk around Platt Fields at 5.30am.

10 babies are stillborn every day in the UK, and I couldn’t help thinking of the dozens of couples who were having a horrendous weekend, not caring what time of the morning it is, but simply trying to deal with the shock of their loss. I almost felt that by staying up all night I was empathising with and sharing in their loss.

I ended up spending nearly 3 hours wandering slowly around Platt Fields, watching the birds, listening to the morning sounds, sitting while enjoying the early Sun, and thinking about how much I miss Amy.

To Gary Elloitt,

Following our conversation on 11th June 2007, I am writing this letter as a formal complaint about the mis-selling of your product “Your Group”. Ofcom have advised me that this is the next step I should take.

2 months ago, my wife and I were wondering how to reduce our mobile phone bills. So I phoned 150 from my Orange mobile and talked to a Customer Services Representative about the idea of both me and my wife using a single tariff. I was told that the “Your Group” service would allow us to do that, but that we would both need to be on Orange Animal tariffs.

On May 4th 2007, we went into an Orange Shop in Manchester to find a phone which my wife would be able to upgrade to. We explained to the Customer Advisor about how we wanted me to go onto my wife’s tariff and he confirmed that we could do so. My wife didn’t upgrade in store since they didn’t have any phones which she liked.

My wife phoned 150 to upgrade her phone and tariff a couple of days later, only because she believed that once we both had Animal tariffs, I would be able to be added to her tariff.

2 weeks before I upgraded my phone and tariff, I again called 150 to find out the date on which I was entitled to upgrade to an Animal plan. During this conversation I wanted to confirm that I would be able to go onto my wife’s account using the “Your Group” service, and was told that I could, all I needed was an Animal tariff.

I called 150 again 3 days before I upgraded to see if I could upgrade early and found that I couldn’t, but again I enquired about whether I could go onto my wife’s account using “Your Group” as soon as I upgraded, and I was told I could.

So on the 22nd May I upgraded my phone and tariff. In the negotiations about upgrading my account, I explained that I wanted to upgrade to the £25 Dolphin tariff because I wanted to move onto my wife’s tariff once I had been upgraded. I chose the cheapest tariff because I thought I would only pay it for the first month, then, once I joined my wife’s “Your Group”, I would share her tariff.

Earlier this afternoon, my wife and I phoned the “Your Group” Team so that I could be moved onto my wife’s group, and then share her tariff. We were shocked to find that this is not what “Your Group” allows, it simply allows people in a group to call each other for free, and moves my phone number and tariff into my wife’s Orange account – meaning that both her tariff and my tariff would now all be charged to my wife.

I believe I have been mis-sold your “Your Group” service. I am upset and angry because we only agreed to our new phones and 18 month contracts because we believed we would be able to share a tariff only when we had upgraded to a new Animal tariff. Had we known that we could not share a tariff, we would have cancelled our Orange accounts and gone with another mobile service provider who did offer this, or something like it.

In our conversation today, we agreed that both my wife and I had agreed to these 18 month contracts. You made the point that when we agreed, the price of the tariffs and the minutes and texts with them were explained to us, so since I had agreed to pay £25 per month for my mobile service, there is no compulsion for you to let me out of the contract or to change it.

It was also explained that you cannot let me share my wife’s contract because you do not offer the service and you do not have the technology to do that. I conceded this point and suggested that you could compensate my wife and I by letting one of us not pay for our tariff, since this is the product your staff told me I was entitled to. You said you would not do this, and instead told me what a good deal the tariffs we are now bound to are. I had asked the lady I talked to before our conversation whether Orange could cancel our accounts without charging us any fees as compensation, but she also said that you would not do this since we had agreed to the terms and conditions of the contracts.

My issue is the ethical problem that Orange mis-sold me a service which you could not and do not offer. My wife and I were deceived into believing that if we upgraded to new Animal plans, we would be able to share a tariff.

As a representative for Orange, you were not willing to admit that we had been deceived and were not willing to take responsibility for that, or to compensate us for the deception. You offered to lower my wife’s tariff as a gesture of good will. This does not compensate us for the fact that we are now in 18 month contracts which we would not have agreed to if we had not been told that we could share a tariff through “Your Group”.

Please let us know what other forms of compensation you will offer us for the fact that we were deceived into being bound by new 18 month contracts.

Yours Faithfully,

Ben Gibbs

The last few days have been a bit of a culture binge for me. I’ve been to an art exhibition, the theatre, a festival and a film premiere!

It started last Friday with an art exhibition launch at Projekts skate shop. The artist is a chap called French who has done numerous skateboard graphics over the years. He has a really distinctive style of line drawings, mostly focussed on heavy metal and death. See his website for a feel of his work. One of the pictures was of an Orangutan - it was brilliant and is my favourite.

On Saturday Mary-Lou and I were treated by a kind friend to tickets for a play at the Palace Theatre. The play was an adaptation of Mahabharata, an ancient Indian legend. I enjoyed the play, especially during the opening dance when it dawned on me that these were real people doing all this great dancing just a few yards away.

This production was an extremely whittled down version of the actual story - 74,000 verses and 1.8 million words! I was excited about seeing a play based on ancient Hindu beliefs and tried to find meaning in the story. There was quite alot of philosophy in it with the god Krishna taking us through the story. The 2 main points I got from it were that we are born with a duty which we must fulfil - regardless of the consequences, and that mercy is better than revenge. I get the latter point, but not the first point. Surely with free will we must consider the consequences of all our actions? Anyhow, I enjoyed the experience.

After the Theatre we were going to go to FEAST which is creative festival in Platt Fields Park. Mary-Lou was going to sing there with her singing group - Singing For Larks - but we were too tired so we just went home.

Then on Sunday I ran the Skate Area at the Burnt To The Ground festival in Manchester’s Northern Quarter. It has been a stressful couple of weeks trying to organise this but it went really well, everyone enjoyed skating the Mini-Ramp we got and there was a really great vibe.

This evening Mary-Lou and I went to the Premiere of a movie called Black Gold. It is a documentary about the global coffee industry, focussing on a co-operative in Ethiopia struggling to find buyers for it’s coffee. I thought it was put together really well and clearly explained the cause and effect relationship between western consumer choices and the coffee farmers. I highly recommend that you go and see it this weekend when it opens nationally. See the website to find where it is being shown near you. And here is the trailer to encourage you to go and watch it!