The revolution

Posted by Andrew Mernin on May 1, 2008 9:29 AM

When I was in short trousers I remember watching a sketch on The Two Ronnies called the worm has turned. The skit was set in a world in complete parallel to 1970s Britain where women ruled supreme and a small band of men tried desperately to cling on to their rights.

What does this have to do with business? I hear you ask.

Well it seems to me that, just as the worm turned on men in The Two Ronnies sketch, the worm is beginning to turn on the corporate giants, as the customer launches its fight back.

Last week a High Court judge confirmed what bank customers have been arguing for years - that bank charges are unfair and we no longer deserve to be hit in the pocket for going over our overdraft limit.

It is still up to the Office of Fair Trading to assess the situation, but it looks as though last week's ruling will pave the way for customers to win back the fees they have paid.

Meanwhile, as two oil giants posted record-breaking profits this week, truck drivers staged a protest in London's Park Lane, blaring their horns to protest a 30% climb in the price of diesel over the past year.

Shell and BP may have shrugged off any criticism they received, but at least the customer is finding its voice and it could only be a matter of time before the fuel firms are forced to listen.

Anyone looking to join the customer revolution, but needs inspiration on where to start, need look no further than comedian Dom Joly's new TV show The Complainers.

The show consists of various big businesses and institutions getting it in the neck by Mr Joly and friends largely by giving them a taste of their own medicine.

One campaign involves the traffic warden’s warden – armed with an in-depth parking rule book he stops wardens in their tracks by uncovering illegally marked parking spots which, by law, can not be used to enforce fines.

Train operators and call centre companies are also among Joly’s other numerous targets.

To join the revolution watch Channel Five, Monday night at 10pm.

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How's this for a cod piece?

Posted by Ian Brown on May 3, 2008 10:56 AM

With my fellow members of LEAF, I spent last Tuesday in the Lincoln area on a training day which included Grimsby Fish Market.
I now know a lot more about fish, sea fishing and the politics around bringing it ashore. None of this is a fisherman's tale other than in a very literal sense. I also can tell you there is something very fishy about celebrity chef recommended alternatives to cod and haddock which they say are from a more sustainable fish....pollocks indeed!

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Qualified opinions

Posted by Katie Pringle on May 7, 2008 8:24 PM

Tommorow myself and my business partner are off to a meeting with a buyer at a large museum who may hopefully, possibly, maybe, want us to create a product specifically for them. This would be our first commission and we are pretty nervous about the meeting.

We don't have any experience in this area and so we have absolutely nothing on which to base our expectations. So what do you do when you don't know what to do? Well, if you're anything like me, you go ask someone, anyone what they might do in that situation.

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Big brother is watching

Posted by Andrew Mernin on May 9, 2008 9:35 AM

With every year that passes, our working lives seem to creep closer and closer to the pages of 1984.

From the monitoring of email and internet usage to the recording of phone calls "for training purposes" an increasing number of bosses seem more focused on the surveillance of their staff than watching what their customers are doing.

But now a piece of legislation is about to come in that is so Orwellian it would make even the thought police proud - welcome to the regime of the National Staff Dismissal Register.

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Return to sender

Posted by Katie Pringle on May 12, 2008 7:28 PM

This evening I got in from work to find a parcel at the front door.

As my eyes scanned across the address an unwanted recognition crept over me. Just under a week ago this very same parcel had been taken by me, from my house, to my local Post Office. In the time honoured tradition I had written on the front where I wanted the parcel to be sent to. Sometimes this gets referred to as the address. The place we wish the parcel to go to. This address was not and is not, my address. And yet here it was, back again...in my house!

Like some kind of Lassie-esque parcel, this package had come home. ARGHH!

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Should employers block social networking sites?

Posted by Jonathan Wheatley on May 16, 2008 2:16 PM

Can you prevent time wasting on the internet?

I am asked more and more as an IT Consultant with MC Ware to block and monitor websites due to managements concerns about time wasting but I am not sure if this is always the answer.

One week the panic will be related to Facebook, the next week Bebo and who knows what will be next. I am sometimes of the opinion that people who are committed to wasting time on the web have probably always found other ways of avoiding work.

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Food and Fuel too expensive?

• Tags:
• ONE NorthEast

Posted by Ian Brown on May 16, 2008 7:07 PM

I have business interests in food and fuel and I take offence at HMG (the country's management) somehow blaming the downturn in the economy on food and fuel prices rising.

This in a society that wastes a third of its resources i.e. this weeks announcement that the UK puts £10billion worth of food straight from the fridge to the pedal bin....crazy when you think about it.

This week I attended an event organised by Fiona Hall one of the north easts three MEPs ...... for me it focused my mind on the need to act now to survive oil prices in advance of $125.

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Governance and Government....a good thing?

• Tags:
• Government Office North East
• Groundworks
• Nick Brown

Posted by Ian Brown on May 27, 2008 8:27 PM

We'll do the easily digestable one first... Governance is a good thing and now contains less calories than motherhood and apple pie, I was trained in it this week.

I'm just a simple country lad and frankly a big fan of horse or what you may know of as common sense, for litigious reasons you need to have proof that you are leading your organisation properly. In life it is best to stay on the moral high ground, indeed it would be fair to say nobody ever drowned on the moral highground. Now the link to Government comes from my attendance at the Government Office North East stakeholders day....for a definition read on!

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A brush with the laws

• Tags:
• Draft Legislative Programme
• flexible working

Posted by Ross Smith on May 28, 2008 12:12 PM

I've just got back from a meeting with the Regional Minister Nick Brown, who was discussing the Government's Draft Legislative Programme with representatives of business in the North East.

Some crucial decisions affecting the regional economy will be made in the next Parliamentary year, including reform of skills policy and new regional economic development structures.

Meanwhile, proposed laws on flexible working and the option for business rate supplements will also be of great concern to many employers.

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Inner Space

Posted by Andrew Mernin on May 29, 2008 10:14 AM

Anyone who attended the Thinking Digital conference in Gateshead last week no doubt came away with their heads full of the mind-boggling technological ideas that await us in the future.

There were holographic presentations - like something from a Star Wars film - and even one scientist who predicted that we will one-day live to the age of 1,000.

Another tech expert hailed the end of face-to-face meetings thanks to 'telepresence' while the audience was wowed by a futurologist who believes video games will one day be played in the real world in real time.

But for me the most impressive piece of future technology on display reminded me of the 1980s family film Inner Space.

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Eat up and speak up...and sit back down!

Posted by Ian Brown on May 30, 2008 8:35 PM

EAT is now over for another year, it goes from success to success and has continued to provoke all the senses.
One week ago I had the honour of announcing the North East Chef of the Year 2008 results - the awards came at the end of a long day of cook offs and being in catering I know the pressure to perform and indeed the rivalry that exisits between the top chefs in the north east, as Wendy Gibson said on the night it is also great that a woman won through in a world that can seem male dominated. My brief was to either give a speech or not...I read the audience and given the time of night kept to reading the names out.....but since I'd given it a bit of thought here is the speech that was never uttered...............

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