Just a short post to say that the company van is back on the road, after a small mistake with ordering the wrong hose. So give us a bell, so we can blow the cobwebs out!
Just kidding. It was back on the road on Friday evening, so has already done a few jobs. 
If like me you have fun trying to recall the seventeen different PIN numbers you have, and so now only use a single card for everything, while the others gather dust and interest charges, you might like to know one of the reasons why signature verification was phased out for most things.
I’m not going to pretend that the UK didn’t have far more motivated signature checkers than the US guys encountered by our new hero, but it was still pretty poor.
http://www.zug.com/pranks/credit/index.html gives a humorous reminder of what you could get up to, before V day 2005. Meanwhile, http://www.zug.com/pranks/credit_card/index.html is simply mind-blowing!
Sadly, the company van died on Tuesday, blowing a water hose and emptying the radiator all over the road. Currently, service is pretty much unaffected, however, although on-site key cutting is not practical at this time, and any full strip uPVC replacements or door repairs will be slightly limited.
Parts are on order, and normal service should be resumed next Tuesday.
In the meantime, please don’t hesitate to call.
A collegue tells me that in his area, one large series of adverts in one of the big phone books by one national advertiser actually has many small adverts, all with local addresses, all across the area. They are desperate to look like a local company, and, to be fair, if they are prepared to open an office in every town to get an address, then fine.
Unfortunately, it turns out that the addresses being given are in fact not genuine. One turned out to be a derilict garage, whilst another, perhaps more worryingly, turned out to be a lady’s home, who said she had no knowledge of the advertiser and certainly hadn’t given permission.
Rest assured that this company has full permission and authority for both the addresses we use!