O2 - A staggering example of the worst possible customer service imaginable.

I'm generally a pretty honest bloke. I believe that karma can re-visit you, and why take the chance. So, rather than go to a moody fella down the Tottenham Court Road to get my iPhone 4 unlocked so I could use it abroad, I contacted my network provider. 'Well, Mr MacDonald, you've been on quite a high tariff now with us for some time, and there's never been a problem with your payment history, so that's fine.' I dutifully filled out the 'unlock my iPhone' form on their website, and then waited the aforementioned two weeks before receiving a text saying 'Your iPhone is now unlocked' Note, dear reader, that this is all the text said, nothing else.

I was away on holiday on my own for the first time, and one of the things I was looking forward to was blogging, and twittering, and facebooking etc. Luckily, Thailand is well served with WiFi hotspots.

The saddest thing about this whole debacle is that when I stepped bleary eyed off my plane in BAngkok and went to the AIS shop in the terminal, I was not the least bit surprised when they put in a Thai SIM and it didn't work. 'It's not unlocked' the Thai lady said, in her customary pleasant tone. I showed her the text from, O2 saying it had been, but as you can imagine, I might as well have been showing her the instructions to assemble a particularly challenging set of shelving from IKEA. The lady advised me to take it to the MBK centre in Bangkok where they'd sort it out.

I went there. This is using a day of my holiday, by the way O2. Shall I send you an invoice?

They sorted it out by putting in a gevey chip thing. www.gevey.com if you're interested, but I presume it's some kind of hack chip. It cost me about £35. Can I have that back, O2? Thought not.

I then entered into negotiations with O2 via twitter - this is when it really pissed me off. Precis to follow:

O2: Did you unlock?
Me: Yes
O2: Did you then sync?
Me: Yes [Although, where in your instructions does it tell you to do that? Nowhere, that's where]
O2: Have you synced it with a non O2 SIM before coming away?
Me: No. Where on earth do I get a non O2 micro SIM from, and why do I need to? You told me it was unlocked?
O2: You'll need to find a non O2 SIM and sync it with iTunes for it to work.

Let me insert a brief hiatus here, and also apologise for the swearing.

I'M ON TOP OF A FUCKING MOUNTAIN IN SOUTH EAST ASIA!!!!! WHERE THE FUCK DO I FIND A PC WITH ITUNES ALONG WITH A NICE MAN WHO WILL SUPPLY ME WITH A NICE SIM CARD AND TEST IT OUT.

I then received the following:-

Suffice it to say, I DM'd the number and got no response. None at all. And I told them that quite frankly, no I was not prepared to waste yet more of my holiday pissing about with a phone that should have taken me all of 5 minutes to sort out having followed all their instructions. No apology. Nothing. Throughout the exchange I was polite, and courteous. I understand O2 don't want people unlocking their phones for obvious reasons. But I bet they prefer even less their customers blogging like this, to over 1000 of their followers, then leaving to go to Orange as soon as they possibly can.

I think the saddest thing is that I'm just resigned to it. It's pathetic. Next time, I know for a fact there is a lovely chap on Tottenham Court Road who'll do the whole thing for me for a tenner. It'll probably invalidate my warranty, but the same fella will swop my smashed screen for £40, and their native insurance at £15 a month is a sum I am astonished they have the audactiy to charge. I get more comprehensive cover, including water damage, for £6 a month on my home insurance.

I cannot believe that there is no-one at this company that can see why this is unacceptable. Honestly, I have not been biased here- this is exactly how it happened. Are any of you really surprised either. They are all the same. I could tell you a story about Virgin installing home broadband when I moved to Winchester that I could only possibly file under fantasy fiction. Sky and BT? Don't make me laugh.

In the past, I have lauded O2 when they sorted their 3G network out. Often, when I speak to them they are very pleasant. Someone, find me the nefarious doom-monger who is orchestrating their appalling service performance.

Thailand Day One

I didn't have much access to proper computermabobs, so I'll do this a bit at a time as I have free moments. I'll start quite simply by the first few things I learnt on my first day in Thailand

Some things I have learnt in 6 hours in Thailand. 

1) A smile will get you 86% of the way anywhere.

2) The fourth floor of the MBK could turn even a root vegetable into a fully functioning smartphone.

3) We have much to learn from this poor, second world country about basic courtesy and manners. To each other as well as customer service environments

4) See above also for fast food

5) If carnal fulfillment is your bag, this is the place for you. Laminated illustrated price lists even in the taxis

6) I know you all said, but OMG IT'S HOT. In a muggy, fuggy, you feel like you're wrapped in a duvet next to a log fire kind of way. 

And that is in the evening. 

I shall expand and add to the above in blog form when I have time