»22nd May 2007

Keys

It's that time again. When a dry spell on the Cube is broken by a lazy update regarding my inept letting agency, formerly Rent Me who now go by the name of Pads. If you can remember, every previous update regarding these idiots was on the subject of their failure to do a variety of tasks most other letting agencies can handle without a problem.
This time they decided to take my key from me again (a variation on a theme). I say again because it's not the first time some guy came knocking on my door at ten in the morning demanding my key to be cut. It was ten o' clock in the morning on the 10th May, I had probably just gone to bed a few hours earlier, I could remember being pretty tired. In such a condition I was at my most vulnerable to Pads' fucktardery. The guy wanted my key for cutting and when I looked surprised asked me if I'd had any word from Pads. Of course I hadn't, this guy looked like some kind of Pads workman but I couldn't be sure, I asked him if he had the wrong flat, whether it was Flat Four 67 Clarendon Court he wanted and not 69. A few minutes later Mark emerged from his room having received a phone call from Pads about handing over a key. It checked out at least. The guy returned, I gave him my key, shut the door and had the first creeping sense of being fucked over. I'll play their game... Well, I suppose I have to. Anyway, I went back to bed whilst the busy bees at Pads sorted out my key.
You're probably wondering why my letting agents need to get some keys cut for my flat, and why they need my key to do it. Don't they have a master key at their office? If they've already cut your key once before, what happened to the old keys, why do they need cutting again?
The simple answer is that if you pass one problem through Pads, several more serious problems come out the other end. The bulk of this update is excerpts from my chat log to JK. It's a pretty lazy format I know, but I really like timestamps, it's nice seeing the passage of time like that and it makes things more exciting like their are in 24.

[12:54:04] Geon www.ext:

this is a fucking joke

[12:54:12] Geon www.ext:

that guy has been 3 hours with my key, i need to go out today

[12:54:25] Jordan:

?

[12:54:48] Geon www.ext:

some guy from pads was aroud today asking for my key to get it cut or something

[12:54:56] Geon www.ext:

they've done this before, last time they weren't so tardy

[13:02:36] Geon www.ext:

i'm getting a strange sense of deja vu

[13:02:46] Geon www.ext:

i've been here before, ringing them up trying to get hold of a key

The second call to Pads got me in touch with whoever it is who is responsible for this sort of thing, the girl who put me on hold said it was the 'maintennence department'. The maintennence department had 'just gone out' when I rung up the first time, but I had her attention now. I told her it'd been three hours since the guy had collected my key and wanted to know where my key was. She said that he had 'literally just come into the office and is sorting the keys out now'. From past experience, when someone is 'literally' doing something, it actually means no one is literally doing anything.

[13:05:40] Geon www.ext:

it's amazing how systemic their asstardery is

[13:05:59] Geon www.ext:

unsurprisingly, the maintennance girl was out when i rung up

[13:06:06] Geon www.ext:

sure, take my number, you won't ring me back

[13:10:54] Geon www.ext:

idiots.

[13:11:01] Geon www.ext:

'when do you need the key back?'

[13:11:09] Geon www.ext:

'well, as soon as possible really.'

[13:11:21] Geon www.ext:

'well it'll be ready by this afternoon'

[13:11:32] Geon www.ext:

'but i need to go out this afternoon, i need it as soon as possible'

[13:11:44] Geon www.ext:

'well what time do you need it and i'll get it to you?'

[13:11:51] Geon www.ext:

'half two? i need it as soon as possible'

[13:12:00] Geon www.ext:

jesus christ, how clear do you have to be with these people

[13:12:19] Geon www.ext:

if you can get it to me by half two, why wasn't it going to be coming to me by half two without me having to ring up?

[13:13:03] Jordan:

arses

[13:13:42] Jordan:

when did they take it away? you could have got it cut faster yourself

[13:14:34] Geon www.ext: 10 i think

[13:56:45] Geon www.ext:

they're clearly not going to meet my reasonable deadline

[13:56:58] Geon www.ext:

i could have been unreasonable, i could have demanded the key now.

[14:06:24] Geon www.ext:

you don't realise, that with pads, for every one thing that goes wrong. there's a 1000 other things which you don't know about...... which also go wrong

[14:22:13] Geon www.ext:

amazing, they did it. i have my key

When the guy who originally came at ten arrived to return my key I explained my greivances to him but he seemed none the wiser. I'd said that they'd needed my key for cutting before but the first time it hadn't taken five and a half hours. I asked the guy why they needed my key again and said he didn't have any idea. I mentioned that I had thought he'd been round before to pick up my key but he had no recollection and suggested if I was thinking about someone else. He was a stocky middle-aged man with a baseball cap. He asked me if the guy who had been round previously was wearing a baseball cap. I didn't want to point out the obvious. Seriously though, how many apparently clueless minions does Pads employ? Or is this guy just another graduate of the Rent Me school of spinning a ream of shit when put under pressure?



So, what have we learnt from yet another episode in the catalogue of failures from Pads/Rent Me? Surely you're thinking 'but they did return your key before the deadline you set?' Well that's true, and Pads did (by their own standards) well on that one. However, in total, they had hold of my key for over five hours with the intention of getting it cut. Last time I seen a key being cut it took about five minutes. Onto that I'll add say an hour for the journey around Leeds, perhaps picking up other keys and going to the Pads office. I'll also add a further thirty minutes for the Pads-factor - that is, things going wrong and/or not happening. That brings my expectation of how long it SHOULD have taken Pads to get my key cut (again) to around 95 minutes, which means Pads over-ran my reasonable expectations by around 315 minutes, which is of course a pathetic effort on Pads part.
Furthermore, it was after three hours that I was getting worried about where my key was that I had to ring Pads to cajole them into action. As always, one call is not enough, for invariably the person who can deal with your problem has just left the office and will ring you back in twenty minutes. Half an hour later you will then have to ring Pads back yourself and then the person you want will probably have returned to the office from their little excursion. Of course, this is what happens in the fantasy world of Pads. In reality what seems more likely is that said person has never left the office and they simply don't want to deal with you if you only have a problem of theirs which requires simply ONE phone call. Pads have got better things to be doing with their time than sorting out problems they've created you see. Quite what these problems are are of course a complete mystery to the rest of us.
I'm hoping that this will be the last time I have something to write about with regards to the inept landlords Pads. There are only two events on the horizon which involve Pads (which of course have the potential to be fucked up) and that is moving out of the flat at the end of June and receiving my deposit back from them in an orderly fashion... Looks like there WILL be more Pads updates then.


Extar, over, out.

There hopefully won't be more Pads/Rent Me updates.