When self improvement doesn't work for you...

Then it's time to improve something that isn't yourself...

SO I was in B&M shopping (so I thought) for some reeces pieces ane rolling papers, when the store P.A. fired up with an unholy noise like a cross between a foghorn and acoustic feedback, and worse with a really fast "rise time" on the volume.

An involuntary "FooK that" escaped my lips and I found myself heading for a sharp and annoyed exit..

THEN I caught myself, chided myself for being over sensitive and resumed shopping.

It happened again!

I left the store immediately, sans reeces and skins and resolved to DO SOMETHING!

I write a very nice and polite letter to head office telling them of my experience and pointing out that whilst I admit to being an unusually sensitive customer, it can;t be great for the poor souls who work there subjected to it all day...

I got a letter back from the company promising to look into it...

I don't complain in writing very often but I do when something really annoys me, AND it seems quite effective if you are polite and considerate of the realities of the business or service that you are complaining of.

Apparently in the days before email a widely held maxim in business was that every written complaint probably represents 40,000 other people who didn't bother.

The key however, to a sucessful complaint is unfailing politeness and a faux reasonable attitude. (Yes, I am advising a form of dishonesty, but you really do catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, so if you are as angry as Caelus on a bad day (Or me, TBH, but I share my ire a lot less than is strictly honest) you need to wilfully ignore that anger for the time being and concentrate on the polite and reasonable.