The Grumpy Old Blog

You have to hand it to Ryanair. It's a very clever business model that has made chief executive Michael O'Leary an enviably wealthy multi-multi-millionaire. And it's all been done on a business model that not only STILL, as yet, doesn't care one hoot for the customer, despite certain big-mouth promises, but also treats staff with equal disdain, seeing them forced to act like in-air salespeople, wandering up and down the airplane peddling over-priced crap and stupid lottery tickets. And it all starts before passengers even step on the plane. For example, I don't think the Budapest Airport authorities realise that the reason their fancy (and very nice looking) duty free shops were bereft of customers was because there was just one desk open for the three Ryanair flights taking off between 16.20 and 17.30! There appears to be four types of traveller who use Ryanair. 1. Those who simply just want to get from "a" to "b" as cheaply as possibl...

Predictions for 2015 January – ebay crashes under the strain of unwanted Christmas presents. Once again, this is the year the world will end, but not until the 14th of the month at about 2.18pm, but thankfully, Microsoft will dash to the rescue and reboot it at 2.19pm. However, several countries will need updating immediately so the whole thing will slow down to a crawl while these are updated and the world is rebooted several times February – a bank or four will announce that they might have mistakenly miss-sold thousands of its customers products they didn’t need at the time when they didn’t want them. By mistake. Apple unveils their iPhone 7 that sees extremely stupid people queuing outside their shops for days in their efforts to be the first to get one March – BBC 1 goes through an entire day (18th) without either a presenter or guest totally mispronouncing basic English words. Amazon, Apple, Vodafone, ebay and PayPal announce they are going to pay what the...

There is an absolutely huge dilemma in the UK that I need to bring to your attention, but let's leave it until later in the blog. At the time of scribbling this, the casual reader will not need reminding of some of the lesser impending problems in the world at the moment, but I'll remind you of them anyway. There's that nasty ebola virus that governments are trying their best to keep out of their respective countries. Horrid, but not as big a dilemma as this UK one I will allude to. There's Iran posturing about its rather unclear nuclear vision. A vision to have weapon-grade electricity generating stations. Horrid, but not as big a dilemma as this UK one I will allude to. Then there's the unacceptable increase in anti-Semitism throughout the world where Israel can do no right and everyone seems to have forgotten the Holocaust during World War II where just under half the world's then population of Jews (along with gays, gypsies and the disabled) were bru...

Great to know the country's premium automated stealth-tax collection site doesn't do what it says on the front page. Oh sorry, the recently new DVLA farce. If you have a vehicle to shell out for, don't make any changes on-line, as you are then locked out for 5 working days (yep, weekends not included) while the system automatically (yep, " automatically " - you can tell its a civil service 'service', as it apparently realises when it's the weekend and doesn't work then) updates. The DVLA themselves can't do anything for you, so you have to drag out to a Post Office (preferably one than hasn't been closed by this or the previous Government). Why the organ grinders have to send you to the moneys is beyond me! Oh, and the highwaymen at DVLA will also charge you £2.50 to use a credit card. And I love the message on the TOTALLY AUTOMATED PAYMENT phone system " all calls will be recorded for training and monitoring purposes " - I wo...

When it comes to a job interview, some people worry about not having a qualification. Well aside from quoting all the famous drop-outs who became incredibly successful business owners, for example, Lord Sugar, the trend seems to be reversing somewhat. If you succeed in obtaining an interview with the organ grinder as opposed to the monkey, you really should have no problem. Any sensible interviewer should focus on what you can do for the company rather than the rather meaningless bits of paper you might have on a wall. You can be as qualified as Einstein, but if you have no experience of the real world, employers should certainly think twice. They owe to their business. I once worked for a degree-mad multinational corporation where one of the marketing seniors had a superb degree. In physics. One of the other senior marketing managers was equally qualified. With his Geography degree. So, if you have a degree in Animal Husbandry and a degree in Mechanical Engineering, why not app...

Personally, I think a little, or in fact, a lot of humour is what is needed nowadays. Ok, yes, in the right places and at the right time. For example, be sensible and steer clear of flight or construction humour with 9/11 coming up! Something a little more lighthearted does have the big cheering-up factor, which can be far more engaging. Half the problem nowadays is that so many marketing people are, to quote the vernacular, up their own posteriors. And it's not funny. I've been there myself, and to be honest, didn't like it, because it wasn't me. Health and Safety has replaced common sense. Goodness knows exactly what the current dysfunctional and unnecessary HR has replaced (they certainly don't know themselves). And all marketing people seem to have, for some strange reason known only to no one, gone SEO-mad. And it ain't the least bit humourous! This is despite the fact that so many of them can neither write or speak English correctly, and s...

To those who know me, they are well-aware that mentioning HR (Human Resources) to me is the equivalent of holding a red rag in front of a bull. I don't just dislike HR. I detest it. With a vengeance. Had I the money, I would have it proscribed and banned. It is the business equivalent of ISIS or Hamas. Terrorism, just without the violence. I appreciate not everyone can get everything right all the time, and while HR people allegedly should have some sort of commitment to their employees, not just kowtowing to cowardly directors, it's not exactly life-threatening (although certainly nearly always job-threatening) should they mess things up, which they always seem to do with absolutely no effort. Now, the unfortunate thing is, I am not wrong. And I find this disturbing. And it's all based on my own experience of HR. I had a particular experience that I would rather forget. I can't go into detail, because it was so illegal, hurtful and downright dishonest that just...