All articles by Jac Roper – Page 33
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: NPower has responded to a retailer’s recent complaint over promised prices.
Last issue I reported on Tushar Patel’s complaint about the power supplier’s verbal promise to reduce his electricity bill and his shock at discovering that the opposite had happened. NPower needed more time to consider its reply and thus I bring it to you now.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Has anyone put staff through an accredited licensing course lately?
Some may remember that a few issues back (C-Store June 3) I wrote about Stephen and Lesley Devereux’ frustration with putting their daughter Simone through a £150 licensing course to go with her application for a new personal licence only to discover that the certificate was no longer recognised. The ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Is this a misuse of power?
Not for the first time, I have had complaints about the well-known electricity supplier NPower. Tushar Patel’s complaint dates back to the beginning of March. He runs Heathfield General Stores at Pound Hill in Crawley, West Sussex and he says: “A rep approached with a view to reducing my shop’s ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: How do you tell the chavs from the chaps?
I suppose if you look at the statistics then the majority of your customers are reasonably law abiding, don’t pinch from you or abuse your staff. But, yes, it’s time for another warning.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Can anyone recommend a good epos system at a budget price?
Amit Patel is looking for advice from fellow retailers. Actually, he asked me if I could recommend a good epos supplier, but I’m afraid this immediately turns me into a jobsworth. If it goes wrong – and it’s computers, so yes, it will go wrong at some point – then ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: What will happen to cigarette margins when all the bans are in force?
The opinion-formers on radio and TV seem to think people will be breaking their habit of a lifetime left, right and centre. I wonder how falling demand will affect prices and margins?
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Get a P45 or a P46 for every employee. No exceptions – not even for kids.
I’ve had worried feedback from several retailers following my piece in the last issue about ex-retailer John Raisen who warned that the Inland Revenue had wanted £89,000 (eventually reduced to £10,000) off him for possible taxes on previous employees he had on his books but had not registered via the ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: 0845 numbers are indeed very ‘national’ – they’re everywhere.
Twice already in this column I’ve mentioned 0845 national call rate numbers being used by big outfits. My latest complainant is Rakesh Sood, who runs Handersons at Waltham Abbey in Hertfordshire.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: This I can grant you – free money is hard to come by.
Bob Smith says he was complying with a new EC law that said you need a lighted sign on your smoke detector to show customers the way to the door (despite it only being a couple of yards away), when the electrician pointed out some dodgy wiring. It will cost ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: It’s criminal. You try your best and you wind up in court.
Byron Jackson first emailed me in February. He and his wife Nadette, who run a Spar store in South Wales, were about to be prosecuted and were totally shell-shocked.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Anybody need help from an old hand?
Jim Roberts is a rare thing. He’s an ex-retailer turned consultant who once specialised in buying run-down shops, pulling them up by their bootstraps and selling them on at a profit. And, as he was independent himself for many years, he knows what the constraints on business are, which means he’s very affordable.
I recently referred a lady to him who had been on the phone in tears, her business rolling downhill before her eyes. He helped and she is happier. -
Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Getting to grips with new licensing laws can make you certifiable.
Even when the Devereux family tried to do everything in plenty of time to comply and cope with the new regime, it all went pear-shaped. Stephen, Lesley and their daughter Simone run the delightful sounding Cocktails/Chocolate Box at Littleborough in Lancashire.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Phone companies ideally placed to dodge calls.
Two complaints recently made me realise that no one is better placed than phone companies to hide their contact details.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Tote that bale. A newsagent’s life is a tough one.
In the last issue I wondered if any other newsagents had noted extra charges on their invoices for missing tote boxes as Anish Shah, who runs Sonam Enterprise in South-west London, had done. This prompted an email from John Beswick in Old Leake, Lincolnshire who has never had a tote ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Property prices seldom go down – and it’s the same with rent reviews.
The following would seem to indicate that the landlord just thinks of a figure and then doubles it. Narendra Patel, who runs Cosmos Newsagent in the Tottenham area of north London, must get the jitters every time his rent review is due.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: How do you know if you are being ripped off?
In the April 22 issue I reported that the final chapter had been written on bogus ‘drugs awareness’ publisher Anderson Clarke Publications. ACP was folded by the DTI following an investigation which showed the company wasn’t printing all the copies of books for schools for which it was charging sponsors.
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Your ‘best asset’ can sometimes turn out to be the very opposite.
Yes, we’re talking staff here. I regularly get callers with long tales of woe about useless, lying, thieving staff and those who can’t even be a waste of space since they are too busy malingering to show up at all. A recent caller, who preferred to stick to the pseudonym ...
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Dear Jac
Dear Jac: Has any other newsagent suffered from the mysterious disappearance of tote boxes?
If so, Anish Shah would like to know. For the first time in the six years that he has run Sonam Enterprise in Richmond, southwest London, five of the tote boxes his newspapers come and go in have disappeared.