Had a busy day today. Woke up nice and early and after doing my morning routine and taking Bella for a walk, I locked myself in my office to get stuff done. I finished my year-end expenses and even brought myself right up to date and did June too. I am determined to start doing each month at the start of the following month. No more leaving it all until the week before they have to be submitted and getting all stressed. My new Three broadband router came around lunchtime, just before I needed to leave the house to go to an appointment at a local florist at 1pm.
Got home and set up the new broadband router from Three. It means I don't need a landline once it is all up and running as it uses 4G and has a mobile sim card in it. That said when I set it up it wasn't working properly and had a rubbish download speed. When I called three support, the call centre was somewhere overseas, which always frustrates me more than speaking to a machine. The help for any company should be routed to a call centre in the country you are calling from so for example the UK you are speaking to someone whose first language is English. These businesses are outsourcing their support overseas to save money which just leads to frustrations from the customer and some more support person is getting grief through no fault of their own. When you have to spell Neil and Greenwood 3 times on a call with 2 different people, it already puts you in a bad mood. I wouldn't expect to be able to operate a helpdesk for Spanish-speaking customers, despite my basic grasp of the language, so why do they expect people to do it for the UK. Call centres are becoming the clothing sweatshops of the 21st century.
Switched my Gas and Electric Supplier to a company called Octopus Energy, who are recommended by Which magazine. It was really straight forward and my combined direct debit for both fuels went from £247 a month to just £118 a month!!! BIG Difference. So if you are reading this and want to see if you can save any money just click the image or THIS LINK. It's really quick to do and they even sort out cancelling your existing supplier and switching you over. I actually got an email within the house from my current supplier saying they were 'sorry to see me go'. Well maybe keep your prices low then! Oh and also if you switch on THIS LINK we BOTH get a £50 credit on our energy bills. Winner Winner Chicken dinner (cooked with much cheap gas or electric lol). During this cost of living crisis, we need to do all we can to help each other cut bills. You're welcome!
4pm I had a coffee taste testing (one of two) and have the 2nd part tomorrow, so I will have £30 for my holiday fund. Then at 6pm I had to head into Manchester for a 3hour (yes you saw that right 3 HOUR) focus group about shortbread. From the general gist of it I think patersons are looking to bring shortbread up to date and appeal to a younger audience. Looking at a lot of their packaging it's long overdue. They are obviously very proud to be a Scottish business and that shows, as their boxes usually include tartan, thistles, scottie dogs, views of Scotland etc. I think apart from having Jimmy Cranky playing a set of bagpipes, wearing a kilt on the box, they couldn't be more Scottish. It all feels very traditional and aimed at my grandparents who have probably eaten shortbread for eternity. BUT when that generation is no longer around, if they want to still be relevant they need a new audience.
Got home just before 10pm and went straight to bed as up early tomorrow for Cumbria.