I'll never forget something an ad man said at a dinner party a few years back ... his biggest fear, he said, was being surrounded by mediocrity. I thought of him today and wondered if he has ever had an argument with one of the Vodacare assistants about the seven days from box guarantee. My biggest fear right now is having a stress induced heart attack in a Vodacare outlet because, considering the "more than my job's worth" attitudes, I will surely die. I know I shouldn't be at death's door because of a cell phone ... and, after all, I never had any stress at all re cell phones while using my old one. So what's changed? I got a new Nokia N82 with my contract renewal, that's what! Being blonde, it took me two weeks to figure out just how to take it out of the box! Then a week to manually transfer 500 of my numbers which weren't on the sim card (I didn't know they could do that in five minutes with a machine). Finally, I was ready to use the phone - one month had gone by - within three days, I realised the phone was faulty. So I had the seven day guarantee argument, which is pure bullshit if you ask me. I am sure I could go to small claims court and the judge would agree with me that such an expensive product has a longer guarantee under consumer rights law .. but whatever .. the argument helped as they replaced the phone three days later. The new phone worked for exactly one day - on the second day, it would not even turn on. I took two hours out of my day today, to get to Sandton by the 7th day, despite my meltdown with too much work on my desk. The seven day guarantee apparently doesn't work on a replacement phone so now I am really screwed. After my tantrum the chap helping me said he would go for a replacement phone and I said I don't want a Nokia N82 anymore and asked him, seriaaaaasly, if you would want a product after two duds! I now want a Sony Erikson or my money back (I had to pay extra for the phone) but we have long dialogue ahead of us ... if I live through it!
And on the seventh day they shall have rest .... eish