Vincent MacDonald | Reputation Guardian

Dixons Phone Support Ripoff

mac — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 12:14:28 +0000

Unforeseen Costs of Buying from Dixons Online.

The Background Story

I was last month looking to buy a new external hard drive for my computer and after a little research decided to try a new(for me) online retailer – Dixons. The order and checkout process were easy and the price (£110.98) that included faster delivery was certainly one of the best prices to UK shoppers.

I was able to choose the delivery day, sadly one is not given the choice of afternoon or morning delivery and although this meant sacrificing a complete day I stayed at home all day eagerly awaiting my new purchase. However at 9.00 pm that evening I began to suspect that the delivery would not take place. I therefore checked the delivery ETA online and to my surprise saw that my item showed as having already been delivered – even if I knew nothing about such an occurrence.

The next day I phoned the Dixons customer support, to enquire where my hard drive was. Here is what the Dixons website shows:

To call the Dixons customer service or aftersales agents, dial the 0844 561 1111

Given that the only available telephone number was a dreaded “0844″ (always expensive for mobile phone users) support number but in view of the urgency and cost I continued.

A polite gentleman took my details and after verifying my identity confirmed that the items were listed as having been delivered and said he would make enquiries and get back to me. On asking him why such merchandise did not require a customer signature he told me that a signature was indeed required. This hardly made me very confident as I certainly had not signed for anything the previous day.

Shortly thereafter I did get a call and told that it had not been possible to contact the delivery driver but in case the item had been lost/misplaced I should complete a report listing the items and particulars of my delivery address as well as any statement I might wish. This procedure would apparently “help” to get my goods quicker. I said that I would call back later as I needed to get all the relevant receipts and documentation (I was not at home at the time).

I did call back and gave the information requested, which only took 13 minutes.

When I arrived home that evening I was amazed to see a package addressed to me hidden behind a pile of bricks in my front garden. On opening the package I was happy to find my hard drive and upon testing it I was delighted to see that despite the rainfall the hard drive did work perfectly. I immediately called Dixons to inform them that I had found this package and thank them for delivering it despite the signature requirement not being fulfilled.

The True Cost for Customer Support

On getting my phone bill I was horrified to see that due to my need to call Dixons, for a failure to deliver my purchase I would now have to pay £8.18 to my mobile phone service provider. In effect the cost of this purchase had just risen by 9%.

On the face of it this might seem small change to many, however it got me wondering just how many people faced similar costs for getting “support” from Dixons.

Dixons Charging for Support Culture

Additionally I know that many company’s and indeed even the UK government use these types of high cost phone numbers for support purposes, however on looking at the Dixons Website support page I discovered that this was not the only such number in use by this company, in fact there were another 10 such numbers for customer service related issues. But to me the real kicker was the following message displayed on that Dixons website page:

If you have a complaint about Dixons service and wants support from Dixons, the aftersales line is available at0844 41 42 406.

So even if you want to complain, as I might have done, you will possibly be charged even more money to do so, even if the fault you are complaining about is not your own but stems from poor service by this company.

Dixons Future Online Practices?

There are a couple of questions that this case raises in my opinion, especially if one considers this practice with regards to the number of possible customer support issues handled by the Dixons phone support.

Firstly, it’s far more expensive to obtain a new customer – than to keep an existing one. That’s because wooing new customers often entails a higher level of costly marketing and advertising efforts and sales promotions to create awareness of, and desire for, a product or service.

Secondly, existing customers who are satisfied with a company’s product or service are likely to become repeat customers, and are apt to recommend the business to friends and colleagues. In our global, extremely competitive business environment, holding onto customers has never been more critical.

Unfortunately, not all businesses see things this way. Some see sales targets and quick profits more important than providing an honest service.

Personally I would think that it might be worth considering a change to this form of customer support and for Dixons to give free customer support to all customers, after all it is a cost of doing business and I am sure it is therefore also a bona rude tax deductible expense. After all how long can any company keep a system in place that can easily be responsible for losing many hard-won new customers.

How Internal Company Reputation Can Affect Your ORM

Warner Carter — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 23:00:44 +0000

Online Reputation Management (ORM)

I asked fellow blogger and SEO/Online Reputation Management specialist Warner Carter if he would do a guest post (or two) on my blog. I was delighted when I read his posts. This one perfectly illustrates the possible problems for businesses, as well as giving useful tips on maintaining a good reputation online. You can find out more about Warner in the bio at the end of this post.

How Internal Company Reputation Can Affect Your ORM

I just read an article about a company whose reputation was ruined just because of a careless, reckless employee. It was alarming because no one thought that a simple ‘mistweet’ and a ‘misunderstood’ profile photo could break hundreds of professional relationships. What hurt the company most were things broadcast without the management’s knowledge. Every detail was bent and twisted, and the very first one to pick these tasty bits of information up was their direct competitors. Malicious advertising jingles and print ads surfaced; all these were undoubtedly created to destroy the company’s name.

Monitoring your employees’ behavior will help protect not only yourself but the company as well. It may sound a bit like a baby-sitting task, but you don’t have to literally keep a close watch on them just to restrain their behavior when outside the company’s premises. Many employees believe that their non work-related lives are outside the company’s authority. There are even reported cases of employees suing their employers for encroaching on their private lives, for giving sanctions for events that happened outside company premises.

The social network effect The popularity of social networking sites and personal blogging opened convenient ways for ordinary people to express what they feel. For simple employees, blogs and social networking sites are perfect extensions of their emotions, of the emotions they can’t express directly to their bosses and co-workers. We all know that these sites offer advantages and disadvantages, too. These sites are great tools for marketing and communication. Majority of companies today also use these sites to communicate with their employees even during weekends and non-working hours. One drawback about using these sites, however, is that these sites are faster ways of spreading gossip in and out of the company. This disadvantage leads to a lot of problems that have been affecting many employers and employees today.

What you can do to change your company’s reputation: Do not prohibit your employees from using social networking sites. Social networking sites are great tools for expanding a service and delivering messages quickly. Let them post messages or updates about what they want. Let them blog. Democracy has no limitation. Allow your employees to blog and say anything about your company. If you treat them well, they’ll write good things about your company, too. Do not go overboard. Let them do what they want to do outside the office. The executives of some companies act like school principals and even track their employees’ lives outside work premises. This causes your employees to lose trust in you, and can even make you liable for lawsuits. Obey the law, compensate your employees properly. There is no room for anger in a satisfied employee’s heart. A satisfied employee will always be a grateful employee. These are the loyal employees who devote not only their talent but also their lives to the company. Be a walking testimony. You can’t control all your employees. They have free will, too. You cannot please everybody, so be open to the possibility of at least one person being dissatisfied with your service. Just in case these matters end up in the courtroom, let your own history save you. Your loyal employees will surely attest to your good work. Employees have the power to put you down, but most of them won’t use that power against you, if you have not committed any wrong.

Social networking sites can empower employees to ruin your company’s reputation, but these sites can help you maintain good professional relationships as well. One wrong tweet and you’re gone, but one good tweet can put things right. To summarize, the reputation of your own company is in your hands. It is not about catering to all the demands of your employees; it is about relating to them and understanding their needs. Treat your employees kindly because your company will not succeed without them. We were all employees once, so we should know how it feels to be in their shoes.

Author Profile Warner is interested in everything online that fuels discovery. I find SEO a facinating puzzle so of course work for an SEO Reseller, Endless Rise

For more posts on Online Reputation Management (ORM) come back and visit us again or just click our RSS feed button above.

Intuit Free Software Not So Free to Apple Mac Users.

mac — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 16:37:45 +0000

Intuit Free Software at What Cost?

I have used Quickbooks by Intuit for many years and when I started I was always amazed that this software was not available to Apple Mac users. Well that is no longer the case as there is now a version of Quickbooks for the Apple operating system.

Intuit do however also offer a Free download aimed primarily at freelancers and people just setting up a small business. This is a great idea as it gives anyone starting a business the ability to test drive the software at a time when their outgoings are quite possibly high, for Free. I am sure if any business is successful it will eventually need to upgrade from the free software to the Pro version, thereby assuring Intuit of future customers.

Intuit Free Software

I was intrigued by this new software and as an Apple Mac owner I registered for a copy of this Free software. Upon receipt of an email from Intuit with the download link I noticed it was a Microsoft Windows file.

I returned to the Intuit website and started a “Chat” session with a sales representative, asking if there was an Apple Mac version of the Free software. His reply was that although there was no Apple Mac version available (in UK where I live) I could always use this in conjunction with a windows emulator like Parallels.

Currently in the UK Parallels costs £64.00 ($100.00), Windows 7 is listed at £149.00 ($230.00)**, so when adding the cost of this option -$249.00 and then looking at the £249.00 price tag for Quickbooks pro that Mac users are in a NO Win situation here. The Free software will cost them the same as Intuit’s Quickbooks Pro software.

Maybe Intuit could at least suggest to their sales representatives that they should not rub salt into Apple Mac users wounds.

** Prices quoted courtesy of Maplins, a UK computer and electronics retailer.

www.sourceinterlink.com | Reputational Woes

mac — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 14:47:54 +0000

www.sourceinterlink.com | Reputational Woes

I was looking at a job posting for a Social media Manager at Source Interlink. My interest and experience with cars and motor-cycles (together with my social media background) seemed to be a good match for many of Source Interlinks areas of expertise and the job requirements.

However my Reputation Management training (as well as a bit of curiosity) prompted me to research the company a little more. So my first stop was Google. I did a search for “www.sourceinterlink.com” – Ok I’m a little lazy and so I copied the url from the advertisement.

The first page results were mostly the usual company pages( about, jobs etc) however the 7^th result was “ Www.sourceinterlink.com’s Blog | Www.sourceinterlink.com …” – Well this was what I was looking for asit would give me an idea of their use of blogging and social media as well as, hopefully, links to their social media profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. So I immediately clicked on this hyperlinked title.

Imagine my surprise when instead of seeing the Source Interlink blog I got instead a warning message on my computer – See below.

As you can imagine I was totally dumbfounded and a little annoyed that such a reputable company would use such tactics in their social media campaign. This is exactly the opposite of social media campaigns by the majority of companies who instead encourage an open, transparent and honest interchange with their customers. Certainly no reputable company would stoop so low as to do even 1 of the actions mentioned in this warning.

I therefore did not proceed to this “Blog” and instead clicked the “Get me out of here” button. As I believe most sane people would. I was however left with a sense of betrayal by this company that I had until then assumed to be totally above board and indeed a leader in the industry. Certainly I would not trust anything more associated with this company or it’s affiliates.

For most people that one warning would have been enough to dissuade them from further use www.sourceinterlink.com or it’s associated company www.simautomotive.com -

However there is one interesting thing that I noticed when I returned to the Google search results page. That is that the URL for this site is in fact not the company URL but the address of a URL shortening service, which of course then redirects visitors to another page. This means that this listing might be (and quite possibly is) the site of someone completely unrelated to Source Interlink. Off course without visiting the site it is impossible to ascertain the truth of this assumption also.

This means that either:

o Source Interlink is indeed using underhanded methods of collecting information from a blog, thereby also possibly damaging visitor’s computers.

o Another person/company is using this tactic to damage the reputation of Source Interlink and it’s associated companies.

Either way the result remains the same and the loser is www.sourceinterlink.com witha big dent in their Brand’s reputation, growing bigger each day this practice is allowed to contuinue.

I personally found it hard to believe that this practice was sanctioned by such a well-known company as source interlink and so instead of writing a cover letter and applying for the position, I sent them a report on what I had found.

For all of you, my readers here (below) is a screenshot of the search results and the BLOG page you would be redirected to, so if you have already been there you may decide if it is indeed a company blog or an imposter.

If youhave any more info on www.sourceinterlink.com and their blog please leave a comment here.

Tools For Measuring Online Reputation Management

mac — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 02:50:53 +0000

Often overlooked Online Reputation Management should in my opinion be one of the primary goals of any social media strategy. Only by monitoring what is being said about us can we get feedback to better gauge how we are really doing and react accordingly. I found this great article on Online Reputation Monitoring and thought you might enjoy it also.

Professional Tools For Measuring Online Reputation Management in Social Media

By Julie Ann Ross

Online reputation management enables marketers to measure brand recognition, associated value, and generally how well a company is positioned within the online marketplace. What people are saying, and who they are telling, are important things to know. Marketers need to know how consumers are speaking about a brand, whether they like the brand, are disenchanted with your service, praise you or condemn you.

As user generated content (UGC) becomes a more popular way for consumers to learn about products and services, marketers are realizing that it is less their own efforts, and more their fans’ and detractors’, that determine their online success. They need online reputation management tools to see where they are succeeding or failing.

In the past, we have talked about some of the different tools to measure online reputation management, but these are professional level tools that many social media and marketing agencies use in their social media monitoring efforts.

Radian6 is one of the premiere online reputation management tools available, looking at more than 150 million public sources and networks, like blogs, comments, forums, mainstream news, photos, and videos. They also check Facebook and Twitter for mentions of your company’s brand and keywords.

This online brand management tool examines specific social media metrics of the people talking about you, including Twitter count, comment count, media type, and even sentiment of the messages. Radian6 enables you to create your own online reputation management dashboard, to monitor and report on social media conversations about your brand. Radian6 has access to 30 days of past conversations, although you can archive each month’s data once you start tracking your online brand reputation.

Originally called ScoutLabs, Lithium is another major premiere online reputation management tool widely in use. Lithium not only completes searches across millions of sources – blogs, Facebook, YouTube, forums, and Twitter – it eliminates spam and duplicate content, so marketers can avoid content written by robots.

With Lithium, it is possible to determine the sentiment and amount of the customers’ messages, seeing which words are being used the most, which issues could become important in the future, and even where your customers are talking about your brand, allowing you to focus marketing energy and budgets into those channels, including staying up to date on the latest slang, making sure they do not mistake one phrase or sentiment for another.

Starting out originally as an on-demand online reputation management software for public relations, Vocus has begun moving into the social media circle, pouring a lot of energy and effort into their online monitoring. While it offers many of the same features as the other online reputation management tools, it will also filter out aggregator sites, and works to identify and monitor more than 20 million of the most influential blogs.

It also works to rank top tweeters and bloggers by numbers of followers, blog comments, and activity volume, so you can more readily identify the influencers and focus your marketing attentions on them. It can also identify key influencers within a particular industry or social circle.

Sysomos’ MAP – Media Analysis Platform – is an online reputation management tool that allows users to launch unlimited queries into conversations and social network updates. It helps marketers understand the key influencers in a particular industry or demographic group. Unlike the other online reputation management tools, MAP has a spam-free database of conversations that dates back to 2006. Other tools can only look at the previous week, or in the case of some analytics tools, only as soon as you activate them.

You can also identify key influencers and get access to their demographic data, like age, geography, gender, and profession, as well as determine their authority and the extent of their social media footprint. Finally, MAP lets you determine whether the sentiment of the conversations are positive, negative, or neutral.

With any of these online reputation management tools, any marketer can see what impact their online marketing efforts are having, and what areas need to be refined and what areas should be used in future campaigns.

Rostin Ventures restores reputations online, through Online Reputation Management Services of social media marketing, search engine marketing and reverse SEO techniques. Online brand management begins with Rostin Ventures.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Julie_Ann_Ross
http://EzineArticles.com/?Professional-Tools-For-Measuring-Online-Reputation-Management-in-Social-Media&id=5447484

I thought that Julie Ann Ross’s article was informative and well written and gave some great Online Reputation Management solutions and I hope you enjoyed it.

Best Website Hosting

mac — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 15:51:15 +0000

Website Hosting | Secrets of Cheap Website Hosting

With hundreds of website hosting companies offering all kinds of hosting plans, it has become challenging to find balance between price, features, performance and support. Certainly I have had my own fair share of problems with cheap website hosting companies(see previous posts on this blog). It is therefore a pleasure to recommend a company that not only offers fast and good customer service as well as very cheap hosting plans. I have personally used this company for website hosting on 3 new websites (on different hosting accounts).

That company is JustHost Currently they are doing a great deal formy UK customers at £1.99 per month for shared hosting, with Unlimited Disc Space and Unlimited Transfer/month. As an added bonus if you sign up and pay for 1 year’s hosting (£23.88) JustHost will register and give you a Free Domain(subject to availability).

If you are considering a new website and need website hosting then just click on this image

– Please note that as an affiliate of Just Host I do receive a commission on any sale made if you click on the above links. So if you are looking for hosting and enjoyed my blog, then please click on one of my links. If not then just visit www.justhost.com. Either way the price to you will remain the same (ie no added costs)

Ryanair Wins the Battle but Loses the War

mac — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 14:46:34 +0000

www.ihateryanair.co.uk becomes www.ihateryanair.org

The recent case involving Robert Taylor the owner of I Hate Ryanair website and Ryan Air is of interest to all Online Reputation Management specialists. Especially as we are sometimes called upon to defend a position in Uniform Domain Name Disputes.

Ihateryanair.co.uk was set up in February 2007 by Robert Taylor to share the horror stories of people traveling with this budget airline. Three years later in April 2010 Michael O’Leary CEO of Ryanair complained to the domain name registrar Nominet, stating the blog was “vitriolic and highly disparaging”

Of note should be the fact that neither the domain name nor the content was considered as being a reason for Nominet to close business on www.ihateryanair.co.uk

In a 22 page judgment, Nominet’s legal expert Jane Seager ruled that “criticism websites are essential in a democratic society” – However any commercial gain through the use of the Ryanair name could not be justified.

She went on to say that “If they draw in Internet users by using a domain name containing a company’s brand name, then they must be wholly devoted to honest criticism and open discussion and not potentially tainted by commercial concerns”.

The commercial concern in this case was the sum of £322 (approx. $475) earned by Robert Taylor from sponsored links to travel insurance and currency exchange sites.

Tyler has taken the ruling in his stride and moved the blog to it’s new home at www.ihateryanair.org telling followers “We will continue to provide you with the latest on how this pathetic excuse for an airline will attempt to extract cash from you through sneaky hidden charges, fly you to places that are not where you actually want to go, and leave you stranded when the crap hits the fan”

In this case it certainly seems that the ROI for Ryanair is very much in the minus regions which should give some satisfaction to all the users of Robert Taylor and the ihateryanair.org site users.

Reputation Management Problems for Craigslist.com(London)

mac — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 10:38:27 +0000

Reputation Management Problem | Example Craigslist.co.uk

Recently I was looking for rental accommodation in London, UK. Having lived in USA I immediately looked on Craigslist in London. I was happy to see that despite being fairly new in UK there were a number of listings each day in the “Rooms/Shared” section.

However it was only when I looked at all these listings that I got the true picture. For the purposes of this article I will take 1 day’s listings (September 15^th 2010) as an example.

On that day 25 listings for shared/rooms were to be seen. Out of that number 15 listings (60%) were for properties that could only be seen on a site (www.interlet.com) after paying for membership to their site, with the basic plan costing £89.99 (approx. US $140). This company added a minimal description (on Craigslist) with a standard last sentence (including link) saying that for more information the viewer should visit their site.

In my opinion these ads are not complying with the terms and conditions of Craigslist which state (under “Conduct” section) –

You agree not to post, email, or otherwise make available Content that constitutes or contains :
•   ”affiliate marketing,” “link referral code,” “junk mail,” “spam,” “chain letters,” “pyramid schemes,” or unsolicited commercial advertisement;
•   “that constitutes or contains any form of advertising or solicitation”
•   post the same item or service in more than one classified category or forum, or in more than one metropolitan area;

I do not know if any of the properties listed by this advertiser actually even exist or if as I suspect they are just teaser descriptions that promise greater things upon paying for a membership.

Well for any company (or for that matter state) there really is little point in having terms and conditions (Laws) if you are not also willing and able to enforce them.

As far as this practice concerns Online Reputation Management, we should consider the user experience.

•   The frustration of opening, over 60% of the ads, only to find, essentially a dead-end.
•   The realization (later) of the time wasted in opening all these ads.
•   The assumption that maybe Craigslist is allowing this practice for it’s own nebulous reasons.
•   Possibly even a review of whether the viewer’s time might have been better spent on a competitor site like Gumtree.

From a Reputation Management viewpoint this is an easy fix, as it merely requires that the company allocate time and resources to ensuring that their terms and conditions are adhered to. After all the T & C s were written for a reason.

Sadly however on Craigslist the problems do not end there. After searching listings of multiple days I decided to “reply” to 10 such listings. I had chosen these because they offered accommodation in “Premium” Neighbourhoods of Central London at very affordable prices. All listings included utility bills and cable TV and Broadband internet. Some even intimated possibilities of “other benefits” with phrases like “I’m a lovely and friendly lady..i love meeting people”
With my favorite being the line “We are currently both women in their late twenties living in the flat, who are lovely! Which did beg the question “were these women contemplating a sex change soon?”

Unlike my experience in USA where more than 75% of my enquiries were answered within 2 days, here in London only 20% were answered. One of the replies asked me for details so that a “Lawyer” could include these in a Tenancy Agreement/Contract – This before I had even seen the property or met the Flat owner.

I came to the conclusion after comparing the listings I had chosen to reply to with similar listings on other sites, that Craigslist was also unable to stop what I came to assume, were for the most part scams, from being published on their site. This is of course a different and harder problem to solve. However it does affect a user’s experience on the site (not least if that user happens to be the victim of a scam as a result) and impact on a Company’s Online Reputation.

For the reasons mentioned above my overall impression of the time I spent on Craigslist (4 hours) was that it was completely wasted as far as the property searches go and I would therefore not be returning.
OK maybe it was not a “complete” waste of time, after all it did get me to write this post which I hope will give a good example to all interested in Reputation Management of a well known company’s reputational problems.

Lastly there was the listing for Free room for fit, active lads aged 18-24yo
With phrases like “So, if you are a fit, masculine lad who’s sexually top,” this was at least an interesting slant on how to find a “boyfriend “ by an enterprising gay man. All this without seemingly breaching any terms and conditions even if many might consider this listing to be in the wrong category. As far as Reputation management is concerned this was but a minor hiccup.

What To Do With an HM Revenue and Customs Letter

mac — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 12:12:12 +0000

Stay Calm and don’t pay before checking all the figures

The HMRC has started sending letters advising people (1.4 million) that they did not pay the correct amount of tax during the period 2008 – 2010 to UK residents. People with complex income streams seem to be those most likely to be affected. These forms represent an informal tax calculation and are not tax demands.

In these recessionary times it was easy for the Government to argue that it needed to reclaim the full amount (with interest) – despite the HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) seemingly being to blame. Although this is disputed with their claim “that the cause was neither an IT problem nor human error” Ok it was possibly the Martians then.

It seems that anyone who has underpaid by less than £300 will not be pursued, whilst those with less than £2000 (average £1400) underpaid, will make additional payments through the PAYE (Pay As You Earn) system. David Gauke (Exchequer Secretary) has said that in cases of genuine hardship, HMRC will allow for payments to made over a period of time. If however the amount underpaid exceeds £2000, then HMRC will “be in contact” to discuss payment options.

All should be aware that anyone in receipt of such a payment demand letter, who does not make immediate payment, will be charged 3% interest. This although seemingly unfair is a legal requirement.

What You Should Do.

First you should check and see if you can understand why you underpaid. George Bull, head of tax at Baker Tilly, said “Those in the 1.4 million who are about to receive tax demands will wonder what else they could have done. Most will have reasonably assumed that, because all their income was received after deductions of income tax and NIC via the PAYE system, HMRC already had all the information necessary to get their tax right”

The Low Incomes Tax Reform Group (LITRG) is publishing a guide highlighting the main points to note and watch out for. Thay advise that you should not accept any figure on the calculation without checking that it matches your own estimates.

Second, if the underpayment has arisen despite HMRC being in full possession of all the information it needed to calculate your tax correctly, then you can challenge HRMC under extra statutory concession A19 for the amount owed for tax years ending more than a year ago. In exceptional circumstances – where HMRC failed to make proper use of the facts it had been given or if it allowed arrears to build up over two whole successive years – HMRC said it might also write off the underpayment for 2009 – 2010. LITRG will be publishing their guide on Tuesday 14^th September. However below is their sample letter for your use.

Third, if you believe there is a possibility that the error occurred because your employer or pension-payer was not operating PAYE properly, without your knowledge, then you should inform HMRC and ask it to pursue the correct party.

In summation therefore, don’t panic and don’t pay without first checking the figures making sure they are correct. Make sure you try to claim where you can and challenge anything you don’t understand.

For more info – http://www.litrg.org.uk

Sample Letter

Dear Sir or Madam:

[Your own name]

[Your NI number]

[Any other HMRC reference shown on P800]

I have received your tax calculation for the year(s) [quote that which applies to you – 2008/09, 2009/10, or 2008/09 and 2009/10].

The calculation suggests that I have underpaid tax for[quote the year or years]. I was unaware that my tax affairs were not in order. I had thought that all the tax that I was due to pay was deducted under PAYE. I believe that the underpayment has arisen because you failed to take action upon relevant information already in your possession for the year(s) in question.

For the tax year 2009/10, I appreciate that you are not notifying me of the arrears more than 12 months after the end of the tax year in which you received the information indicating that more tax was due.

However I feel that the “exceptional circumstances” condition applies because you:

Failed more than once to make proper use of the facts you had been given about my sources of income.
Allowed the arrears to build up over two whole tax years in succession by failing to make proper and timely use of the information that you had been given.

I am therefore requesting that under the provisions of ESC A19 that the whole of the underpayment as shown on P800 should be remitted.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Google Simplifies Reputation Management for Local Businesses

mac — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 16:02:38 +0000

Online Reputation Management Simplified for Local Businesses by Google

Apart from the tools Google offers to monitor your Online Reputation, they have now taken another leap forward. It is now possible for business owners to reply to any reviews posted on their Place Pages in Google Maps.

I would urge all local business owners (who own websites) to check out this great article by Chris Crum at WebProNews regarding these changes as they impact your online reputation management. The article is short and to the point and will be a huge benefit to your reputation management strategies.

Oh yes in case you are wondering Chris Crum has been a part of the WebProNews team and the iEntry Network of B2B Publications since 2003.

A must for all involved in Online Reputation Managent of local businesses.

Vincent MacDonald | Reputation Guardian

Dixons Phone Support Ripoff

Unforeseen Costs of Buying from Dixons Online.

The Background Story

The True Cost for Customer Support

Dixons Charging for Support Culture

Dixons Future Online Practices?

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How Internal Company Reputation Can Affect Your ORM

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How Internal Company Reputation Can Affect Your ORM

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Ryanair Wins the Battle but Loses the War

www.ihateryanair.co.uk becomes www.ihateryanair.org

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Reputation Management Problem | Example Craigslist.co.uk

As far as this practice concerns Online Reputation Management, we should consider the user experience.

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What To Do With an HM Revenue and Customs Letter

Stay Calm and don’t pay before checking all the figures

What You Should Do.

Sample Letter

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