Three months ago someone obtained access to the contacts in my Yahoo account. The messages that were sent in my name were so badly written that my friends realised immediately that they were hoaxes. I changed my password. A few weeks later the account was dead and Yahoo have done nothing to help me despite four messages left on their website, three of which were acknowledged. I have lost one thousand five hundred contacts and have not seen emails sent to that account since then.
Another consequence – our email addresses are used for security checking and so I have not been able to notify some organisations that I have a new email address. Today I spent twenty minutes trying to inform an on-line insurer about the change. Their web site would not allow me to explain matters in my own words but insisted that I chose form a narrow range of questions. Then I was able to send a few words to an online assistant who referred me back to the question bank. I finally left a message to the effect that, when my policy expires I will take my business elsewhere.
Similar frustration is caused when providers of good or services encourage you to endorse or “like” them and a list of prepared statements is all that is offered. Try telling them that you charge £100 per hour to give an opinion and that the minimum charge is for half an hour.
Oh for a button on computers that extracts a fee from troublesome organisations once you have wasted, say ten minutes because they have assured you that it’s easier online.