Last updated 19:38, Thursday, 12 June 2008

THIS week I have been moving house.

We have not moved for almost 30 years, and I can tell you now that I will never, ever suggest that we move again.

It is not the sorting, packing, unpacking and re-sorting all those years of accumulated possessions that has wearied me; nor the fact that I am stiff and black and blue from lifting and carrying boxes, going up and down ladders and tripping over homeless rugs and crates of books.

What has got me down is the endless phone calls that have had to be made to change details with banks/utility companies/insurance people.

It used to be simple. We rang up the gas board or whatever, gave them our details, and that was that.

Not now. Phoning them all takes longer than it did to negotiate the move.

First you have to find the numbers. Then you ring them.

Does a real person answer? You know the answer to that one.

First you get a reassuring voice thanking you for calling. Then it tells you to ‘listen to the following range of options.’

By the time the voice has told you to press ‘one’ if you want to speak about a direct debit, press ‘two’ to arrange a visit from an engineer and all the way through to press ‘eight’ to order food to sustain you while you wait, you have forgotten which you wanted and have to press ‘nine’ to hear the options again.

After 10 minutes listening to a tinkly version of Greensleeves and several more messages from the soothing voice telling you that your call is important, and that an operator will be with you shortly, you may eventually get put through to Indira in India, Karen in Cardiff or Angus in Aberdeen.

They will detain you for ages reading out terms and conditions or, in the case of Indira, she will tell you that she cannot deal with your account over the phone and that you will have to go to your branch and fill in a form.

But I did have success with an operator who recognised my accent, turned out to be from Whitehaven and got me sorted in minutes.

There’s Cumbrian efficiency for you.