Free laptops update

Just phoned Barclaycard to ask why I still haven't received the grant card. They didn't know! :oO

However, on checking their records, it became clear that Home Access still hadn't notified them electronically of my correct postcode and this invalidated the PIN number which had been sent out. Even if I'd received a card it would have been invalid! I was then told to phone Capita to ask Capita to contact Barclaycard. Only problem was that the phone number I was given was actually the phone number I was already connected to.

Eventually I managed to get back to Home Access and got a woman who apologised, saying that none of this should have happened. Basically their computer system should automatically have sent out an electronic update to Barclaycard but, inexplicably, had failed to do so. She had to get her supervisor to fill in an escalation form to get Barclaycard notified and to get my grant revalidated as legitimate.

I now have to phone Barclaycard in a few days to check that the electronic notification has worked and that the new PIN and card is on its way.

I then have until 16th June to use it or lose it! I applied way back in February!!

Well, what a learning curve, eh? The added complication is that I am completely deaf in one ear and have limited hearing in the other. This has made extended telephone communication extremely taxing and has proved to me that there is NO WAY that would I be able to hold down an office job...so I'm now going to stop applying for them!

Unbelievably it has got even more cocked up!! This morning I received yet another wrongly-postcoded pin number from Barclaycard. A phone enquiry produced the answer that Home Access had sent them an email blocking and requesting the reissue of the card but, unfortunately, it had failed to notify them of the correct postcode.

Going round and round in circles and am extremely p*ssed off!!

I am not even going to bother phoning Home Access at this moment. Apparently my grant card should reach me by Monday (unless the Post Office send it all round the country as they did last time), and Barclaycard have suggested I simply give the wrong details when I attempt to collect the laptop. I run the risk of being humiliated in the shop and being barred from getting the bl**dy laptop  but...dammit!!!

Laptop isn't quite working as expected because the Home Access equipment comes heavily laden with blocking and control tools which are switched on by default. Lots of howls of frustration from son, and myself as we weren't provided with passwords to access certain control panels. I've had to phone their technical advice lines to get one password only to find I need a different password to get into another part of the system and then have to phone another phone number. It is making things unusually difficult and expensive, even for me (and I'm the person my friends come to to get help!!) - lord only knows how a computer novice is expected to cope!

Still, it is a nice laptop and, once I've got all the spyware removed, it should work properly :o)

Alison, check that the scheme is still running in your area. When I picked up the laptop from Comet, the man said the scheme is to be discontinued here. I don't know whether he meant that Comet was withdrawing as a supplier or whether the Home Access Scheme itself had been pulled by the new Government. He said it had been very successful and that his branch  had been supplying on average 10 Home Access equipment packages a day, during the week I collected mine!