ReedsCo – New Updates

Reed Tan has recently updated his Maximum Visibility (MV) watch to a Maximum Visibility II (MV II) with a new movement; different face and hand options.
I think these offer a significant and welcome upgrade to the watch and have recently returned my V1 to be upgraded.
This was originally volunteered by Reed and shows the commitment to his brand and the excellent customer service he offers.

iTunes VAT receipts

If you’re a VAT registered business using the iPad and/or iPhone and are purchasing applications for business use or as part of your application development research, you’ll probably want a VAT receipt from Apple and will have noticed that all the receipts provided clearly state that ‘… this is _not_ a VAT receipt…”

In which case, you may be interested in the following article that describes how Jeremy Richards was able to obtain VAT receipts.

[Update 09/09/2010 – 10:00]

Received 2 VAT invoices this morning – out of a backlog of 8, along with an email stating:

Greetings from iTunes Store Customer Support. I understand that you wish to have a VAT invoices for your purchases. I can certainly see your concern. My name is Srinivas and I will do my best to provide you an appropriate information.

I would like to inform you that, the iTunes Store sells only to customers as end-users for personal, noncommercial use in their respective countries of residence. For more information, you can review the iTunes Store Terms and Conditions:

http://www.apple.com/legal/itunes/ww

Thank you for being an iTunes Store customer. Apple appreciates your business and understanding in this regard.

Regards,

Srinivas

iTunes Store Customer Support

I have replied using Jeremy’s erudite response template …

Dear Srinivas

Many thanks for your reply. Whilst I understand that your terms state that the applications are for personal use I would like to draw your attention to the Apple website that refers to business applications on many occasions. Just look at all these applications on offer. This part is on the iPhone tab 'With iPhone, you get secure corporate network connectivity, access to thousands of business apps, and tool for developing your own company apps.' Are you really telling me that you are selling people apps that they are not allowed to use?

It is irrelevant whether I wish to use my purchase for personal of business benefit. I am a VAT registered individual and I am requesting a VAT invoice. By UK law you have to supply me with one. Please see the [tax office website] for confirmation.

I note that you have already sent me VAT invoices for transaction IDs:

<Invoices Received>

I am currently missing VAT invoices for:

<Invoices Missing>

I look forward to receiving them, etc…

There’s also a similar experience posted here.

[Update 09/09/2010 – 16:00]

All missing VAT receipts received…

Fibre to the Cabinet

Given that the speed on my broadband connection has reduced from 2.1MB/s to 841KB/s over the past 12 months for no obvious reasons – the service provider always claims the line length as the issue, I’m really looking forward to BT’s roll-out of Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC).

If you’re interested in finding out when you’re schedule to go live, then there’s a list here  - I should be patched in by 31st December 2010. Fingers crossed that BT are ahead, rather than behind schedule!

Pixmania – Buyers beware!

Be very careful when buying from Pixmania. For sure, their prices are very competitive, but the goods are shipped from France… and sometimes they’re selling the French version. It is normally noted on the page for the item:

This means that:

• They’ll send you an adapter plug (European to UK) that you have to fit yourself – a minor effort

What they don’t tell you is that:

• The goods will have French manuals included. You may get lucky and have the English manuals included as well, but a lot of manufacturers are only shipping the manual for the locale to save weight and costs.
• The number given on the order confirmation email is ‘no longer in service’

  

The correct number is 0844 369 0372 and it is possible to contact customer service via email as well – first you’ll have to log in with the email address and password you created when you purchased the item.

Calling the Customer Service number is fun too, the system doesn’t respond when you enter the order number and keeps asking for it to be repeated. Eventually, you’ll get to a message that says “All our operators are busy, please call back later” and you’ll get cut off.

I’ll let you know how I get on with sourcing a UK manual…

<Update> In the end I gave up with Pixmania and downloaded the PDF from the manufacturer’s web site.

User Interfaces

I use DxO Optics Pro for processing my camera images as the second step in my digital workflow after importing the files in to Lightroom.

I was originally introduced to it by Ken Rockwell and it does a great job of correcting the lens errors and gives excellent results, but it doesn’t currently include one of my lenses – a Nikon 35mm  f/2, so I used the DxO site to register my interest for a module for the 35mm.

It is very easy to do with an online form to be completed.

The bit that foxed me was the spam check at the bottom of the form.

The attempt show above was the fourth or fifth one I’d tried… It seems that you need to type all the characters in upper-case. Obvious!

ReedsCo – An update

I’ve posted an update to my experience with ReedsCo here. I’ve quoted my comments in addition below:

The watch has been back to Reed and returned. Apart from a very minor glitch that happens when setting the time, where the hands move as you screw the crown down (this only happens very occasionally), the watch has been running reliably and keeping perfect time.

Overall, great service from Reed and (in the end) a very good, working watch that gets plenty of positive comments.

Honda Lawnmowers…

Mainly due to my own laziness and not finding enough time to take it somewhere to be serviced, but my usually reliable Honda lawnmower had developed a habit of cutting out periodically. 30 seconds to 1 minute seemed to be the period that it had settled on, but always happy to restart after a tug on the starter cord.

The lawn here is very small and the balance between the inconvenience of the mower cutting out, getting the lawn cut and the time out to (a) find somewhere to get it serviced and (b) to then deliver and collect the mower were all in reasonable balance.

Having looked after and fiddled with cars since I was 17, (I like to think) I’m quite adept at figuring out the problem and fixing it myself.

This issue, however, had me stumped.

From time to time, I would strip down the carburettor and fuel system; clean out the fuel tank; adjust the throttle cables; clean the plug and fiddle with the wires.

Everything seemed clean and tidy and in good working order.

But, the problem persisted.

Last weekend was the first cut of Spring and the mower seemed to have settled on every 10 to 15 seconds as a reasonable running period, which was little too far out of balance even for me.

Google to the rescue.

I searched for ‘Honda HRB runs then stops’ and the first link had the answer – JustAnswer. Right near the bottom of the thread, the comment;

I decided that the fault must be electrical so I started by changing the Spark plug and that has cured the problem.

A second check on an alternative Google hit on DoItYourself confirmed the solution. Well enough for a trip out to Halfords.

Mower ran perfectly once I’d changed the plug.