The bank has reclaimed bonuses paid to executive because of the problems caused by the mis-selling of PPI (Payment Protection Insurance) to many of customers.

The payback sum is estimated to be £2 million in total from ten executives, with former chief executive Eric Daniels expected to lose between 40 and 50 percent of a £1.45 million bonus.

This is a baby step in the grand scheme of things but an important one, and one which will give the bank a lot of respect from its customers and the public in general.

Other banks who sold PPI will now be under scrutiny. The public will be watching to see if they follow the example of Lloyds Bank and recover bonuses from their undeserving executives.

PPI policies to cover loan repayments in the event of illness or unemployment were mis-sold in some cases. Some customers were misled and given the impression that the cover was mandatory, while others discovered the policy was essentially worthless due to exclusions in the terms and conditions.

Grammy Winners 2012

The songstress was fashionably attired in a full skirt with ruffle details for this year’s Grammy’s red carpet. The designer of her outfit was Christian Siriano.

Corinne Bailey Rae, English singer–songwriter, released her first album on 24 February 2006 on EMI. It was released in February 2006 in Ireland and the United Kingdom, and in continental Europe on 3 March 2006.
The album debuted at number 1 on both the R&B Albums Chart and UK Albums Chart, selling 739,000 copies in its first year.

It became one of the best-selling albums in the UK, while it also sold 1.9 million copies in the United States, and over 4 million copies worldwide.

Christian Siriano

Christian Siriano is an American fashion designer.

The sad loss of Whitney Houston on Saturday night led to a slightly morose Grammy 2012 Awards ceremony.
But there were still some exciting moments and the musicians and artists celebrated her life in style.

Who got which award!

It’s a massive day for lovers and retailers.
Billions of pounds has been spent on greeting cards, food and drink, chocolate, jewellery and of course flowers.

Wouldn’t it be great, if all the meanness, malice and mischievousness in the world was obliterated, just for one day, by people everywhere expressing their affection for others?

To this end, we urge all greedy bankers, nasty journalists, corrupt police, and racists to have a day off.

Happy Valentines Day!

This post will act as a reminder for all the special occasions throughout the year.
Of course we can’t list your personal days but the ones that are in the public domain will get a mention a week in advance.

Valentines Day

Let’s start with Valentines Day. It’s only a week away. This means you now have no excuse to buy, plan or organise something special for the person(s) you want to shower with love and affection!

Maybe you just want to say, “Thank You!!!”.

Happy Valentines Day

February the 14th is Valentines Day.

When they get there, some actually adapt quickly and soon fit in.

For others, the culture shock is really daunting. There are so many considerations and most of them have nothing to do with football.

For starters, there is the language barrier, the discipline, culture, weather, the press, and strange traditions.

Fortunately the huge sums of money that players earn soon annihilate all the challenges and make them seem palatable.

Club can do more

Some clubs help their players to adjust, and mature but sadly others just assume that they will take things in their stride.

Before clubs pay a fortune for players they check;
heart, lungs, blood, bones, joints etc for defects.

They rarely consider other pertinent factors such as character and morality.
After their acquisition, they also neglect the most important part of their relationship with their employees – training.
Not just footballs skills training but how to exist in the cauldron that is the Premiership.

The football pitch is an arena filled with testosterone, surrounded by baying fans and scrutinised by satellites. The pressure to perform in such a public atmosphere is enormous, even for the most seasoned professional.

It’s not surprising that some players just can’t cope.
The society they came hardly prepared them for life in the Premiership.

Clubs let their players down by not helping them to be respectful, tolerant and egalitarian, despite their upbringing.

Other top football leagues

Premiership   English Football League
Serie A   Italian Football League
Bundesliga   German Football League
Ligue   French Football League
Brasileiro   Brazilian Football League

For example, when Comet sells you an appliance, they give you a delivery date and then ring you up with a better delivery date, if you pay more.

Warranties

Also, they try to sell you extended warranties which can be over £100 pounds when you have just shelled out for an appliance of 300-500 pounds. The worse part is that the warranty does not take effect for 2 years because the appliances are usually guaranteed by the manufacture for this period.
Meanwhile they have your cash in their bank account earning interest for 2 years.

Comet in particular, has badly trained staff and they make no apologies for that.

A woeful tale

During the post Christmas frenzy, I decided to buy a new dishwasher.
I made a beeline for Comet. The manager of the branch told me that the model of appliance I had chosen was unavailable. Reluctantly, I picked another one and he asked one of his salespeople to complete the transaction. I tried to redeem a gift card for £200.
After swiping the card, the salesman told me that the gift card wasuseless. He suggested that I produce the receipt showing when and where the gift card was purchased.
I immediately rushed home and returned with the receipt. Meanwhile, my wife stayed with the salesman and he suggested to her that the person who had bought the gift card had already spent the £200.
On my return to the shop he continued to say that the gift card was worthless and he could not do anything with it.
I left the shop in disgust and waited until the following morning to complain to Comet HQ, Huddersfield. The Comet customer support people told me that the card had not been activated properly in the shop at point of sale . They rang the branch manager and asked him to sort out the card.
The manager rang me and still refused to resolve the problem. He suggested that I contact the people who had issued the card. After several phone calls, I decided to try and resolve the problem at another Comet shop.

At this branch the customer support people were more useful. The customer sales assistant took my card and receipt made several calls. About a dozen calls.
She also suggested that the card and the transaction on my receipt did not match.

Eventually after checking CCTV cameras at the time of the gift card purchase she was able to resolve the problem. She loaded the card with the elusive £200 and gave it to me. She still refused to acknowledge that a Comet staff member had messed up the transaction and not loaded the sum onto the card at point of sale.

I spent 3 hours with her as she stumbled from department to department but she never gave up. After all that she never apologised and refused to admit that they had messed up. However at this branch I was able to order my dishwasher and got the exact model I wanted.

The Comet ethos seems to be ‘we don’t care’. And you can see where their staff gets their bad attitude from.

High Street robbery

Hopefully, SOPA and PIPA will soon be dead in the water soon. However, they could be replaced with something as arcane and unlawful.
Manufacturers have every right to pursue criminals who steal their products, ip and infringe on their copyrights. But they should use existing laws to protect themselves and get redress.

A case in point is Microsoft’s accusation against high-street retailer Comet.
Comet are accused of pirating 94,000 Windows Vista and Windows XP recovery CDs and selling them to consumers.

Microsoft has filed a suit against Comet Group PLC, for manufacturing counterfeit discs at a factory in Hampshire and selling them through its UK retail outlets.

This smacks of a small business selling their customers stolen property at a car boot.
Comet has 248 stores across the UK.

I hope that Comet gets their just rewards.

Hopefully, this strike by Henry should have been a wake up call for Wenger who is still failing to get to grips with the problems which have prevented Arsenal from competing in the Premiership, for 5 seasons.

Henry was once the consummate player at Arsenal and at 34, he still has what it takes to help a jaded team with only a couple of quality players.

By comparison Tottenham, Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea all have a plethora of world class players, despite the fact that some of them are underachieving at the moment.

Wenger’s achilles heel has always been his belief that he can turn a ‘sow into a silk purse’ and he relentlessly tries to prove that, at the expense of Arsenal FC.

Other more ruthless managers and successful managers, Sir Alex Ferguson and Jose Mourinho, for instance, know when to release players who are not performing or adding value to the club.

Arsenal has a weak defence, and relies too much on Robin Van Persie for goals. The obvious thing to do would be to get a couple of new defenders and 2 more strikers.

Unfortunately, good players don’t grow on trees but Wenger should by now have an understanding of the Premiership system.
If a player does not perform after 1 or 2 seasons, recover your losses and try others.

That’s how sport and business works. It’s a failed policy to hang on to players who just collect their mammoth wages and fill out the 25 man quota.

Part of the problem has been Arsenal’s backroom staff. The other top teams always beat a path to exciting players when Arsenal are still umming and arrhing.