By Isle of Wight Observer
In the olden days when you needed to buy household goods, you traipsed round the shops. That could be a faff, so someone invented Argos. I vaguely remembered its origins had something to do with Green Shield stamps, so I checked.
In the ‘60s and ‘70s, retailers gave you Green Shield stamps. We used to fight over who would stick them in the book – you had to lick them and I still remember their taste. Once you’d filled a book with them, you perused their catalogue and selected something for free. The scheme worked well but ultimately failed when mean old Tesco decided it would no longer issue the stamps. The Green Shield company soldiered on for a while, accepting a mixture of stamps and cash for its goods. When that business model also failed, the company transformed itself into Argos. I’ve no idea how they’re doing now, because almost everyone I know who used to buy stuff from Argos now uses Amazon instead – which means the roads are always filled with vans dropping off little packages.
Last week, a delivery intended for me almost went to someone else. The driver had my address, but didn’t know exactly where it was. His delivery before mine was only a few miles away, and cleverly he associated someone working there with me, so asked if they’d take my parcel. I was quite impressed when the pal messaged to tell me, but as I was in, decided the cheeky driver could bring the package to me as intended.
The biggest drawback of ordering on-line is having to be there when the goods show up. You’re trapped indoors; you can’t even pop out for five minutes. Should you dare to leave, occasionally they’ll put the package in the shed or leave it on the doorstep and photograph it, which means you run the risk of it being stolen. Social media is full of photographs of lost packages on doorsteps other than the intended recipients. I’ve had goods stolen this way and, as far as I know, the thief got away with it.
I once had a 42-foot lorry-trailer stolen and, quite brilliantly, traced it to a dodgy haulage yard in east London. I hadn’t been in business long and the theft might have ruined us. It was insured, of course, but we couldn’t claim for fear that the next year’s insurance premium would bankrupt us. The loss was made worse by having to make a monthly finance payment of £500 for something we no longer had. The stolen vehicle was used for carrying air cargo pallets, and was fitted with a brand-new roller bed floor system. The thief stripped them out and, when I tracked it down, two dodgy blokes were in the process of fitting my rollers into another vehicle. The partially stripped and dismantled trailer sat right outside their gates. My heart pounded as I dialled 999 to report a crime in progress. “There’s no proof that’s your stuff in there,” they said, explaining why they wouldn’t come and investigate.
A month ago, I had an electric cement mixer stolen. Several other West Wight premises have also suffered tool thefts recently, so I reported mine on-line. After asking dozens of pointless questions about my ethnicity, sexual preferences, shoe size, date of birth etc, the police website assured me they’d investigate. Moments later, they emailed to say their so-called ‘investigation’ was already over, because there was nothing to go on. Immediately after that, I got a text message from ‘victim support,’ offering counselling for my loss.
A week passed and I happened to bump into a uniformed officer, based in Yarmouth. Naturally I told him all about my theft and mentioned the other stolen tools. Despite being our regular beat guy, he knew absolutely nothing about our mini crimewave.
No wonder thieves laugh at us; we should sack the useless crime commissioner and her useless management.