Reports of large scale earth tremors approximately 0820 local time have been confirmed as an earthquake registering 4.7 in the richter scale as reported by the USGS.

Sitting here watching Sky News I can't believe how this is turning into the news event of the year in the UK here's a list of the last 30 earthquakes to hit New Zealand over the past few weeks!

Over the past few years most mobile operators have tried to increase their ARPU by offering nice "walled gardens" portals that are easily accessible from their operator branded handsets. Vodafone have probably put the most effort into this and have heavily tied their Vodafone Live! portal into a large range of Live! branded handsets. Over the years this has caused no end of problems with handsets running slower than the original handset firmware, full of bugs (I had 2 x SE T610's replaced until Vodafone admitted their firmware was so buggy they upgraded the firmware) and using up valuable phone memory with useless files and graphics that can't be deleted.

This has been taken a step further with the recent release of the Nokia E65 and N95 - two awesome new Nokia handsets with WiFI and integrated VoIP through a native SIP stack. Vodafone have crippled the N95 firmware and removed the VoIP function from Vodafone branded handsets meaning you lose an important feature of the phone. With the E65 Vodafone have restricted the SIP client so it will always default to the 3G data connection for VoIP meaning you can't use VoIP over the WiFi connection.

Vodafone NZ are yet to release either of these handsets into the local market so we'll have to wait and see what happens here. In the UK there is a huge backlash occuring against Vodafone and the UK Trading Standards are also encouraging users who have a crippled handset to contact them and Nokia service centres are being flooded with users wanting to have their phones flashed with original Nokia firmware. There are also numerous reports

Rather than admitting they have crippled the handset to stop people using cheap VoIP calling using their handsets Vodafone have responded by saying they have removed VoIP "because it doesn't believe it's a mature technology" ... Yeah right!
 
If you're after one of these handsets do your homework before you have over your money. I purchased an unbranded parallel imported E65 last week and absolutely love it. I would certainly not be giving Vodafone any of my hard earned money for a handset that is crippled with buggy firmware.

No work for me this afternoon.. The nice Fedex man just delivered my new toy.

Review coming when I've had a few days to play with it!

One thing that's annoyed me over the past week has been been a continual obsession by the media of the strength of our NZ$ vs the US$ with it currently trading at close to 25 year highs and our exporters pleading poverty.

One thing that nobody seems to have mention is the fact it's only the US$ that is currently weak and that not everything we import into NZ or export is paid for in US$. Against the UK Pound Stirling we're currently around .37, .55 to the Euro and .89 to the Australian dollar. All of these values are pretty typical of where they have been for the past 3-4 years.

Australia is NZ's largest export market, followed by Japan and then the EU. Export or Import deals to most of these countries will typically be paid for in local currencies. If they are paid for in US$ it will be a conversion from local currency to US$ therefore the value of the US$ is irrevelent.

According to the media people are also rushing to book overseas holidays because of the strong NZ$? Maybe if you're heading to the USA this is a good time to go but for the bulk of us who to go Australia or Euope there is virtually no difference between now any any time over the past few years.

Since I'm a kind and generous person I thought I'd give away some money. I just received this but have no need for the money today so will let somebody else claim my prize. You'll actually get a few $ extra if you're paid out in $US because the current exchange rate of 2.00651 will actually give you $1,036,922.50

ONLINE WINNING ANNOUNCEMENT

I am pleased to inform you of the final announcement that you are one
of our New year winners of the UNITED KINGDOM ONLINE PROMO AWARDS, held
on April 20th, 2007. You have won for your self
a total sum of £516,778.00 POUNDS STERLING and its Equivalent is
$921,201:00 USD.

Please contact Our Officer for your claims by sending to him your
Details Below.

Mr Peter Taylor(OFFICER)
Email:payoffice888@yahoo.com.hk

PROVIDE DETAILS BELOW AND SEND TO OUR CLAIMS AGENT FOR VERIFICATION

1. Full Names:
2. Address:
3. Age:
4. Sex:
5. Marital Status:
6. Occupation:
7. Phone numbers:
8. Country:

Mr Peter Taylor(OFFICER)
Email:payoffice888@yahoo.com.hk

Yours Truly,
Lucy Baines
Co-ordinator(Online Promo Programme)
=======================================================            ONLINE WINNING
ANNOUNCEMENT

I am pleased to inform you of the final announcement that you are one
of our New year winners of the UNITED KINGDOM ONLINE PROMO AWARDS, held
on April 20th, 2007. You have won for your self
a total sum of £516,778.00 POUNDS STERLING and its Equivalent is
$921,201:00 USD.

Please contact Our Officer for your claims by sending to him your
Details Below.

Mr Peter Taylor(OFFICER)
Email:payoffice888@yahoo.com.hk

PROVIDE DETAILS BELOW AND SEND TO OUR CLAIMS AGENT FOR VERIFICATION

1. Full Names:
2. Address:
3. Age:
4. Sex:
5. Marital Status:
6. Occupation:
7. Phone numbers:
8. Country:

Mr Peter Taylor(OFFICER)
Email:payoffice888@yahoo.com.hk

Yours Truly,
Lucy Baines
Co-ordinator(Online Promo Programme)

Mauricio has posted the press release here

TelstraClear blaming Vodafone is rather interesting. The network is live and from what I understood was very close to being complete. I guess we'll see a bit of a PR war now developeing between both companies over the coming days..

I decided it was about time to go and change my mobile plan and sign up for You Choose, primarily because although I'll still be spending the same it will give me more for my money. I popped into my local Vodafone store at Westfield Queensgate today and asked the friendly staff member what deals were available.

"We have the Choose 60 with the free Motorola V360v on a 12 month contract and free TXT2000 for 12 months"

I said I was interested in a 3G device and that I didn't actually want a new phone because my existing V600i phone which I paid $749 for still worked perfectly well but I wanted the extra 25% airtime and would therefore buy a phone and sell it if there were any deals since they couldn't give me the extra 25% airtime without buying a new phone.

The staff member then pointed out a Motorola 3G device (can't recall exact model) that was normally $399 but was available for $99 which got me interested. He then asked me if I was an existing Vodafone customer to which I said yes. He then asked me if I was on prepay or on account to which I responsed that I was on an account.

"Oh I'm sorry these deals are only available to new customers not resigns"

The response dumbfounded me. Why bother with all the advertising if it's not available to resigns? All this says to me is that we don't value your business and would be happy to see you port your number to Telecom and take your business with you.

So I asked what deals were available to me as an existing customer and he wasn't quite sure if there were any but headed over to a PC to have a look.

First stop was the v.box site. Every must remember v.box right? Vodafone spend loads of money sending all their on account customers out a nice metal plate towards the end of last year with a unique login to thank them for being a Vodafone customer

To say ‘thanks’ for being with Vodafone we’ve given you a v.box with some great offers just for you. Once you receive your combination via TXT, you’ll be able to log in to your v.box and see what great offers we’ve put together for you.

I mentioned the v.box website has had no deals, news or competitions or infact anything worthy of even reading for several months now.. after sending the new password to my phone and logging in it didn't take long before he realised the same thing. Looks like marketing wasted a fair few $$ there, it's no wonder airtime in NZ is so expensive.

He then asked me if I had checked out the hotupgrades.co.nz site to which I responded that I had tried it several times recently and got a mesage saying they were working on the site and to come back soon. He then tried the site himself to be greeted with the same message. Reading the blurb instore this site will offer customers deals for new phones based upon the amount of time they have been a customer and the amount they spend. Sounds like a great idea.. Just a shame it doesn't work.

He seemed a bit embarrased himself by now that nothing seemed to work and asked me how long I'd been a Vodafone customer for to which I responded just over 11 years. His response was that he was sure there would be some deals available for me and said he would try looking up my account on their computer...

2 computers and a CRTL-ALT-DEL later he then came to the conclusion that their was a fault somewhere with the system and he was unable to look up my details at present. After a short discussion he told me to keep trying the website to see what deals where on offer first and to come back into the store at a later date if I couldn't access it and he would see what sort of deal he could do for me.

Now I know I love mocking Vodafone but the simple fact is that most of the time they deserve it. Despite this Vodafone is a brand that I truely admire and to be completely honest is a company I would love to work for because there are so many simple things that could be fixed to make the whole "Vodafone experience" a far more rewarding adventure. My experience today however almost left me lost for words. The guy at the store was great but I'm sure he wasn't happy with what happened.

All I want to do is feel like I'm getting myself a deal. I'm not expecting a free $1000 handset. I'm not even expecting a free handset at all. I honestly don't even want buy a new phone. I just want to sign up for You Choose and get the extra 25% airtime for signing up with a 3G device but somebody decided the phone had to be purchased at the same time as you sign up. Because I was stupid enough to pay $749 buying an unsubsidised V600i within days of the 3G network launch to have the latest and greatest toys I'm effectively being penalised. Vodafone will only give me the extra 25% airtime if I go and buy a new subsidised phone. Why not just give customers the 25% extra airtime if they are already using a Vodafone NZ new 3G device?

How can a company be so dysfunctional and still have customers?

How long will it take before hotupgrades.co.nz actually works?

Do Vodafone actually care about their existing customers?

Will anybody at Vodafone respond to this?

Check in next week for the latest.

Well another Easter has come (and almost gone) and yet again NZ is caught in in the debate over our retail trading laws. Something needs to be done to address the inconsistancies that exist with our laws so that it's a level playing field for everybody.

I personally don't have an issue with stores being closed on Easter Friday and Sunday however when we have exemptions for "tourist" towns that have no logic behind them you realise things are an absolute shambles. Why should Queenstown be exempt and not Wanaka? Why should Parnell shops be allowed to open but not Newmarket?

To add to the dramas most people don't actually realise that Easter Sunday is *not* a Public Holiday, it's merely a day that most retailers are not allowed to open their doors. As a result of this staff who do normally work on Sundays either have the choice of receiving no pay at all or taking a day's annual leave if they do wish to be paid, an issue that the National Distribution Union obviously forgot to mention when they critisised Bunnings for opening yesterday. Bunnings also paid staff members who did work time and a half as well as giving them an extra day in lieu, again something they didn't need to do.

With several private members bills before Parliament at present lets hope somebody can at least do something to sort out the mess. The most obvious decision would be to keep Easter Friday as a Public Holiday (with no exemptions as there are now) and let all retailers open on Sunday. Failing this Easter Sunday should be legislated as a Public Holiday and all retailers forced with close with no exemptions.

Let just hope somebody does something to sort things out..

Jama blogged about Wednesday's price increase here but today petrol prices just happened to fall again because Gull (who started the price war in Auckland) didn't raise their prices. As a result petrol prices are now cheaper across the entire country than they were earlier in the week with prices hovering around 151.9 for a litre of 91 unleaded.

Surely questions have to be asked how on Wednesday petrol prices had to increase but suddenly fall? If the increase was truely justifed then the backdown shouldn't have happened.

Fuel companies are the world's biggest cartel and seems to make a mockery of anti competition laws in virtually every western country. Why?

So after a few evenings last week suffering with international HTTP running at slower than dialup speeds (if at all) for hours on end the problem is back again.

How about some compensation TCL? I pay good money for a service that has performed like rubbish. How about even being able to get basics right like updating your status page to indicate there are problems?