Dear wiggle.co.uk

Roger Burton West said:

...an address in London _is_ in the United Kingdom, contrary to your
assertion, so you really shouldn't be telling me you can't air-mail my
order outside the UK.

Farnell's website had a problem with my last order and despite by best
efforts insisted on turning the delivery and invoicing country into
Afghanistan. I guess because it's first on some country lists and
somebody's done a sloppy coding job.

I have an account and told them no correct VAT invoice no payment...

Jon

Roger Burton West wrote on 27/07/2007 16:15:

Quoted message said:

...an address in London _is_ in the United Kingdom, contrary to your
assertion, so you really shouldn't be telling me you can't air-mail my
order outside the UK.

My housemate had problems with Wiggle yesterday - every time he put his
address and credit card details in the site would dump him back at the
beginning of the process with no inkling as to what the problem might
be. He nearly gave up on them.

Turned out it was the apostrophe in his billing address that was
throwing it. Taking that out made it go through fine.

It's just sloppy coding... (and the spelling/grammar on their automated
emails is terrible, too! "Your Friend has just brought from wiggle"[1]
was the subject of a referral voucher, for example...)

Peter

[1] If anyone wants me to refer them to wiggle for some free glasses
when spending over £50, let me know[2] :-)
[2] Sorry, thought I'd take the opportunity whilst talking about it

--
http://www.scandrett.net/lx/
http://www.scandrett.net/bike/

"Peter Scandrett" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Roger Burton West wrote on 27/07/2007 16:15:

Quoted message said:

...an address in London _is_ in the United Kingdom, contrary to your
assertion, so you really shouldn't be telling me you can't air-mail my
order outside the UK.

My housemate had problems with Wiggle yesterday - every time he put his
address and credit card details in the site would dump him back at the
beginning of the process with no inkling as to what the problem might be. He
nearly gave up on them.

Turned out it was the apostrophe in his billing address that was throwing
it. Taking that out made it go through fine.

It's just sloppy coding... (and the spelling/grammar on their automated
emails is terrible, too! "Your Friend has just brought from wiggle"[1] was
the subject of a referral voucher, for example...)

Peter

[1] If anyone wants me to refer them to wiggle for some free glasses when
spending over £50, let me know[2] :-)
[2] Sorry, thought I'd take the opportunity whilst talking about it

--
http://www.scandrett.net/lx/
http://www.scandrett.net/bike/

I have used "wiggle" for years and never had any problem at all. Like all IT
processes it is "Junk in Junk out"
if you are incapable of no processing your input correctly then you can expect
failure!

don't criticise the website -- look at your own input

[censored] in [censored] out!

--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire,
England, United Kingdom.
www.tapan.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk

Trevor A Panther said:

"Peter Scandrett" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Roger Burton West wrote on 27/07/2007 16:15:

Quoted message said:

...an address in London _is_ in the United Kingdom, contrary to your
assertion, so you really shouldn't be telling me you can't air-mail my
order outside the UK.

My housemate had problems with Wiggle yesterday - every time he put his
address and credit card details in the site would dump him back at the
beginning of the process with no inkling as to what the problem might be. He
nearly gave up on them.

Turned out it was the apostrophe in his billing address that was throwing
it. Taking that out made it go through fine.

It's just sloppy coding... (and the spelling/grammar on their automated
emails is terrible, too! "Your Friend has just brought from wiggle"[1] was
the subject of a referral voucher, for example...)

Quoted message said:

I have used "wiggle" for years and never had any problem at all. Like all IT
processes it is "Junk in Junk out"
if you are incapable of no processing your input correctly then you can expect
failure!

don't criticise the website -- look at your own input

You do talk some rubbish. GIGO[1] covers such things as badly written
code. One can put in correct details but if the code running on the
website is garbage how can you get anything but garbage out of it?

[1] Garbage in garbage out
--
Phil Cook looking north over the park to the "Westminster Gasworks"

"Trevor A Panther" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:RHrqi.5490

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Turned out it was the apostrophe in his billing address that was throwing
it. Taking that out made it go through fine.

I have used "wiggle" for years and never had any problem at all. Like all
IT processes it is "Junk in Junk out"
if you are incapable of no processing your input correctly then you can
expect failure!

don't criticise the website -- look at your own input

[censored] in [censored] out!

Um, Trevor - I'm guessing you're not in the IT industry. A website failing
to cope with an apostrophe in a billing address has a fairly serious
problem. It's a bug - I'd count it as a fairly serious one, especially
because it's probably easy to fix and should have been tested in the first
place.

It's definitely not user error, contrary to what you write.

clive

On 27/07/2007 20:28, Trevor A Panther said,

Quoted message said:

I have used "wiggle" for years and never had any problem at all. Like
all IT processes it is "Junk in Junk out"
if you are incapable of no processing your input correctly then you can
expect failure!

Um - quite a lot of addresses have apostrophes in them, so any website
should be able to handle them. In fact, my full surname (not as shown
here) also has an apostrophe in it, and I would definitely expect that
to be handled correctly.

Quoted message said:

[censored] in [censored] out!

Quite.

--
Paul Boyd
http://www.paul-boyd.co.uk/

Trevor A Panther wrote on 27/07/2007 20:28:

Quoted message said:

"Peter Scandrett" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

My housemate had problems with Wiggle yesterday - every time he put
his address and credit card details in the site would dump him back at
the beginning of the process with no inkling as to what the problem
might be. He nearly gave up on them.

Turned out it was the apostrophe in his billing address that was
throwing it. Taking that out made it go through fine.

I have used "wiggle" for years and never had any problem at all. Like
all IT processes it is "Junk in Junk out"
if you are incapable of no processing your input correctly then you can
expect failure!

don't criticise the website -- look at your own input

I disagree - to a certain extent you're right, but particularly when it
comes to web coding you should a) check for common cases like this,
perhaps also hyphens and double-barrelled names, and b) check for
potential security issues. One wonders if the site is vulnerable to SQL
injection attacks or similar - if the input data hasn't been processed
properly, being stripped of special characters or even spaces then it's
dangerous to the site itself and data integrity, let alone the
inconvenience for the user, as in this case.

Anyway, we're veering way way off topic for the group so I'll leave it
there... sorry.

Peter

--
http://www.scandrett.net/lx/
http://www.scandrett.net/bike/

Peter Scandrett said:

I disagree - to a certain extent you're right, but particularly when it
comes to web coding you should a) check for common cases like this,
perhaps also hyphens and double-barrelled names, and b) check for
potential security issues. One wonders if the site is vulnerable to SQL
injection attacks or similar - if the input data hasn't been processed
properly, being stripped of special characters or even spaces then it's
dangerous to the site itself and data integrity, let alone the
inconvenience for the user, as in this case.

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses. In the early days it was a case of trial and error
as to how you divided the house, street, village and postal town names
between the two or three lines provided so as to get past the credit
card authorisation but at least now the CC companies seem to have got
better even if the web coders still haven't realised how many lines a
British address can have.

Tony

Tony Raven said the following on 28/07/2007 09:06:

Quoted message said:

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses.

I suppose you're right there. The ones that bug me are where you have a
pull-down list of counties, and you have to enter the address as shown
on the card statement... ...except many pull-down lists don't recognize
many counties. North Somerset, for instance, where I usually have to
select "Avon" (abolished 11 years ago) which then doesn't match my card
address...

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

--
Paul Boyd
http://www.paul-boyd.co.uk/

Paul Boyd said:

Tony Raven said the following on 28/07/2007 09:06:

Quoted message said:

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses.

I suppose you're right there. The ones that bug me are where you have a
pull-down list of counties, and you have to enter the address as shown
on the card statement... ...except many pull-down lists don't recognize
many counties. North Somerset, for instance, where I usually have to
select "Avon" (abolished 11 years ago) which then doesn't match my card
address...

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either!

He he :-)

The postcode will get it to the delivery office but the postie will
then have a devil of a job finding what street it is.

Quoted message said:

If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

Counties are no longer required. So number, street, town and postcode
are all that is required.
--
Phil Cook looking north over the park to the "Westminster Gasworks"

Phil Cook said the following on 28/07/2007 10:04:

Quoted message said:

Counties are no longer required.

Tell the website designers that when it's a compulsory field!

--
Paul Boyd
http://www.paul-boyd.co.uk/

Paul Boyd said:

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

We have had mail delivered multiple time with the correct house name,
street, postal town and post code but with the village missing. I
arrives covered with handwriting suggesting various villages near the
postal town that the postman might try until eventually someone guesses
the right one and it is delivered. So I wouldn't lend any credence to
what Royal Mail claim.

Tony

Tony Raven said:

Paul Boyd said:

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

We have had mail delivered multiple time with the correct house name,
street, postal town and post code but with the village missing. I
arrives covered with handwriting suggesting various villages near the
postal town that the postman might try until eventually someone guesses
the right one and it is delivered. So I wouldn't lend any credence to
what Royal Mail claim.

Posties in delivery offices usually have no idea what code goes with
which street unless it is on their patch. I know the codes for the
streets on my walk and a few that get confused with mine but that is
it. There is a big estate of blocks of flats in our area where
addresses come up with flat number, estate name and postcode but with
the house name missing. We had to create our own idiot sheet to decode
the postcodes.

In fact post towns are largely redundant in postal addresses these
days. The sorting is postcode defined In your case number, street,
vilage and code would be sufficient for the post. However it would
probably not help those without access to the postal system so the
town would have to be added for them.
--
Phil Cook, the postman.

Phil Cook said:

Paul Boyd said:

Tony Raven said the following on 28/07/2007 09:06:

Quoted message said:

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses.

I suppose you're right there. The ones that bug me are where you have a
pull-down list of counties, and you have to enter the address as shown
on the card statement... ...except many pull-down lists don't recognize
many counties. North Somerset, for instance, where I usually have to
select "Avon" (abolished 11 years ago) which then doesn't match my card
address...

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either!

He he :-)

The postcode will get it to the delivery office but the postie will
then have a devil of a job finding what street it is.

um no most will have a book a postcode normally only cover a street or
part or one.

admitily if it's a bit of junk mail they are unlikely to look. also if
you do it long enought you get to know the codes.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

Counties are no longer required. So number, street, town and postcode
are all that is required.

in most yes but not all.

roger
--
www.rogermerriman.com

Phil Cook said:

Tony Raven said:

Paul Boyd said:

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

We have had mail delivered multiple time with the correct house name,
street, postal town and post code but with the village missing. I
arrives covered with handwriting suggesting various villages near the
postal town that the postman might try until eventually someone guesses
the right one and it is delivered. So I wouldn't lend any credence to
what Royal Mail claim.

Posties in delivery offices usually have no idea what code goes with
which street unless it is on their patch. I know the codes for the
streets on my walk and a few that get confused with mine but that is
it. There is a big estate of blocks of flats in our area where
addresses come up with flat number, estate name and postcode but with
the house name missing. We had to create our own idiot sheet to decode
the postcodes.

In fact post towns are largely redundant in postal addresses these
days. The sorting is postcode defined In your case number, street,
vilage and code would be sufficient for the post. However it would
probably not help those without access to the postal system so the
town would have to be added for them.

ask for the code book if your office is reasobly old it should have one,
if not the PHG can look it up for you.

roger
--
www.rogermerriman.com

Paul Boyd said:

Tony Raven said the following on 28/07/2007 09:06:

Quoted message said:

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses.

I suppose you're right there. The ones that bug me are where you have a
pull-down list of counties, and you have to enter the address as shown
on the card statement... ...except many pull-down lists don't recognize
many counties. North Somerset, for instance, where I usually have to
select "Avon" (abolished 11 years ago) which then doesn't match my card
address...

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

A often hear argument in my house is when I'm on the phone to some
muppet that doesn't realise that asking for my street as one bit of
"security" and asking for my postcode as another "security" question is
pointless, there is only one street with the postcode. That's ignoring
the fact that both the street name and the post code are in the public
domain so that neither of the answers are any form or security and I'm
just being asked to pander the the script that the muppet has on the screen

Tony Raven said:

British addresses. In the early days it was a case of trial and error
as to how you divided the house, street, village and postal town names
between the two or three lines provided so as to get past the credit
card authorisation but at least now the CC companies seem to have got
better

The credit card gateways are mostly using AVS (Address Verification
System, I think) which only checks numerics: so, house number and
postcode. I know, it doesn't sound like much.

3dsecure (a.k.a Securecode/Verified by Visa) redirects the buyer to the
card issuer's web site during the payment process for more extensive
checks, and is shortly to be mandatory for Switch^WUK Maestro payments.
I expect other card schemes will follow suit

-dan

Roger Merriman said:

Phil Cook <[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Posties in delivery offices usually have no idea what code goes with
which street unless it is on their patch.

Quoted message said:

ask for the code book if your office is reasobly old it should have one,

We used to have one but it hasn't been seen for ages. we moved
buildings two years ago and it is still a mess. The management in our
office is USELESS. We don't even have a map of the delivery area on
the wall, if we get a temp in they print out a bit of streetmap. If
ever Royal Mail invite me to a [censored] up in a brewery I shall take my
own beer and glass!

Quoted message said:

if not the PHG can look it up for you.

No such thing as a PHG anymore. :-)
--
Phil Cook looking north over the park to the "Westminster Gasworks"

marc said:

Paul Boyd said:

Tony Raven said the following on 28/07/2007 09:06:

Quoted message said:

Even to this day the majority of web sites don't allow for typical
British addresses.

I suppose you're right there. The ones that bug me are where you have a
pull-down list of counties, and you have to enter the address as shown
on the card statement... ...except many pull-down lists don't recognize
many counties. North Somerset, for instance, where I usually have to
select "Avon" (abolished 11 years ago) which then doesn't match my card
address...

A British address doesn't need to have many lines though. At it's most
basic, house number and postcode is all you need, although I wouldn't
try it either! If you ask the Royal Mail website for the RM-approved
address it is often much shorter than people use.

A often hear argument in my house is when I'm on the phone to some
muppet that doesn't realise that asking for my street as one bit of
"security" and asking for my postcode as another "security" question is
pointless, there is only one street with the postcode.

I work for one of those companies, it's quite frustrating for me and
anyone at the company that has tried to use common sense has been
threatened with dismissal.

When customers provide a postcode for the first time I tend to give them
the address that that postcode is for and ask if that's right. I've been
told not to do this as it's in breach of the DPA.

I'm sure you can imagine terminal stupidity is behind this but the guy
who's on the other end of the phone is just doing his job.