Mannerisms

There is zero leeway in the Web-sites designed by Attila et al. If you fail to follow, 100% precisely, a set of procedures you are totally locked out.

There’s none of Google’s friendly: “Do you mean . . . ?”

Going onto the web-site of a domestic supplier this week I am asked to enter my account number. I enter the number on my bill where it says: ‘Account Number: **********.

Red asterisk and warning words appear. ‘Your account number should be eight numbers long.’ My account number is ten numbers long.

So nothing doing.

I am condemned to spend over an hour on call lines to get a human to make the adjustments to my service.

I tell a human about the account number. She tells me their account numbers have variable lengths. She did not add: 'So as to piss off customers like you'.

Someone suggests to me that it’s not that website designers are sadistic bastards, but that actually they’re kindly folk who enjoy computer games and so want to give consumers some fun with a few jolly tests and puzzles before accessing their suppliers’ web-sites.

The web-site designers' fun-filled message sems to be: 'Get to the Beta competence level in our super-cool game and you'll be allowed to spend your money on our company's products and services',

They need a kicking.

Can’t we have web-sites designed by lifestyle designers, not geeks?