Taking the Pith

Just a bit of fun for today.

From time to time it has been my exceedingly great pleasure to pen a pithy and sometimes pointed email when some corporate prat has overstepped the mark. I usually do it for other people but on the occasion I’m about to reveal it was from my own righteous indignation and outrage that I typed a diatribe to Northern Rail.

The reason being that our brilliant granddaughter, Erin, had been given a fine by an over-zealous nit of a ticket inspector on her train journey, despite her making every attempt to pay for her ticket with the correct amount of cash. I was most incensed at the time, as you will soon see.

This isn’t the only pithy email I’ve constructed for Erin. I once wrote to Netflix on her behalf, demanding to know why The Grinch starring Jim Carrey had been removed from their streaming service to be replaced by the (hopelessly inferior) cartoon version. It didn’t make any difference but I had fun trying.

Anyway, have a butchers at the one I wrote to Northern Rail. I’m quite proud of it.

Dear Sir/Madam

I write regarding the mentioned unpaid fare notice that was issued to my 14-year-old granddaughter, Erin Cardwell. I have phoned Northern Rail four times, so far, to attempt to resolve this issue regarding the princely sum owed of £1.35 but despite being passed from one department to another have yet to speak to anyone who is able or intelligent enough to help me with this matter. I have been given this email address and I would greatly appreciate it if someone from the right department could call me back please.

Further to this there are a few other issues I would also like to discuss. These are:

1. On the day in question Erin had exactly the right change for the fare but was denied the opportunity to pay it by the ticket inspector. Why? I demand to know why.

2. On the notice she was given by the inspector it lists Erin as “the offender.” For a teenager who has never been in any kind of trouble in her life we find this to be overtly judgemental and also a grossly excessive use of unnecessary and inflammatory language. What is our country coming to when large corporations criminalise young people over £1.35. Northern Rail seriously need to address their policy in wording especially considering Erin made every possible attempt to pay on the day in question.

3. Also, on the ticket, she is named as ''Mrs'' Erin Cardwell. This is wrong and also somewhat offensive. The whole episode has caused Erin a lot of distress and I would very much like it if this particularly zealous, and, I suspect, unpopular inspector could be asked to tone down his manner as it was very abrupt to the point of abject rudeness and upsetting to a young girl. Again, Erin is only 14 years of age.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Alan Stevenson

Pretty damn pithy huh? I got a response the next day in the form of a grovelling apology and the ticket cost (£1.35) waived. It just goes to show what you can do if you speak up and stick it to the man.

If they hadn’t waived such a paltry figure I would have been happy for them to take us to court over it. I would have loved writing to the newspapers and our MP a lot more. Honestly, treating a kid like that over less than the price of a Greggs sausage roll.

Maybe I could hire myself out as a pithy email writer for hire!