Everything Doesn't Work

In which The Author reverts to Plan A

In the course of this blog I've mentioned James Burke's landmark 1978 BBC TV documentary series Connections a number of times. For the last couple of weeks I've been thinking of something from the very first instalment, as it seems to sum up what's been happening to the country of late.

In 'The Trigger Effect', Mr Burke talks about the possible effects of a prolonged electricity blackout on an advanced, economically developed industrial First World country. (The clip comes and goes from YouTube, but here it is for the time being.)

Probably because the series was a co-production with Time-Life, Mr Burke chose the USA to illustrate his example. Some four decades later, I think the UK probably comes close enough for jazz to his requirements. The remarkable thing is, even that with abundant electricity to power our civilisation, a reasonable standard of secondary education for the majority and advanced technology at most people's fingertips, (to borrow Mr Burke's phrase) everything doesn't work.

I've been thinking about this for a very long time, but the rot really set in at the start of Lockdown, when it seemed the entire country was in a panic-buying hysteria over toilet paper. Apparently the thinking behind it went something like this: toilet paper comes from China; China is in lockdown; therefore we won't be able to get any toilet paper. A couple of people posted this reasoned argument on Facebook and human stupidity did the rest. When Italy went into lockdown, pasta vanished from the shelves as well. I'm fairly sure that the majority of pasta on our supermarket shelves isn't actually made in Italy (for all that the packets bear red, green and white logos and evocative names), for the same reason that most frozen pizzas aren't. Probably the best known brand of 'Italian' pasta sauce – Dolmio – doesn't go anywhere near Italy during its time in the jar. But online idiocy spreads more quickly than a pandemic, and can't be tracked and traced electronically.

It turns out that we didn't need a technological breakdown for the average British consumer to be thrown into a tailspin. By chance, I was asked to copy-edit the debut novel by Susannah Wise, This Fragile Earth, at around the time everyone started working from home. It's a grim near-future tale of England after the internet stops functioning – and without the internet, nothing else can function either. I was reading the panic-buying scenes with horrid fascination, wondering how on earth Ms Wise had been able to predict the future so accurately. I'd like to see Mr Burke update his series to take account of the Wired World, and to see how long it takes his worst-case scenario to come about in the light of current technology.

For over ten years now, my brother has been asking anyone who'll listen, 'Why is nothing straightforward any more?' At first I thought he was exaggerating. He doesn't use the internet, or have a smartphone, so by opting out of the Scissors Age (see Stone, Paper, Scissors), I thought he'd just made a rod for his own back. However, I'm fairly well tuned in to the digital world, and I've seen it slowly start to break down over the last few years. But the internet is only one factor at play in the chaos of modern life. Our old friend Human Stupidity seems to underpin much of the rest of the story.

This particular story starts on the afternoon of the Saturday after Xmas. I was reading the paper over a pint in the National Tap, and I came across an interview with Prof. Richard Dawkins. His new book had been published shortly before. If I'd still been in the bookshop, I'd have known about it ages before that. I'd probably have bought my own copy for Xmas. (Back in the good old days, I might have been able to bag a sample copy from the trade sales rep. When publishers still had trade sales reps, that is.) I also knew that Gollancz had published a collection of Christopher Priest's short stories. With the Dawkins book at half-price on Amazon that weekend, it seemed a good excuse to buy both and get the free delivery. That was the easy bit. I logged on to Amazon on my phone, added the books to my basket, and went to the checkout page.

End of easy bit.

I knew there was a good chance I wouldn't be at home when the postman came. With the extended break reducing the opening hours at the sorting office (not the easiest place to get to), I decided to have the books sent to a 'Local Hub'. I used to do that anyway, and have them delivered to one of the newsagents in Aberdare. As I'm in town most days, it was no hardship for me to call in and pick up my parcel when I was passing. The problem was that they seemed to have given up being an Amazon Local Hub. The nearest alternative I could find listed was in Hirwaun – the little supermarket opposite the Lamb Inn. It's a bus ride away, but the services were frequent and I had my Stagecoach weekly ticket, so I didn't mind the prospect of a little excursion. I amended the details, processed the payment through PayPal, and a few minutes later the confirmation email arrived. Needless to say, the delivery address was my house.

I had thirty minutes in which to amend my order – but not on the app. If I could have logged in on a computer, I could have sorted it out fairly easily. But that option didn't seem to be available on a phone. I resigned myself to a missed delivery and went back to the crossword.

On the Monday afternoon I had an email from Amazon, telling me that my parcels (plural) had been delivered to a neighbour. As soon as I saw the name and address my heart sank, because this had happened once before.

The old boy living opposite is a real gentleman, but I think he must suffer with dementia. Last time Ken took a parcel in for me, a couple of years ago, he vaguely remembered it but neither of us could find it. The following day my friend Gail, two doors away, messaged me to say my parcel was in her house. Ken must have dropped it into her house when the kids were there, and they hadn't thought anything of it. When I saw Ken's name in the email, I had a horrible feeling history was going to repeat itself.

It kinda did.

I didn't get home until very late on the Monday, so I left it until Tuesday morning (New Year's Eve) to knock Ken's door. Not surprisingly, he didn't remember taking in a delivery the previous day. In fact, he didn't remember anyone coming to his door – not even his carer, who calls every lunchtime. Together we hunted for some time, while I explained at least four times what the books were and what the parcel would probably look like. Eventually I had to leave him to it. I gave him my number and asked him to ring me when the parcel turned up, so I could arrange to collect it later. Then I went into town, caught up with some friends, and got home before the buses stopped running.

I was heading to the party in the Welsh Harp when another neighbour spotted me leaving the house and called over to me.

'Did you get your Amazon stuff?' he asked.

He told me he'd been rushing off to work earlier in the day and had spotted a parcel on my windowsill. He hadn't had time to pick it up and take it in, and assumed that I'd seen it myself. I hadn't, of course, but someone else obviously had. I half-hoped it was one of the junkies on their way back from getting their methadone fix in the pharmacy at the end of my street. The thief probably thought the parcel was something s/he could sell for drug money. Well, I can only hope the early stories of Christopher Priest have fried her/his brain, as they did with mine back in the day.

I contacted Amazon Customer Service on 2 January, and after a while I got to speak to a real live human being. I explained the situation, and she raised a new order for me. Just like that. The previous two books – combined value over £30 – were presumably written off by Amazon as just another glitch in the supply chain. This time I checked that they'd be delivered to the Local Hub in Hirwaun (which seemed to tax the woman on the phone for a while) before confirming the replacement order.

When my books did finally arrive (having been dispatched from the same warehouse at the same time), they were in two individual padded bags. In an attempt to swim against the tide, Amazon had stopped using their recyclable cardboard packets and switched to plastic instead. And they hadn't sent them to the Local Hub at all. I ended up collecting them from Hirwaun Post Office, in the main street. Not even the guy behind the counter knew what they were doing there. I gave Amazon quite a low rating in the questionnaire which arrived on my phone before I'd even got on the bus back to Aberdare.

I didn't order any physical books for a while after that. With lockdown in effect I didn't know how couriers would be faring. (I found out when it came to the desk.) But three weeks ago I decided to order two books from Amazon, which were on offer and selling in large numbers. This time I placed the order on the laptop, making sure all the 'local collect' details were correct. At the time, one of the titles (I'll call it Book A) was out of stock, but they confirmed that Book B had been dispatched to my Local Hub the same day and would arrive within two days.

Three days later I had an email informing me that Book A was ready for collection. Not Book B – Book A. It was a very pleasant day, so I walked to Hirwaun along the Cynon Trail and called to the shop around lunchtime. I had to show the lady behind the counter the barcode Amazon had sent to my phone, and show her my ID, before she handed the book over. (I can understand why the shopkeeper would ask to see ID, of course – which is why the subsequent developments made me so angry.) There was still no sign of Book B, so I joked that I'd be back up to collect it the following day.

That didn't happen.

Five days after allegedly sending it, Amazon admitted that it had got lost in transit and offered to send a replacement copy at no extra cost. It was the Xmas debacle all over again – except that this parcel should have been tracked from portal to portal, and not left with some random bloke who happened to be at home when the courier called. I agreed to have a replacement, and a couple of days later you'd have found me on the Cynon Trail again. The woman in the shop laughed when I told her what had happened, and didn't ask to see my ID this time. She scanned the barcode from my phone and I finally went home with Book B.

Once bitten, you'd think – but no …

I decided to try my luck a third time, and this time things got seriously fucked up.

Amazon had a single copy in stock of Investigating Alias: Secrets and Spies, a fairly academic treatment of the surreal TV show I mentioned last time. As the book was published fifteen years ago by a specialist British house, I decided to grab it without further delay. To an ex-bookseller, it was the sort of scenario that spells 'Out of print' in big letters on one's mental stock control system.

Did I say 'without further delay'? Well, that's a fucking joke!

I ordered it on Saturday 20 June. At 5.34 p.m. on Sunday I had an email saying it had been dispatched for 'next day delivery' to the Local Hub. At 10.34 a.m. on Monday, Amazon emailed me to tell me the book would be delivered 'today'. On the Monday afternoon, at about 4.00, I had a message via the app to tell me my parcel was 'eight stops away'.

And that was the last Amazon knew of it.

I wasn't going to head to Hirwaun in the evening on the off-chance (especially with the restricted buses running at the moment). I decided to wait until my collection email arrived before going up on Tuesday. And no collection email arrived.

Early on Tuesday morning, I accessed the Customer Service part of their website and had a long text chat with the woman who'd dealt with my problem over the Xmas holidays. (I assume it was her, anyway. Her name is so unusual I doubt there can be two people with it in the same call centre.) She was apologetic (of course) but not very helpful.

She told me I could go to the shop and show my ID and the dispatch email, and that would be enough to allow me to collect the parcel.

I told her I wasn't prepared to walk for over half an hour on a fool's errand, and I didn't want to have a stand-up argument with the shopkeeper in front of a queue of customers.

She asked me if I could give them '24-48 hours' to sort it out and contact them again if I hadn't heard anything by then.

I reluctantly agreed. I had a book to work on anyway, so I didn't want to waste time walking to Hirwaun and coming back empty-handed.

On Thursday morning, pretty much 48 hours to the minute since I'd ended the previous online chat, I was back on to Customer Service. Luckily for me, the previous exchange was still in the window, so I gave the guy a few minutes to get up to speed before I started on him in earnest.

There was still no trace of my parcel on their system, so they couldn't issue me with a barcode to collect it.

I asked him what had happened after 8.27 p.m. on Monday evening (the last they saw of it, when presumably it was delivered to Hirwaun).

He didn't know. He offered to order a replacement copy. I vetoed that on the grounds that I didn't expect them to receive any more stock of that title. He offered to credit my account with £5 for the inconvenience. I kept arguing with him, and eventually the bid went up to £15. Then he asked me if I'd prefer a refund instead. I asked him to wait for a while and I'd get back to him.

So I set off for Hirwaun, armed with my ID and the dispatch email, as well as a screenshot of the earlier conversation telling me that I'd be able to show them to the shopkeeper. I also had a screenshot of my statement that I didn't want to argue in front of a shop full of customers.

Well, that's exactly what happened!

I walked to Hirwaun by lunchtime and made my way to the shop. The woman behind the counter smiled when she saw me and held up not one but two Amazon parcels with my name on them. But when I explained what had happened, and the fuck-up with their Customer Service people, that was as far as things went. No barcode, no collection: computer says no.

I argued with her for a few minutes and showed her the communication with Amazon, but apparently unless her little machine agrees, she can't do anything. So I got straight on to Amazon again while I was in the shop, text-chatting an increasingly angry exchange to a supervisor (by now the issue had been 'escalated'). The Amazon system didn't know where the parcel was, and so she couldn't issue a barcode for its collection, I told her the fucking parcel was about three feet away from me – I could see the fucking thing. It had my fucking name on the outside. I had my ID and my dispatch email with the parcel reference number. The woman behind the counter fucking knows me! Computer says no.

No go. She couldn't issue me with a collection barcode either, because the refund had already been processed. As far as Amazon were concerned, the matter was at an end.

I told her to re-charge the original price of the book to my PayPal account, send me the barcode, and I'd take it there and then. Couldn't be done. Computer says no.

I told her to think of something before the next bus to Aberdare arrived, because once I set foot on it the matter would be at an end. She asked me to hold while she spoke to a colleague. She came back and asked if I could give them '72 hours' to look into it. I told her they'd already had 72 hours to sort things out, and that I didn't care what she said after this. I was going to go to the media instead. (Which I did, incidentally. I spent quite a while on Thursday afternoon tracking down contact details for print and broadcast consumer journalists and emailing each one with a cooked-down version of the story.)

She offered me more compensation for the wasted time, raising the stakes to £35 by the end of the argument. I told her that the credit would sit in my account until the end of time, because I had no intention of buying any physical items from Amazon again. Then the bus came, and anything she said after that was irrelevant. I was already deciding on the wording of my email to the press while she was messaging me on the way home.

Anyway, that night I had a look on eBay and found a second-hand copy of the book for £5.99, including postage. (That's half the price Amazon wanted. It's not in perfect condition, but who would be after fifteen years?) It arrived in the post on Wednesday.

The great British SF/fantasy novelist M. John Harrison has a new book out this month. I toyed with ordering it online, but I'm through with Amazon and their broken promises. I could have ordered Mr Harrison's book from Waterstones and got it in a couple of days, as well as earning points on my loyalty card. But Waterstones are big enough to look after themselves in the present crisis.

I ordered a copy this morning, from Storysmith in Bristol. They're a relatively new independent shop in Bedminster, and hosted the Ben Aaronovitch signing during which I unexpectedly changed gender last summer. They're nice people, and small bookshops need to try and get through the next few months by any means necessary. At the moment, Amazon seem to be doing their best to drive customers back to the independents, so I'm more than happy to join the exodus.

As for the other parcel in Hirwaun with my name on it …

I can only assume it's the original copy of Book B – the one that got lost in transit. Or possibly it's the replacement copy. It doesn't matter, because it'll sit behind the counter, next to Investigating Alias, for ever. The most surreal aspect of the entire story is that I know exactly where they are, and the shopkeeper knows exactly whose they are. And there's no way in the world that we can reconcile these two facts.

Everything doesn't work …