Actually, sod this, I'm not going to let these fuckers get away with their incompetence:
---,
Directors' Office,
BUPA House,
15--19 Bloomsbury Way,
London,
WC1A 2BADear ---,
Thank you for your letter (reference XX/XXXX-04DEC03/XX/XXX). I trust that despite it being misaddressed to a `Mr. C M Lightfoot', I will not now start receiving correspondence for an additional, fictional person.
You have misunderstood the problem. The letters that I have received were being sent to me at an address where I receive mail (though not my home address); they were not, as you suggest, being wrongly delivered by Royal Mail; in fact, they had been sent by BUPA to the wrong person. I suspect that you have a database of people to whom you deliver mail -- I'm sure I got junk mail from BUPA before you started sending me bills -- and that database did not distinguish two people with substantially similar names.
In any case it seems all I can do is hope that the letters stop arriving.
You did not answer my question about credit ratings. What information does BUPA send to credit reference agencies, in general? Has it sent any information to any credit reference agencies regarding me because I have not paid these misdirected bills? Has it sent any information to any credit reference agencies which would connect me with this other C W Lightfoot, who is nothing to do with me and about whose credit record I know nothing?
Thank you also for your comments about purchasing health insurance. Are you aware of any `league table' which would allow me to compare insurers on the basis of how often they make time-consuming bureaucratic errors?
Yours sincerely,
Chris Lightfoot.
Let's see what happens now.
So, writing snide letters to incompetent organisations is a pretty base form of entertainment, but unlike some other forms of entertainment it sometimes improves my life. Of course, it would be nice to get a response with some fire in it, rather than simple bland corporateness like,
Mr. C M Lightfoot,
...,
Cambridge.Dear Mr. Lightfoot,
Thank you for your letter addressed to our Chairman. Mr. Sanderson has asked me to investigate the reasons why you have received mail from BUPA, which is clearly addressed to another person at a different address with a different postcode in Cambridge.
I am sorry that this has occurred, as I am sure that it must have been extremely annoying for you. My enquiries with the Royal Mail were cut short, however, when I learned that Mr. Lightfoot, the BUPA member, has now moved hundreds of miles from Cambridge. Therefore, I am hopeful that the Royal Mail will not be able to continue incorrectly delivering his mail to you.
On the other hand, please do not hesitate to contact me if you experience any further problems regarding this matter.
With regard to your ambition to have health insurance, I would suggest that you research the market thoroughly in order to obtain the best possible cover at the lowest possible price. I wish you well in your search.
Yours sincerely,
(signed, one of the BUPA directors' staff)
There are several things to say here:
That said, the demands for money may stop in any case; I haven't had any for a while, and BUPA might even have been provoked by my letter into investigating which letters are sent where. And I doubt there's much point writing again unless they fuck up some more (though I need to clear up the point about credit ratings...).
This is all done with wwwitter.
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