Todays blog is written by my sister – you really couldn’t make this one up!!

Dear Mr Jones

I feel compelled to write to you regarding an experience I had this weekend in one of your Car Warehouse retail outlets.

I entered your store at the weekend with the intention of purchasing a pay as you go mobile for my Father’s 77th birthday today. I selected a phone from your comprehensive range at the cost of £39.95 + £10.00 sim card. I proceeded to the till, gave all of my personal details at the request of your member of staff and reached into my handbag to retrieve my purse. Imagine my astonishment when I pulled out £50.00 in cash to hand over, and your staff member visibly recoiled from me in horror! His next words will resonnate with me for a very long time, when he uttered apologetically, as if I had tried to put a steaming turd in his hand – “we don’t accept cash”. At this point his colleague stepped forward and said quite matter of factly, and I quote “well we do, but we will have to charge you an additional £20.00 for this service”!!

Now call me old fashioned but when I woke up this morning, pound Sterling was still legal currency in the UK. In fact where I come from it is the preferred method of payment and in certain circumstances I would normally expect a discount for payment by this method. Needless to say I left your store in a state of numbness and phoneless!

There is no doubt Mr Jones that you are a very successful businessman – in fact as a high profile dragon you obviously have an eye on future trends. I am more than aware that the bottom has fallen out of Sterling recently, and am just wondering if you know something that the rest of Europe doesn’t? Or could it just be that you are much shrewder than the rest of us – and manage to get a 60% bonus for handling the green stuff!

Yours Dumfounded

Helen Todd

PS: You may be pleased to know that I did manage to purchase the mobile for my Father at a local Tesco store, where the product was £10.00 cheaper and they are still more than happy to accept my hard earned cash.