I can't slam dunk it... it won't fit!

Have you ever heard someone utter the words, “a licence to print money”?

Hmm, yes probably.

It’s a nice thought and a great privilege if you’re allowed to do it.

Well, the Royal Mint has that very privilege. They also have the honour of making coins by the billions to pump into the monetary system.

Perfection is the key

Clearly it carries a great responsibility. Everything has to be exactly right with the printing of each note and the structure of each coin. With a high level of accuracy every single item produced has to be as per the design specification.

Ok, so that’s marvellous.

When Was That Then?

Well apart from when they get the design wrong that is. Take for example the new 20p coin launched in 2009. Its size and weight were perfect but after the Royal Mint had sent 200,000 into circulation they then realised they had forgotten to date them. Coin collectors went mad of course, paying up to 250 times their face value to get hold of one.

I’m sure that’s a mistake that the Royal Mint will never make again.  Presumably they now have even stricter rules to reach perfection.

Great, that’s marvellous.

Change Saves Money

Well, unfortunately it appears that isn’t the case. You see, the Royal Mint have just launched new 5p and 10p coins. The new designs will save them £8m a year apparently.

Now that is marvellous.

The cost saving is in the material used for the coins as they are now being made out of steel instead of copper and nickel. So what’s the problem then?

A Cost Saving? Er, No

Well unfortunately it would seem that in order to keep the coins the same weight they’ve made each one thicker.

You see, in the UK there is an old style parking meter that is unable to accept the thicker coins, and the problem is they are installed everywhere. The estimate to replace these useless parking meters is estimated to be around £80m, to be paid for by the local councils.

Not marvellous at all.

Lack of Parking

So due to the incompetence of the Royal Mint coin designers there are bound to be some serious parking issues coming up. The thing is, parking is bad enough already. Car parks never seem to be made big enough.

May be this will force the government and councils to look into controlling parking in a better way.

Why Put It There?

For instance, my youngest daughter plays netball during the evening at a local sports leisure centre. Parking would be fine if it wasn’t for the fact that there’s a secondary school bolted onto the side of it.

This means that whenever the school hold a parents evening, or something similar, it’s impossible to find a space to park. It leads to double parking and complete chaos.

Get Famous & I’ll Press Record

Of course I do find somewhere to park eventually, but I end up missing a substantial amount of her training session. She really enjoys playing and her ability is improving all the time I might add, not that I get to see much of it.

Who knows maybe one day she’ll be on TV. At least it will allow me to watch a recording once I’ve given up on the parking idea.

Success can surely happen as only last year one of the older girls progressed to playing for England, which is fantastic. If only netball had been made into an Olympic sport then she could’ve potentially played for England at the London 2012 Olympics, and been on TV too.

Now that would definitely be marvellous.

London 2012 Olympics Special

Oh, whilst on the subject of the London 2012 Olympics, a special commemorative collection of coins are now on sale. Guess who made them?

Yes, the Royal Mint of course.

A lot of thought has gone into the making of them, and let’s face it, given the amount of attention surrounding the London 2012 Olympics they need to get them bang on perfect.

The Collection

There are 29 coins to collect in all. Each one representing a different Olympic sport from the London 2012 line up.  Number 5 for instance is basketball.

Personally I really enjoy basketball. I loved playing it and find it great to watch, which is why I’m off to see a couple of games with my family when the Olympics arrive in London.  It’s because of this that my dad has bought me a number 5 coin to keep.

Basketball Queen

Now, we had a look at it to see the unique design on it, and yes, it represents the sport of basketball. There’s a special moulded design on one side. On the other side, the head’s side, it has the standard Queen’s head with the official wording of “ELIZABETH.II.D.G REG.F.D.2011”.

Yes, they remembered the date this time.

So well done Royal Mint, that’s marvellous.

Conclusion

Well no, it isn’t really. The thing is, presumably the date on a coin has to be when it was actually made. Otherwise it may be deemed illegal. I get that bit.

So I guess you may have realised by now that for something that is to be a collectable, commemorative coin for the London 2012 Olympics does in fact have the date of ‘2011’ planted on it.

Only the Royal Mint could make something so collectable, seem so worthless.

Marvellous… absolutely marvellous.

Whoops!

I recently read an article that highlighted blatant mistakes in some supermarket labels.

For instance, Wilkinsons were selling Colgate toothpaste at £2.60 each, or 2 for £6. Hardly encouragement to buy two if you ask me.

Then ASDA chipped in with their own bargain for Lucozade Sport by selling it for £2 a bottle, or 2 for £6, huh?

And not wishing to be excluded from the silliness was Tesco who listed Dr. Oetker pizzas for £1.39, or 2 for £4.50.

Clearly none of these were meant to say this and can probably be put down as genuine mistakes caused by the ever growing involvement of computers in our society.

Signs Don’t Escape

Whilst reading this article I started to think about all of the mistakes that have been made in signs over the years.  It specifically reminded me about one I came across a few weeks ago. It was located in my local Sainsburys supermarket car park, and it just didn’t make any sense at all…

Now, I don’t think it can be attributed to being classed as a computer glitch.  For me it’s definitely human error somewhere along the line.

The Sign In Question

You see, the sign said “Thank you for leaving these spaces free for Blue Badge holders”. Ok, that’s a nice thing to say and I can clearly see the positives with it.  Unfortunately though it was located in the wrong place… or so I thought at first.  Don’t worry, I’ll explain.

Normally supermarkets locate simple and useful signs throughout their car parks. They have exit signs guiding drivers out, no entry signs controlling one-ways, and specific signs indicating where the disabled bays and mother and toddler spaces are.

But Why Say That?

I was with my wife at the time who is a disabled Blue Badge holder. So upon arrival into the car park I pulled up into a disabled bay.  It was then that I noticed the sign in front of me. I stopped for a moment and turned to my wife and said “Well that’s not right is it?”

The message on the sign was clearly thanking me for not parking in the very space that I’d just parked in.  How ridiculous.

I started to think it through… well it’s obviously for people who shouldn’t be parking in a disabled bay. So for instance my good self when I’m not with my wife. That’s OK, fine. Completely agree.

Broken Pencil

The daft thing is that if I park elsewhere, so not in a disabled bay, then I won’t see the sign.  The flip side is that if someone doesn’t have a badge but does park in a disabled bay then they probably couldn’t care less whether they are thanked or not for doing something that they clearly haven’t done.

It’s just a crazy scenario.  The sign is simply like a broken pencil… pointless!

One Answer

Somewhere along the line this sign and location has never been thrashed out across the boardroom table, or maybe it has, which is a bit worrying!

The problem here is that the only suitable place for this sign to be is in a normal parking space, and not in a disabled bay.  This way each driver will be thanked for not parking in a disabled bay, and for kindly leaving those spaces for people who may need them.

The issue with this policy is clearly that hundreds of signs are needed for each non-disabled parking space, something I’m sure the cost justification department will say no to in most cases.

Conclusion

So what’s the way forward then?

Well, I guess they could just forget about thanking drivers, albeit the wrong ones, and remove the signs altogether.  Or perhaps the best, most accurate and relatively cost effective thing to do is to leave the sign located in the disabled bay but simply change its wording.  I’ve come up with a couple of ideas.

How about… “Dear Blue Badge Holder: Well done on finding a free bay!”

That’s fairly tame I know so perhaps something a little stronger would be more fitting…

“No Blue Badge? Ring 01234.555.678 to find out where to pick your car up from. Signed Mr. Tow Truck”.

Oh well, I’m sure you get the gist.