[Oldmanmatt]

I know, but the local habit is to use V grades. Vb is a Font 3 (ish?)... V0 is a 4 approx.

[andyd]

The local habit is something a little different by my recollection.
That aside, the V grade thing has always seemed a little wierd for me in Devon. Most of the grades seem wrong to me as they were transformed from British tech' to V. Why not lead the way and bring south Devon up to date with the elegance of the font grade?

ps- looks great. Looking forward to a session when I'm back in the motherland.  What's the score with the coffee?

[Oldmanmatt]

Plumbing the machine in this week (before Paul arrives (I have been told!)), Barista training for the lot of us next week.

[andyd]

Where are you getting your beans from?

[Oldmanmatt]

The setters are coming! The setters are coming!

Damn but TCA Bristol crew are good!

61 problems in 5 circuits, in one day and all climbed (ish) too.

Purple, Vb, 12 prbs.
Dark green, V0-V1, 11 prbs.
Blue, V1-V2, 13 prbs.
Red, V2-V4, 13 prbs.
Bright green, V4-V7, 12 prbs.


Untitled (2013-07-03 10:02:50) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:36:16) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

The Beastmaker board continues to grow...


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:27:32) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

We may have spent a bit of time playing...


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:43:15) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

And the kids had to test everything!


Untitled (2013-07-03 16:45:03) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:39:58) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:38:22) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


Untitled (2013-07-03 15:35:03) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


Two weeks to opening.

Nervous...

[Oldmanmatt]

We open tomorrow!!!

Big shout out to Dunnyg, who gave up a glorious day yesterday to assist (read, do instead of) our resident training fiend Mark; to set the systems board and generally dig out around the Bunker!!!

Cheers Huw!


Untitled (2013-07-15 16:27:38) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

(Unfortunately, the wooden holds have to come with a future reset).


We have our Beastmaker Board...



Untitled (2013-07-15 16:28:21) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr


We have a traversing wall, cross trainer, two exercise bikes, a couple of triceps dip stations.


Untitled (2013-07-15 16:26:50) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

And, The Ladybird circuit, for the climber yet to start school.
Nestled between the main problems, Blue, Yellow and Red routes for the shorter climber, finishing at a handy lift down height for the annoying adult in your life...


Untitled (2013-07-15 16:25:17) by oldmanmatt, on Flickr

Many thanks to Mock Rock for that serendipitous delivery ...

[Dr T]

Good luck
 

[tomtom]

Good luck
 

+1 \o/

[Duma]

looking good matt. like the ladybird circuit idea.

[Jaspersharpe]

Best of luck Matt.

looking good matt. like the ladybird circuit idea.

Yeah this is a good idea. Until the Mini Works opened there was a big gap between what Raf could do on the kids wall and anything else, as even using everything was generally too reachy for him on the main walls. This is something The Works has been able to rectify with the Mini Works but the ladybird circuit looks a good way of doing it when you haven't got loads of space to work with.

[Somebody's Fool]

Good luck!

[Oldmanmatt]

Good luck!

Your handy work is looking good!

[tommytwotone]

Brilliant Matt - we'll be passing through in the first weekend of August so will drop in and say hello. Doubt I'll be able to sample much beyond your coffee though, as my other half's not a climber!

[Nibile]

In bocca al lupo , Matt!

Hope to visit you sooner or later! By that time I'll be probably strong enough to project the Ladybird circuit, but it will be worth!

[Oldmanmatt]

THE BOULDER BUNKER IS OPEN AS NORMAL!

As many locals will by now know, we at the Bunker have been doing battle with Npower since June this year.

Some people have got the idea that we have had to close down.

THIS IS NOT THE CASE! We are open as normal!

I have, from the start been extremely candid with the tribulations of opening a climbing wall. Other wall owners have warned me off this, but it's not in my nature and I believe people will and should be more understanding of what it takes for them to be able to indulge in their passion.


Npower, without informing us, changed our unit rate from 14.6p/unit (already high, check your own bill) to 25.74p/unit (nearly 3x more than anyone else in the country pays) in January. Because they made an error reading our meter and thought we hardly used any power.
This happened because they claimed to have been unable to read the meter, even though they repeatedly read the gas meter during the same period and never once left a "cannot read you meter" card.
When their mistake was discovered, they sent us a bill for £5500 (on top of what we'd already paid) and immediately debited the entire amount from our account.
Luckily, with the assistance of the bank (yea Nat West!) we recovered it immediately.
However, even after much discussion, we only managed to reduce the bill to £3000.
So we were forced to agree a very high repayment plan on top of a much higher monthly bill.

This is why we had to let go of two staff members.

That is why I over reacted to Mr Gary Willis in the DWS thread a few weeks ago.
Letting go your best staff members is incredibly heart wrenching.

That should have been the end of it, though.

We were promised a rate of 13.86p/unit and a token payment for our inconvenience. So it should all have been sorted in June.

Then at the end of September we received a new bill, for over a £1200 (on top of the £568/month we are already paying) because they are continuing to charge us at 25.74p / unit.
This means that even paying £568 /month we will never get on top of an ever growing debt and will be forced to increase this payment. They will not allow us to change providers.

Leaving us with ongoing bills of over a thousand pounds per quarter (or almost another member of staff).

We do not use any more electricity than the average household!

Here's a snap shot of our consumption and the calculations of what we SHOULDER have been paying.



Would anyone care to ask me if I would recommend Npower as an energy provider?

[Oldmanmatt]

And if anyone wonders why we carry on?

See Ed Gow-Smith's post in the Southwest bouldering thread.

Ed trains here (free, we sponsor him) and trains our youngsters.

And this is what we're getting:

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10205004544259255&id=1411527864

7 year old Keoni



13 year old Kiera.

And too many more to list!

So, yes it's worth it.

[fatneck]

Bastards... Stick with it mate!!

[tomtom]

Might be time to get a lawyer involved Matt... certainly complain to the regulator...

Maybe a letter to Guardian Money?

[andyd]

Would anyone care to ask me if I would recommend Npower as an energy provider?

 


Lawyer sounds like a plan. They have drop-in sessions where they talk you through it/tout for business down the road from me.
Get all of your evidence together.
Ask them for their evidence of what they say they've done.
Change energy suppliers.
Sorry for your pain dude.

[Oldmanmatt]

We have spoken to a variety of journalists today, one (from a certain financial Broad sheet) phoned the Npower press officer for us.

10 minutes later we had a call from a senior manager at Npower (as they had now magically found our mobile numbers and email address).

So they finally want to talk.

But will only make it go away if we accept that it is all our fault and if we agree to a two year contract with them.

Oh, and they have credited our account with £20 for our inconvenience.


Every decision we have made since June has been based around this massive, ever growing debt (it's like taking a loan from Wonga, without even ever agreeing to or asking for it).
We had to FIRE two good people, just to even contemplate covering this crap.

I asked Shark for permission to add a commercial post here, just to let people know that we were not actually closed (we've spent all day trying to reassure booked groups etc etc) and I have let my fingers run away with the typing, again.

But, maybe, I will post up suitably redacted copies of the correspondence in a separate, non-advertising thread later, because what they have done to us is incredible and people should be aware of how dishonest these bastards are.

Remember, we spent two months over the summer under threat of legal action for "not allowing them access to read the meter" (first letter came in June), when they had already read the meter in April!

But, every time we phoned; we were told it's all a mistake and not to worry and they will re-bill etc etc. Then a few weeks later we'd get another load of crap and threats.

[andy_e]

I had to submit a meter reading five times over the space of six months before they could actually generate a correct final bill (which resulted in them giving me back £20. I bet that hurt...) and it involved multiple threats of letting the ombudsman know just how wilfully ignorant they were of any correspondence from me. Switch to co-op, much better.

[tomtom]

I'm with First... who apparently have their faults but are fine.
They also have an app - so you can enter your readings every month yourself - and see your usage change etc...

MrsTT is with NPower, and 18 months ago tried to switch - using the switcher service - to a different cheaper NPower tarrif.. still on-going.. *facepalmicon*

[Muenchener]

Sounds like a lawyer might be more use than journalists at this point (albeit also more expensive).

[Jaspersharpe]

That's really shit, what bastards. I agree that you need legal advice on this, would CAB be a good starting point? You've probably already thought of this.....

[Oldmanmatt]

Amazing response through Facebook and Twitter (45000+ views on the original post, several hundred shares and God knows how many views of the shared posts. Comments, emails, messages and phone calls from all over and crucially some long phone conversations with senior managers (board level no less) of rival Energy companies, only too willing to point out what Npower did wrong.

😎