Barclays or Bars of Clay

Just hang up the phone after talking to Barclays bank Customer Care. I seriously wonder if the brains of guys at Barclays bank are filled with Bars of Clay, maybe which is why Barclays hired them. I have had relationships with various banks in the last 3yrs but have never encountered such a poor and dumb service squarely aimed at looting and annoying customers.

Reason for my call - To cancel the damn card/account of Barclays Bank. I want to cancel my card and wipe off my records from the database of Barclays bank. I have come to hate it so much that I dont want a trace of mine in Barclays bank. These guys will easily win Gold Medal for pissing off or annoying the customers.

1. They dont have a branch office in Chennai, but they have it in Kancheepuram(town 70kms from Chennai) . Can anyone explain me the logic? The only logic I can think of is maybe they want to be so damn faraway that customers dont flock banging their doors . Since there is no branch, you cannot make cash payments.

2. Your other option is online payment or dropping Cheque in dropboxes. So, if you want to know Dropbox locations, you gotta download a PDF file from their site and zoom it to 200% to be able to read something. I am not even sure, if clearance is regularly done at these dropboxes. Apparently my friends cheque was not taken for clearance the day he had dropped and he was charged with late payment charges and interest. Are we to be blamed if the bank does late clearance or if the banks are on leave?

3. Customer Care numbers are always busy. The call doesnt go thru itself - it simply gives a message "The Customer you are trying to reach is busy.Please try again later" and shit. I have only experienced call getting connected and then you navigate thru the Interactive Voice system and finally end up waiting for the human voice to come online. Forget all that here, the call simply doesnt go thru- you cannot even reach that interactive or whatever voice system they call. I emailed them about the probem and they very intelligently responded with this message "Please note that you can also reach us on our Barclaycard Helpline numbers mentioned below, our customer service excutive will be please to assist you". What a meaningless, dumb reply?

4. Skip a payment and you'll be tortured everyday with dozen calls from dozen different numbers from all over the country. Yes, everyday you'd get automated calls from dozen numbers reminding you to pay the outstanding. You cant even yell back. They keep bombarding you with these calls for atleast 4 - 5 days even after you make the payment.

5. And you will also receive a dozen SMS reminding you to pay up.

6. No soul would ever call from Barclays bank to check why is the delay or maybe to send a person to collect cash or cheque. You will simply be bombarded with Automated Calls from Barclays call center as though we are some robots or computer programs here.

8. If you lost a card, they dont bother to send you a new card. I made requests for it and its been a month or so and I have not received it yet. They visit your home to do hajar verifications but dont give you the card. These guys are so good at irritating.

9. Highest late payment charges for a credit card. Atleast, of all the cards I have used

10. My balance transfer request was rejected and the status was not updated to me. I had to make repeated calls for a month. Everytime they would respond saying its in process and I will receive it in few days. One fine day, they told me its been rejected and no reasons offered. I was totally appalled here.

11. I cleared my small outstanding of Rs 1200. I called up to close my account or relationship with Barclays. The response was the request cannot be taken since my new card is on its way and only after receiving the card I can place a request. What bullshit? I dont even need the card. now. They know the number of new Card. Why cant they simply block or cancel the card? Inwhich case even if I end up receiving, its just a useless plastic card. I cannot even close or end my account here despite having zero outstanding. After serious arguments, the guy took my request and said it would take 7 days to act on the request and I am supposed to call back to confirm it seems.

Sorry for this rambling. This is just to keep you informed so that you know what to do when you receive those unsolicited calls from Barclays sales rep.

Poor or Rich? Know where you stand

The answer lies in the table below. The table was flicked from a book How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis and customized for the Indian scenario by me. I am not going to review the book here. You can read it in Amazon.com or in this blog or about Dennis in BusinessWeek by clicking the hyperlinks. All I can say is it is not your usual get rich or self help guides from the likes of Robert Kiyosaki or feel good authors like Rhonda Bryne of the The Secret fame. Felix is a man who's been there done everything and he is anti self help. You can simply read it for its sheer fun and wit.

Table: Wealth measured by Cash in Hand or Quickly Realisable Assets

5 lakhs - 10 lakhs - simply poor

10 lakhs - 50 lakhs - the comfortably poor

50 lakhs - 1 crore - the comfortably off

1 crore - 5 crore - the so called rich

5 crore - 25crore - the rich

25 crore - 50 crore - the decently rich

50 crore - 100 crore - the seriously rich

100 crore – 500 crore - the truly rich

500+ crores - the Ambanis and Mittals

Quickly realisable doesnt mean that you can go to an ATM and withdraw. It can be a day or week or maximum a month. You see, big guys not necessarily have it all in cash. By the way the list does not include all your assets. Its simply cash in hand or quickly realizable asset.

Well I hear you guys saying I am happy being poor. The purpose of the list is to know where you stand not to put you/me down. Only if you know where you stand you can move to where you want. The list is arbitrary and may not be accepted by everyone.

Book Review: Go Kiss the World by Subroto Bagchi

Why this book matters?

Subroto Bagchi needs no introduction. If you need introduction, you probably dont belong to the IT scene of India. If you are in IT and yet dont know him, you are then probably not curious about the business side of IT or about the world of business as such. To start with, he is one of the notable figures in IT landscape of India. He is one of the co founders of MindTree consulting. For folks outside of IT, MindTree consulting is a highly successful software company which was started in 1999 and went public with a big bang in 2007. The title of the book "Go Kiss the World" are the last words of Subroto's mom to him. This brief is enough to be curious about this book.

How I picked it?

On a good Sunday morning, my dad passed on the newspaper article of this book and asked me to check it out. I saw the name Subroto Bagchi and was curious to know what's this new book about. I have seen and heard about his previous book "The High Performance Entrepreneur" several times but dint bother to buy, because I was not ready for entrepreneurship. I had that clarity and dint want to be disturbed.

2 weeks later I stumbled upon this book while leisurely browsing in Landmark. Going by the tag line "Life Lessons for Young Professionals" I felt it should be more apt and relatable and bought it without giving too much thought. I dint want any management buzzwords, MBA bookish fundas here. I wanted real life experiences and practical ideas. Lets see how the book fared.

The Review

Started reading with Prologue and I just couldnt go beyond the 5 pages of Prologue. The sentence formations, the style of writing, large sentences, dint strike a chord with me and I couldnt read further. This is largely because the previous book I read "The Art of Learning" by Josh Waltzein had such beautiful writing that I couldnt take anything that is less eloquent than that. Both books are similar; autobiographical in nature and the authors dig into their own lives to share their learnings with the readers. One glaring difference would be, the backdrop of Joshs book is sports and that of Subrotos book is largely corporate life.

I am not even close to being called a good writer, but a book from someone whose previous book is highly recommended one coupled with my personal admiration for MindTree, made me have high expectations in my mind. I was disappointed and took consolation from the fact that profits from this book goes to MindTree charity foundation. Later I felt, its unfair 1st to compare and 2nd to drop the book in five pages. I decided to read thru.

Here’s the real deal. Book is divided into three parts.

In the 1st part he takes us thru his childhood days in Orissa, school and college life and how he gets his 1st job in DCM Shriram as management trainee.

In the 2nd part he talks about quitting DCM, his brief entrepreneurial stint later and finally joining Wipro. Its get lot more interesting here when he talks about early days of IT scene in India, how Wipro dint have an office in US and operated out of his own house. One can also get glimpses of Azim Premji here as he was directly reporting to Premji.

In the 3rd part he talks about quitting Wipro after a 10year stint and joining Lucent before starting MindTree. These are interesting incidents people can easily relate and learn.

It starts with a boring 1st part, gets interesting in 2nd part, and keeps you hooked till the end. Lets be realistic, its not supposed to be a entertainment novel. Its a journey of one mans life from a humble background in Orissa to a high flier written in honest and candid manner.

Overall, the book borders between Ok and Good and there are enough takeaways for young professionals in IT or non IT companies especially for guys from humble or modest background. Its not a must read, but good to read one for young professionals. It definitely offers good wisdom and the impacts of such small learnings cannot be quantified.

Being an Atheist

I am an Atheist. I feel a bit odd and weird to say that. Saying I am an Atheist is as ridiculous as someone saying I am normal. It has to be a default thing. I cannot think of any other way of thinking.

Having born in a very religious family, it doesn't surprise me the way my thoughts have shaped up. Thanks to the freedom of thoughts and speech at home.

Tracing back, the only time I feared God was during my thumb sucking days. Those were days when I was told dont lie, God will poke your eyes with a fountain pen, Dont copy in exams, God is watching everyone from above using Hubble telescope. If I had fallen and hurt myself, I was told, God punished me. I was told, Good peeps go to heaven where hot angels revolve around you ready to grant your requests and Bad folks go down to Hell which is filled with zombies ready to throw you in burning oil. I was told stories of God punishing Adam for eating the forbidden fruit in school and stories of various avatars and demons at home.

Very generously, God dint punish me or my friends for lying or copying in exams. So, things dint happen and I started questioning. Questions had no answers.

Beyond the thumb sucking days, I stopped fearing. I never prayed God for anything. I never asked him any favors. I have not asked him the clichéd why its happening only to me. I used to smile when guys in college close their eyes and pray seriously to God before every exam and before checking the results online. Seriously funny. My world is no worse than those guys who pray five times or repeat slogans throught the day. Infact I am much more happier living, thinking and exploring things at my own free will. As Richard Dawkins author of God Delusion says, It frees you up to live life on your own terms. Its simply living life to its fullest.

This sort of thinking has started rising especially among people who decide to open up a bit. People have started agreeing and saying religion is just a belief, its a way to discipline oneself or the society and the religious tales and its characters are myths.

Yesterday, CERN attempted to simulate the Big Bang experiment. That is a huge progress from the days of Galileo being house arrested for saying earth is not the centre of universe to now where billion dollar experiments that will prove universe indeed began with a Big Bang.

I think the world is very slowly opening up, becoming more tolerant and moving towards Atheism or Agnosticism or spiritualism. Yes religious fanatic groups are still around creating havoc and stunting the worlds growth. Ignoring them, other people who have the opportunity or the freedom to explore are slowly changing. Karunanidhi, Kamal, myself, etc are still living happily because of the more tolerant people.



Do check out the fantastic video which shows some of the worlds best thinkers and philanthropists are Atheists. As in the video "Its far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring". The irony is as Hawking puts its the more you try to understand the Universe, the more you think about God. Well, not the regular mythical God who punishes you or grants you your wishes.

Disclosure: I am from a religious family. I do visit temples but to appease my parents. Its fun and you can do good birdwatching.

Social Entrepreneurs helping Rural India

Its a nice and inspirational video of a social entrepreneur helping Rural India with Solar technologies. Watching the video I am sure you are not gonna become a social entrepreneur. Atleast,

1. You will appreciate the need for such initiatives.

2. You might be hearing this already, Solar is the next big thing, but here are real examples of creative uses of solar panels.

3. Time for these solar folks to turn to the urban side as well, as I am getting sick of the daily 1 - 3 hours powercut in Chennai. Makes me feel, rural guys are better off with solar panels and stuff and we are still dependent on lousy EB.

4. Recent goofups like tying the mangal sutra to bride's friend or sister because of power cut can be avoided. Courtesy: Economic Times

Jumping on Google Chrome Bandwagon

Google announces Google Chrome. I thought Wow, a browser from Google and that was least expected. I was thrilled in thinking How was it going to look like? What surprises in store? MS reaction for it?. Shared the news with my friends. The next day Google released it prompting millions to grab a copy and I was one among them. Thankfully Google servers dint crash. So im in the cool gang of the first few millions to try it out. The coolness factor was important.

Downloaded and started using it. Read all the blogs that had something to say about Chrome. Posts like its awesome, whats the future of FF?, its no IE beater, its a threat to Silverlight and AIR, its terms of service is suspicious, I am not excited about Chrome, Chromes is not secure were all over the blogosphere. For my part I did make noise in Twitter, changed my status in Gtalk briefly to "Chrome is simple and superfast" so that I dont look uncool. Now I am even writing a post which has Chrome as the subject.

At the end of the day, after all the testing, tweeting, hype and hoopla I am back to using Firefox. Did I gain anything in this exercise? At best I can indugle myself in some Chrome discussion in Office and sound more geekier than my colleagues.

Ganesha 2.0 ?

Pic Courtesy: Economic Times

Time for Ganesha to go for a makeover, atleast for the idol makers to give him a makeover this season, reports an article in Economic Times. Funny to learn, Ganesha, the cool dude is jumping the bandwagon of being fit and trim, if possible a pack or two as well. Idol makers are bringing out this new version of slimmer and trimmer Ganesha this Ganesh Chaturthi in Ahmedabad. They go on to say people do not want a paunchy Ganesha, hence they started experimenting with a lean and mean one. I am not sure whether its the public not wanting a paunchy Ganesha or Gujju idol makers getting a bit creative here. Lets see if slim Ganeshas are available in Chennai next week, should be amusing to celebrate Ganesh Chaturthi in his new avatar or version 2.0.

Steven Speilberg to direct movie on Tin Tin comics

I am thrilled. My favorite director directing my favorite comic. Steven Speilberg is directing a movie on TinTin comics. I seriously never imagined such a possibility. As the reports goes he will be directing the first of three movies that are planned. The first film, will be based on one of the Tintin books 'The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham's Treasure'. I am not sure if its going to be animation or real world movie. Whatever it is, Steven and TinTin combo sure has me excited. Well, the folks belonging to the Asterix and Obelix camp are going to be disappointed to know that TinTin is gonna become a movie star.

Looking at the pic above makes me nostalgic. I was a big fan on TinTin comics back in my school days. I simply loved the character TinTin, his dog Snowy and the adventures that followed. It brings me memories of pulling out TinTin books from library, buying a few episodes of it from Landmark and bragging about it the next day in the school. I still remember endlessly gazing at the back cover wishing to own the whole series one day. Funny when I think about those days.

Seems like you cannot have "thisbanksucks" as password for banking

It was pretty hilarious to read this story in BBC about the experience of a guy in UK who had "Lloyds is pants" as his phone banking password. Lloyds is a bank in UK and pants in Britain supposedly means underwear. First, "Lloyds is pants" as password dint go down well and second his attempts to change his password to much better "Barclays is Better" and "Censorship" also dint find any favor with the bank employee in the call centre. That was real funny. Read the full story here to know how it possibly happened and the banks apologies for this amusing incident.

One Hundred Pushups in One Go

How about doing 100push ups at a stretch? Its definitely a herculean task for me. Atleast for now. But it is not, says 100hundredpushups.com if you break it down to small reps every alternate day spread over six weeks. I totally subscribe to that thought and it kinda makes it feasible. 100hundredpushups.com gives you a simple no nonsense program that can help you achieve 100 push-ups in six weeks. I must say that site is also pretty popular with 6350+ delicious bookmarks. I personally liked the site because it is pretty straight forward with no gimmicks and false promises . The program is very realistic and suits people of all ages less than 65. Well try it out, should be a great phyiscal and mental challenge.