Dear Jac – Page 84
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Dear Jac
Cracking the barcode for the curious customer
Glyn Reece, who runs Penny's in Chester, got a chance to show off his superior knowledge when the Daily Mail posed the question: "Is it possible to tell if goods are made in Britain from the barcode on the label?"
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Dear Jac
Catch 22 is holding back Point Four
Some time ago Point Four launched its innovative epos system supported by advertising that would be screened in stores and would make the system free to retailers.
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Dear Jac
Controlling drinking: should you therefore control price?
Septuagenarian Eddie Pittman was distinctly unimpressed by Tesco's gesture to the nation's health: something should be done about cheap booze.
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Dear Jac
Charity should mean donation by free will
Lesley Brown checked her invoices from Dawsons News and saw that 30p a week was being appropriated to support the newstrade's charity NewstrAid.
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Dear Jac
Are service levels on the money?
There has been some feedback following the story in my last column that related Jay Parmar's problems getting supplies of money for his Cardpoint ATM machine.
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Dear Jac
Service down, but charges up - time to move on
Kirit Patel writes: "Further to the article about Bipin Patel, I am writing to inform you that I have been a Natwest customer since 1978 and have found that lately service levels have dropped and bank charges have increased.
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Dear Jac
What would you have to cough up to compete?
Jag Sanghera, who runs D&S News and Off Licence in London's Shepherd's Bush, thought he had found a good deal for Halls Mentho-Lyptus at the confectionery wholesaler Hancocks.
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Dear Jac
The penalty culture is alive and well
Sunil Joshi, who runs a Costcutter at East London's Manor Park, has double yellow lines outside his store.
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Dear Jac
Keep your cool, save your energy
Steve Mand has 10 fridges in his store, Turnberry News in Birmingham. He wants to modernise and consolidate and thought he had read something about some sort of grant in C-Store.
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Dear Jac
Are they barking up the wrong tree?
Can you claim a guard dog as a legitimate business expense?
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Dear Jac
When can you bank on a good deal?
Bipin Patel, who runs Rupell Foodfare in South London's Wandsworth, has been banking with NatWest since 1988.
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Dear Jac
What's the use of an empty cash machine?
Jay Parmar has had quite an issue with his ATM machine. In a nutshell, the machine has been fine, but empty.
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Dear Jac
How to put in an appeal for pennies
When Chris Andrews got a cold call from a rating specialist at Bolton-based Morgan Whittackers, she explained that she was hard of hearing.
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Dear Jac
It's good to share, even if it's 'powerful bad'
I guess a lot of you must be as fed up as I am hearing about/experiencing eye-watering price rises in energy bills.
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Dear Jac
Why penalise those fighting to survive?
Many people will be outraged by Post Office Ltd's apparent decision to cut back the financial compensation package for any ex-post offices taking up alternative ways of supplying certain customer services.
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Dear Jac
The people's Post Office? Which people? Which PO?
Did you see the ads on telly over Christmas? The people's Post Office... all comfy and cosy like in the old Hovis ads.
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Dear Jac
Coins of the realm - just note which realm they're from
Harjeet Mann has become so irritated by the amount of foreign and fake coins that people try to pass off at his store in Chesterfield that he sometimes confiscates them.
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Dear Jac
Lines of communication are wiggly
In these days of incessantly ringing mobiles and torrents of emails, it's odd sometimes how the lines of communication get twisted.
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Dear Jac
How do you sum up the worth of an accountant?
It has been said that a good accountant will ask, how much profit do you want to make? 'Cooking the books' tax-dodge jokes aside, an accountant can be an invaluable business tool.
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Dear Jac
Life's a lottery - you can't win them all
Camelot has responded to my (what I thought was favourable) coverage in the November 30 issue, where I recounted Andrew Renham's tale about his local competition.

















