Put it this way. If the phone was ringing would you let it just ring out, thinking you’ll answer it tomorrow?

Email is another form of communication but unlike the phone can’t make the urgent sound that demands you answer it immediately.  So it amazes me how many business people (including banks and large corporations) don’t actually reply to emails, even ones that are relatively urgent) till days or weeks later.  Why is that?

I believe it’s because they don’t have staff regularly monitoring their email and that’s a poor thing.  It’s a legitimate form of communication and people will use it because it’s convenient.  Why is it convenient? Well, let me count the ways:

1. They don’t have to wait for someone to answer the phone
2. They don’t have to call during business hours but rather send a message at a time that suits the sender
3. Written email will often help clarify the problem or request and additional information can be sent such as images, copies of text, etc
4. They don’t have to sit on hold for a long time as is often the case when making phone calls
5. Written responses mean that the receiver can read over it again and again to check on the response rather than having to depend on their memory whether they heard right.

I’m sure there are others but this was just off the top of my head.

So, will you be checking your email regularly now rather than just thinking about it occasionally?  It’s worth thinking about.

This is a laugh!

Just got this email with an attachment which no doubt has some script installed in it.  What makes it so funny?  Well, apart from the obvious things like not addressing it personally to me (I don’t even have a NAB account), spelling errors, etc, it talks about paying me in Euro – from an Australian bank?  Doh!

I have notified the real NAB of the new phishing/spam email doing the rounds.  To date I’ve received 3 copies in less than half an hour.

Subject: Reward 20 Euro (31 AUD) ,take our survey jurney

Dear NAB Credit/Debit card Holder,

For better cooperation between NAB and his clients, NAB Survey Team has
initiated a new poll on the functionality of our banking services. By
completing the attached survey form emailed, you will receive an amount of
20 Euro. This amount will be debited to your credit card account in 2 days
after verifications. To participate, download form attached to email !

Thank you to all the readers this year who have helped make this blog worth writing.  I know my posts have been less than in past years but I expect if you know what’s taken place in my life you’ll know that’s not unexpected. I’m hoping to pick things up for the new year.  In the meantime, read on, I have something special for you – or for your kids.

At this time of year we think about our kids and what will delight them, surprise them, and make them happy.

I recently became aware of a great service that shows a photo of Santa in your own home – so your kids can see he really did visit!

It’s called I Caught Santa. The site allows users to upload a picture of their Christmas scene and add a Santa Claus that looks like he was “caught” in the act, in “their” house. Imagine the look of wonder and surprise when a child gets a picture of Santa caught in their house. Parents can also share their photo online, print it at home, or send it to a store for processing. Why not pop over there right now?

Then this useful tool might just help sway your thoughts to what you should and shouldn’t be participating in.  I thought it very interesting to watch and it will probably open a few minds and eyes.

I’ve just had a liberating moment – well, more than a moment, quite a few minutes really. But I feel like I’ve just freed up some of my time and will most likely fill it with something else.

What am I talking about?  My Google Reader. It had become too full with over 1,000 posts I haven’t even read or skimmed through.  It became overwhelming and I decided to cull the list of blogs I was subscribed to.  I got rid of all those which haven’t updated for months – although that didn’t cull the 1000+ new posts I haven’t yet read. And then I went through those that I was really no longer interested in but had subscribed to quite some time ago. That included forums I might not participate in much these days.  I even found there were some dead forums or blogs – no longer active.

Whew!  Feel better now.

And then I added a few new subscriptions, mainly to photography blogs since I have a keen interest in that topic these days.

Now I can get on with my work today feeling a little less cluttered on my Internet desktop.

My husband and I have recently shifted to the country from suburban life.  It’s still a suburb of Melbourne but an outer suburb amongst the hills and bushland. It’s beautiful and we look forward to many years here as we head towards retirement and grand-parenthood.

While I do run a virtual online business of my own, I find it’s still important to maintain contact with local business operators. There are just some things that need to be done on a local basis.  And it’s a great way to get to know the locals and let them know I exist too.

I woke up in the morning realising I hadn’t yet seen a local newspaper so when I went to the post office on my daily trek to the shopping area I noticed some shops had the local paper stuck under their doors. On enquiry I found out where I could get a copy and brought it home to check through the classifieds. (I find it strange thinking about the local paper on the very day it’s become available)

A short time later I had 3 appointments set for the day for a home handyman to do some carpentry, for someone else to come and cut up fallen branches and clear the area at the back of our property and for yet another to regularly mow our very large lawns.

It’s important to support the local business community whenever possible.

I noticed in my spam filter two messages that are supposed to be from the Australian Tax Office telling me about a Tax Refund. I don’t believe for a moment that they would contact me that way – I still get mail direct from them or via my Accountant, however just to alert you to some other things about this email.

• It is not personally addressed.
• Any correspondence from the tax office would include my tax account number details.
• Email is not secure so why would they anyway?
• Why does it list AUD? I didn’t think the Australian Tax Office dealt in other currency with Australian tax payers?
• Why would I need to submit a tax refund form?  Didn’t they just say they’d done a calculation?
• If I hold my mouse over the hyperlink I can see straight away it’s not the ATO website address but some other scammer’s address. I hope they get shut down quickly.  It started with http://pool-96 for those interested in knowing.

When are these idiots going to spend their time on something worthwhile that helps people rather than trying to rip them off?

Dear Australian Taxation Office customer,

After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of AUD $250.50.

Please submit the tax refund form and allow us 3-5 business days in order to process it.

A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons. For example submitting invalid records or applying after the deadline.

To access the form for your tax refund, please Click Here.

NOTE!
For security reasons, we will record your ip-address and date.

Thank you,
Australian Taxation Office Online Department.

I forgot to check the amount of webspace available for a multi-user blog before upgrading it and the thing has crashed.  I had to backtrack to find out what I did when a similar incident happened earlier in the year.  And then I remembered.  I had to get it restored to a former backed up version by my IT guy and then add webspace and then upgrade the thing.  Forgot, forgot, forgot!

So hoping he can fix it for me soon so I can increase the space and then re-run the upgrade.  Doh!

You are viewing a blog – a series of articles or posts that make up the blog.  This particular piece you are reading is a post or blogpost.

One of my pet peeves, although only little, is people who ask about writing blogs when they actually mean posts or articles.

It’s just a little thing but I feel it important to educate people – a blog is a collective of posts, thoughts, articles, entries, whatever but the individual items are the blog posts – not the blog.

What do you think? Blog or post?

I received two of these letters this past week and was shocked to receive bills I wasn’t expecting. They were for my trademarks and I couldn’t recall having to pay bills of that size before. It worried me and was unplanned/unexpected.

Needless to say, research online shows that there are warnings about these letters which are not official.  Below is a link from a legal organisation and the other is ‘hidden’ information I found on the website of the organisation that sent the letters.  I say ‘hidden’ because that page is not linked in their menus and not visible on the site – I only found it through a Google search.

http://www.holdingredlich.com.au/urgent-alert-warning-to-trade-mark-owners

This information is on the Trademark Publisher website but is a hidden page in that it’s not listed on their menu.

INFORMATION ABOUT TRADEMARK PUBLISHER (TMP) – DATABASE SERVICE:
THE TMP WEBSITE WWW.TRADEMARKPUBLISHER.INFO DISPLAYS THE TRADEMARK, THE NAME OF THE TRADEMARK OWNER, THE NAME OF THE ASSOCIATED BRAND AND PRODUCT/SERVICE ON THE INTERNET. IT IS ONLY AVILAIBLE TO PAID, REGISTERED TRADE NAMES AND DESIGNS WITH THEIR IP AUSTRALIA REGISTRATION NUMBERS AND CLASSES. PUBLICATION ON THE TMP INFO REGISTER PROVIDES WORLDWIDE PUBLICATION ON THE INTERNET. THIS PUBLICATION IS AN ELECTIVE SERVICE AND DOES NOT SUBSTITUTE FOR REGISTRATION, NOR DOES IT PROLONG THE VALIDITY OF YOUR TRADEMARK REGISTRATION WITH IP AUSTRALIA.