This time, it’s a story about Timbuk2. They make bags.

About five years ago, I bought a black/black/black Timbuk2 laptop messenger bag from Europe Bound in Toronto. I love it. It’s perfect. It holds all my stuff, and is great for daily commuting or a weekend trip. It’s travelled with me almost everywhere I’ve been for the past half decade.

But last summer, I noticed that my bag’s original velcro flap fasteners just weren’t as, well, velcro-y as they used to be:

Not surprising for something that gets ripped apart several times daily. Still, a bit of a nuisance. So I emailed customerservice@timbuk2.com, and asked: “Can you suggest the best way to repair this?” The reply arrived later the same day:

If you don’t mind us sewing through the flap, we should be able to replace it for you.  You can fill out a warranty claim here:  http://www.timbuk2.com/tb2/retail/warrantyreturn.htm

A kind offer, but I wasn’t keen on them sewing right through the bag to fix it. So I asked, “Is there any way to replace the velcro w/o sewing through the flap?” Again, a very speedy reply:

Looks like we can try to repair it, or worst case scenario, just replace the bag. Go ahead and follow the instructions here, and we’ll get you all squared away! http://www.timbuk2.com/wordpress_cms/customer-service/the-timbuk2-quality-guarantee/

So I filled out their warranty form, got an RMA number, and then, promptly did nothing for a year. Yes, that’s right. I got busy, or lazy, or perhaps just plain forgot, but I never sent my bag for them to diagnose and/or try to fix. I just kept on using the bag with the non-velcro-y velcro. It wasn’t ideal, of course, but it got my stuff from point A to point B.

12 months passed, and then, a few weeks ago, for whatever reason, I decided to email Timbuk2 again. “I know it’s been a year,” I wrote, “But does your offer still stand?” Their reply:

You can go ahead and still send the bag in. Just make sure to write that RMA number on the outside of the package and we will either issue you a store credit or fix the bag.

Keep in mind this is more than a year after I filled out the original warranty claim, and five years since I bought the bag. And I didn’t even buy it from them! I bought it from a third-party retailer. So I headed to Canada Post to mail my messenger bag off to San Francisco.

Well, as it turns out, shipping a messenger bag (even an empty one) can be pretty darned expensive. So, I emailed Timbuk2 one more time to let them know that I appreciated their offer, but that the cost to ship my bag to them was prohibitive.

A few days later, their reply (from Heather):

We apologize for the long wait.   I sent over another email with a credit code in it to use on our website. You can use this to purchase a new bag. We just ask that you donate your current bag to someone in need.

Boy oh boy, that’s above and beyond. And that last line — that’s classy.

Want to guess who I’ll buy my next bag from?

They suck in (at least) three ways:

1. Banks charge a fee for every transfer (my bank, TD, charges $30-80 per transfer)
2. Banks’ international exchange rates are terrible
3. Sometimes, your money needs to pass through an intermediary bank, which may charge additional fees

So then, when when Jenna and I decided to move to France, I started looking around for alternatives to bank wire transfers. After looking at several options, we decided to try out CanadianForex, an online forex service that advertises better exchange rates and lower fees than the banks. I was skeptical.

So then, for the benefit of anyone considering CanadianForex, here’s a quick outline of how it all went:

Setup

I set up our CanadianForex account while we were still in Toronto. The process was pretty simple. It involved filling out an online form, taking a telephone call from a friendly CanadianForex rep to confirm a few details, then sending in proof of our Canadian bank account (a scanned bank statement).

After we arrived in Lyon and opened our French bank account (which is an entirely different story), I decided to try to actually move some money. I set up our French bank account as a beneficiary, then placed an order online.

Exchange Rate

I ordered Euros on January 11, 2012. That day, if I’d bought Euros through my bank, one Canadian dollar would have bought me 0.74867 €. At CanadianForex, the rate was 1 CAD = 0.7627 €

Bottom line: Using CanadianForex got me an extra 1.4 centime on the dollar, compared to TD Canada Trust. Not bad.

Fees

Because of the amount we transferred, CanadianForex didn’t charge us any fees.

Zero fees.

TD would have charged us at least $30 CAD per transfer.

Customer service

I telephoned CanadianForex a few times — once to confirm that my French banking details were set up correctly, and another time to confirm that there would be no intermediary bank involved. Both times friendly human beings with Australian accents (CanadianForex is owned by Austalia-based OzForex) helped me out and answered my questions.

The rest of my dealings with CanadianForex were entirely online, and very straightforward.

Side note: When I asked TD about their wire transfer protocol, they handed me a photocopied form, and told me that when I wanted to transfer money, I could fill it out and fax it to them. Fax!

Timing

From start to finish, the transfer took a few days. I ordered Euros on January 11, and received a confirmation that they’d been deposited in our French bank account on January 16.

When I checked, the transfer was exactly the amount quoted, and indeed, there were no fees or intermediary banks involved.

Again, not bad.

Overall

CanadianForex advertises itself as a cheaper alternative to wire transfers, and in my (lone) experience, it is. If you feel like saving a percentage point or two on international money transfers, they’re definitely worth checking out. I’ll definitely use them again.

But heres’s the thing: subscribing to and downloading new podcasts to my iPhone is fiddly. Syncing with iTunes on my Mac is fiddly. Downloading new episodes a-la-carte via the iTunes app on iOS is fiddly.

Which is why I was absolutely delighted to learn about Instacast. It’s a standalone podcast downloader and player for iOS, and it’s exactly what the iPhone’s built-in should have been. I wish I’d known about it sooner. Here’s a video:

Introduction to Instacast from Vemedio on Vimeo.

If you listen to or download podcasts regularly, and aren’t satisfied with iTunes, Instacast is well worth the $1.99 asking price.

I’ll begin by saying we were warned.

Several people made it very plain to us: setting up a French bank account is complicated, and takes longer than you’d think. So then, the point of this blog post is a) to verify that setting up a French bank account is indeed complicated and time-consuming, and b) to vent about that.

Making an appointment

The first thing worth mentioning is that you can’t simply waltz into a French bank and set up an account. You must first make an appointment. So shortly after we arrived in Lyon, as soon as the New Years’ holidays were over, I started telephoning banks to prendre un rendezvous. The earliest available appointments at many banks were a week later. Not later that afternoon. Or the following day. A week later.

Time was of the essence, and after many telephone calls, I eventually found a bank (Le Credit Lyonnais) that was willing to set up an appointment for the following day. So we took it. More on that shortly. But first:

The Catch-22

This part is important. So pay close attention.

1. In order to set up a French bank account, you need proof of residence, like a utility bill.
2. In order to set up any French utility, you need a bank account.

Hilarious, right?

How exactly does one figure a way out of this nightmarish chicken-and-egg scenario? Here’s what we did.

Basically, we found a very generous family who were willing to lie to the bank on our behalf. They wrote us a letter claiming that we lived with them, and also gave us copies of their cartes de sejour and their utility bills to bring to our bank appointment. They also put our names on their mailbox, because in France, it’s apparently illegal to deliver mail if the addressee’s name doesn’t appear on the corresponding mailbox.

So yeah, if you want a French bank account, you should line up an accomplice ahead of time, because you’ll need their help when you’re lying to the bank about where you live.

The appointment itself

Bureaucracy is a French word. We were already aware of the French love of paperwork. The bank was no exception. I’ve taken courses in university that generated less paper.

All in all, the appointment was long (~90 minutes), but pretty painless. Lots of personal questions, and lots of signatures. But nothing out of the ordinary. Our appointment was on a Wednesday, and we were told that we could pick up our cheques and bank cards the following Tuesday or Wednesday. This was good news, because we were about to move into a new apartment, and our landlord would be expecting cheques. And thus began…

The wait

Speed does not seem to be a pillar of French banking. Here’s the timeline:

Day 1

We set up our account.

Day 4

Secret bank access codes arrive in the (postal) mail.

Day 6

We go to the bank to see if our cheques and bank cards are ready. The woman looks up our names on the computer, walks to a locked filing cabinet, and pulls out several envelopes with our names on them. She opens the envelopes in front of us. Our bank cards and chequebook are inside.

Success! We’ll be able to pay our landlord!

But wait. Before she hands us our new bank cards and cheques, the woman looks at the computer again. La directrice of the bank has not given her final sign-off on our account. No soup for you.

We’re told to return the following day, and we leave empty handed.

Day 7

We return to the bank to pick up our cheques and bank cards. Success! We (finally) write our landlord a cheque.

Later that day, we excitedly head to a bank machine to try out our new bank cards. We use the secret bank access codes they sent on Day 4.

The codes don’t work.

Day 8

We return to the bank to ask why the codes they sent us in the mail don’t work. As it turns out, the codes they sent in the mail were not our bank card PINs, but rather, codes for online banking. We’re told that our bank card PINs will arrive in the (postal) mail… in a few days.

Day 10

Our PINs arrive in the postal mail. We’re set. I think.

In conclusion

I started by saying setting up a French bank account is complicated, and takes longer than you’d think. That’s true. If you’re an etranger, and you want to set up a bank account, your two best assets are:

1. A person who’s willing to pretend that you live with them, and is also willing to put your name on their mailbox, give you copies of their utility bills and identity papers.
2. An awful lot of patience.

Bonne courage!

Earlier this week, I found myself in Lyon’s 7th arrondissement, at a bar called l’Antisèche. I was there for L’UkeDunum, a new-ish monthly gathering of Lyonnais ukulele players (or, as they call themselves, ukulélistes).

I’d been in touch with the organizers, Cécile and Guillaume, earlier in the week via email. In broken French, I told them I wanted to attend their jam, but that sadly, my ukulele was still en route from Toronto, stuck in Brittany.

Cécile et Guillaume both assured me I’d be able to borrow a uke.

—

Days later, when I arrived at l’Antiseche, I asked the bartender if I was in the right place for “les ukulélés.”

“Ils n’ont pas encore arrivé,” she replied. Turns out, I was early.

So I ordered a beer (une pression), sat down, and waited for the other ukulélistes to arrive. Over the next half hour, eleven more people trickled in, all carrying ukuleles.

When organizer Cécile arrived, she handed me a ukulele, and told me I could use it for the night, and if I wanted to, I could take it home with me.

“Merci, mais ce n’est pas nécessaire,” I said. “Je vais récupérer mon ukulélé cette semaine.” My ukulele was supposed to arrive later in the week, hand-delivered by the sister of a former co-worker of Jenna’s, who weeks ago, offered to be a kind of ukulele mule.

But Cécile insisted that I keep the uke for a little while. She went on to explain that this particular ukulele came with a story. Cécile told me that this ukulele was a voyageur. She pointed inside the sound hole of the uke, which was full of names, dates, and stickers. It had been travelling across France, passed from person to person to person. The tradition started several years ago on an online Francophone ukulele forum. The forum is long gone, but the uke is still travelling.

Oh yes, and the ukulele has a name: Vendredi XIII (Friday the 13th).

There’s also a website where you can track the uke, and perhaps quaintly, V13 has a MySpace with a great little bio (translated):

It all started Friday, April 13, 2007. A benefactor named Moonuke proposed in a forum to give one of his ukuleles, a Tennessee, who would like to. Then was born the idea that the ukulele could belong to anyone and travel as from hand to hand. The adventure has begun in the Languedoc-Roussillon and then continuedalmost everywhere in Fance and in some neighboring countries such as Switzerland.

Vendredi XIII doesn’t travel alone. Inside its case, there’s a small green notebook that chronicles the uke’s travels. Before the uke is passed along to a new host, each person writes a little something in the book.

—

So, for a few weeks anyway, I’m hosting Vendredi XIII.

It’s been fun (and a good language lesson) to look through the green notebook and read about this little uke’s adventures.

But more than anything, I’m struck by that realization that so early on in my own adventure travelling in France, I’ve already become a small part of something bigger. When my time with V13 is over, I’ll write a few lines in the book, pass it along, and a small slice of my life will become part of a much bigger story. I like that.

Happy Friday the 13th, everyone.

—

Update (14 January 2012): Audio files from the night have been posted to the L’UkeDunum website, including this one, in which my voice is reasonably audible:

This month’s theme was “Days of the Week” and this recording is en ensemble cover of Ruby Tuesday by the Rolling Stones.

This is a longish post, but I’m hoping it’ll be helpful for anyone who’s planning to port their number from Fido/Rogers, and wants to save a few bucks.

Recently, I ported my mobile phone number from Fido to voip.ms. When I called Fido to verify that there was nothing on my account that would prevent a port, they told me I’d have to pay for 30 days of service after my number was ported. Here’s a transcript of my online chat with Fido representative Jennifer:

FidoANSWERS! Hello Daniel Misener, my name is Jennifer, and it will be my pleasure to assist you today. Please allow me a moment to answer your question. Thank you for your patience.

Daniel Misener says: Hello, Jennifer.

Jennifer says: I’m sory to hear you are thinking of leaving Fido, may I ask why ?

Daniel Misener says: I’m leaving the country, moving to France, and need to port my Canadian number to a VOIP service.

Jennifer says: To answer your question, you have no active contract, therefore there would be no penalty if you ported out your number. You would be charged 30 days of service however.

Jennifer says: I see!

Daniel Misener says: Why would I be charged 30 days of service?

Daniel Misener says: If I port my number, after the port is successful, shouldn’t the amount I owe Fido be pro-rated?

Jennifer says: This is part of your service agreement with us, we ask for 30 days notice to terminate your service.

Daniel Misener says: May I give my notice now?

Daniel Misener says: With an end date 30 days from today?

Jennifer says: With a port out, the notice is the port itself. It would begin on the day the number leaves Fido.

Daniel Misener says: Right. My question then is, if I give my cancellation notice today, then port the number before the 30 days are up, will I still be charged 30 days after the port? Or 30 days after today?

Jennifer says: You cannot give your notice today and port your number because if there is a scheduled deactivation, your number will not be able to be ported. So for porting, the port itself is the notice and the 30 days start from that day.

Daniel Misener says: That’s a shame.

This, of course, seems crazy. Why should I pay for 30 days of service that they’re not actually delivering? Some quick Googling turned up this RFD forum thread, and this post at RogersWatch, which explains how to avoid paying for these 30 days. It seems that the CCTS (The Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services) has recognized this 30-day “port fee” as an issue. If you complain to the CCTS, you can avoid paying. RogersWatch’s advice:

1. go ahead and do your port whenever you darned well feel like it
2. after it’s all done promptly call Rogers and tell them to reverse your 30-day fee because you ported out, or else you’ll just file a complaint with CCTS about it (and CCTS will force Rogers to reverse the charge if you file a complaint)
3. if Rogers doesn’t co-operate then either escalate to OoP or CCTS (I recommend CCTS) per this Rogers complaint escalation flowchart

So then, after my port was completed, I called Fido, asked them to reverse the charges. When the Fido representative said she couldn’t, I went to the CCTS website and registered a complaint. It’s simple, and only took a few minutes. For reference, here’s my complete complaint:

Details of the contract dispute: I ported my Fido telephone number to a VOIP provider. The port became active on January 3, 2012. I telephoned Fido on January 3, 2012 to confirm that there would be no further charges on my account. The Fido representative (“Molly”) said that I would continue to be charged for 30 days of service beyond my port date — service that I would not receive, a sum of ~$44.

Date the contract began: [I left this blank]

Date the contract terminated, will terminate or renewed: 2011-12-28

Date you became aware of the dispute: 2012-01-03

What steps did you take to resolve the matter with your TSP? I asked the Fido representative (“Molly”) to reverse the charges internally, as I should not have to pay for services that I will not receive.

What did your TSP say/do? The Fido representative (“Molly”) told me that she could not reverse the charges. I informed her that I would make a complaint to the CCTS.

What do you consider to be a reasonable resolution to your dispute? A reasonable resolution would be for Fido to reverse the charges, so I am not paying for service that they are not delivering to me.

Other organization? [I left this blank]

Two days later, I received an email from the CCTS, confirming that they had received my complaint, and that it fell under their mandate:

Re: [CASE NUMBER]

Dear Daniel Misener,

Thank you for contacting the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS). The CCTS is an independent agency with a mandate to receive, facilitate the resolution of, and, if necessary, resolve eligible consumer and small business complaints relating to certain retail telecommunications services.

We have received your complaint [CASE NUMBER] and hereby advise you that your complaint falls within the scope of our mandate and will be processed in accordance with our Procedural Code (the “Code”), which can be found at:

http://www.ccts-cprst.ca/en/documents/procedural-code

We encourage you to review the Code so that you are aware of the complaint resolution process as well as your rights and responsibilities as a customer.

In accordance with Section 6.5 of the Code, we have forwarded your complaint to your telecommunications services provider (TSP). Pursuant to Section 6.6 of the Code, your TSP is to:

a) within 15 days of receipt of the complaint advise the CCTS in writing, with a copy to you, that the TSP objects to the complaint on the basis that in their view, it should not be investigated pursuant to the Procedural Code or any other lawful reason;

b) within 30 days of receipt of the complaint advise the CCTS in writing, with a copy to you, that the complaint has been resolved to the mutual satisfaction of both you and the TSP; or

c) within 30 days of receipt of the complaint advise the CCTS in writing, with a copy to you, that the complaint remains unresolved and of the TSP’s intention to file a written response thereto.

In the event that your TSP responds that the complaint has been resolved to the mutual satisfaction of both you and the TSP and you disagree that the matter has been resolved, you must advise CCTS within 20 days of your TSP’s response.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding your complaint, or anything contained in this correspondence, please do not hesitate to contact us.

CCTS
P.O. Box 81088
Ottawa, ON
K1P 1B1
1-888-221-1687

Please ensure to retain this correspondence for future reference.

Sincerely,

CCTS Assessment Team

The following day, an email from the Office of the President at Rogers:

Dear Daniel Misener,

This e-mail is in response to the incident that was referred to us by the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS) [CASE NUMBER]. First and foremost, we would like to thank you for taking the time to share your observations with us. Feedback from customers is always appreciated.

In response, we would like to clarify that according to Fido’s Terms and Conditions, which govern all services provided by Fido explicitly state:

“…you may terminate any or all of your Services upon no less than 30 days’ advance notice…” and “… Applicable charges continue to apply until the end of the notice period or until the Services are no longer accessible by you, whichever is later. The transfer of your telephone number to another telecommunications service provider constitutes a termination of the applicable Service(s)…”

Should you wish to consult the Fido Terms and Conditions, you may do so via www.Fido.ca or on the abbreviated version on page 2 of every Fido invoice. Please note that this is a common practice amongst Canadian carriers, as such it may be an applicable condition for your new service provider as well.

A review of your files reveals that Fido has received notice of your cancellation on January 3, 2012 upon the transfer of your telephone number to another telecommunications service provider, as such the 30 days notice period applies as of this date. We were thus unable to find any billing errors. Notwithstanding the above, in view of finding an amicable resolution Fido is prepared to offer the following:

• As a goodwill gesture credit $44.44 which represents the monthly service fees (taxes included) to be charged on your final invoice.

Your final invoice will be issued in date of January 14, 2012. Any usage fees above and beyond your monthly service plan remain legitimate

It is understood that the above option was offered in the sole optic of finding an amicable resolution, is without prejudice and in no way constitutes an admission of liability on the part of Fido.

We consider the above incident resolved.

And the same day, another email from the Office of the President at Rogers, addressed to the CCTS, cc’ing me:

Dear CCTS,

Concerning the CCTS complaint number # [CASE NUMBER], we have contacted Daniel Misener by e-mail and successfully reached a satisfactory resolution by applying the requested credit as a goodwill gesture (monthly service fees of the final invoice).

Should you or our client have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact us.

I also received an email the same day from Fido — an “account change confirmation” detailing the charges on my account that would be reversed.

So then, it seems that the advice from RogersWatch is solid: Port your number, and once the port is completed, call Fido/Rogers to request that the 30-day fee be reversed. If they don’t cooperate, complain to the CCTS. It worked for me, and it was an easy way to avoid paying $44.44.

that tech show

At the time, I knew Nora had been working on a pitch for a show called Spark. I’d heard the pilots, and they sounded great. But in June 2007, when I first got Nora’s message, I had no idea that I’d end up spending the next four and a half years of my working life on “that tech show.”

Working on Spark has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve done in my time at CBC Radio. Every day, I work alongside a small team of really talented people, making the kind of show I’d want to listen to (I mean, seriously, what other show would let me dedicate the majority of a broadcast to an in-depth look at the history of QWERTY?). I count myself very, very lucky. Sometimes people ask me what I do for living, and I tell them, “I call up smart, interesting people, talk to them, and put them on the radio.” Sure beats any other job I’ve ever had.

Which is why today is bittersweet.

Today is my last day working at Spark for at least for a year. And even though I’m leaving for a pretty awesome year-long adventure in France, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little bit misty-eyed. I’m going to miss it all: the story meetings, recording interviews, slicing and dicing tape in Pro Tools, and interacting with “the broader Spark community.” But more than anything, I’m going to miss Nora and the whole team who work so hard to put Spark together every week.

Spark, when it works — when it really, really nails it — is a show about what’s next. It’s a forward-looking show made by forward-looking people. So yes, I’m sad to be leaving. But at the same time, I can’t wait to hear what Spark comes up with next.

I’ll be listening.

I look around our public media field and beyond and see a worrisome gap.

As public broadcasting goes through its own turbulent transition to a new Internet and mobile world, the technology talent gap is a risk that looms large. Yes, there are many other challenges: political and policy battles, business model pressures, cultural and structural obstacles, the need for strategic vision and leadership. And there are other recruitment needs across general management, content, fundraising. But the twin coins of the new digital realm are code and design, and with a few notable exceptions, public media is seriously lacking in both.

Spot on, and pitch perfect. This is a huge part of the reason I’m taking a year off, moving to France and teaching myself to be a programmer-journalist.

Here’s hoping they let me start CBC Labs when I get back.

Opening up the margins by misener

The cbc.ca/tech version is up right now, too.

My time there was, in a word, formational. I knew I wanted to make radio, but the thing was, I had absolutely no idea how. Radio was this thing that I loved — something I knew I wanted to be a part of — but its inner workings were still very much a mystery to me.

At CKDU, I met a ton of really smart, talented people who helped me learn. They showed me how to cut tape, and use a mixing board, and speak into a microphone without popping my Ps. They turned me onto new music, and new radio shows, and new people. They let me host the weekly countdown show (which came with the perk of having my name published in The Coast every week!). They let me experiment on the radio, making my own silly little This American Life rip-off show.

Though I’m no longer actively involved in campus/community radio, I still believe strongly in its mission. CKDU’s was (and still is):

to act as an alternative to public (CBC) and commercial radio stations. We offer programming that can not be found elsewhere on the airwaves in Halifax.

Why mention this? This week, Ryerson University (my alma mater and yes, current employer) held a referendum on creating a new campus radio station, to replace the now-defunct CKLN. The students overwhelmingly voted yes.

Congratulations to everyone who wanted this thing. Can’t wait to tune in.