Latest news with #incompetence
News24
a day ago
- Politics
- News24
Only solution to gangsterism: Fix one broken neighbourhood at a time
Politicians at local and provincial government level characterise the gangsterism problem as one of incompetent policing, writes the author. Jaco Marais/Gallo Images/Die Burger Be among those who shape the future with knowledge. Uncover exclusive stories that captivate your mind and heart with our FREE 14-day subscription trial. Dive into a world of inspiration, learning, and empowerment. You can only trial once. Show Comments ()
Daily Mail
3 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE The Royal Mint owes me money! Mother's fury after Britain's oldest business lost 18 of her son's valuable coins and stalled on paying her after she trusted them to auction the collection
A furious mother has accused The Royal Mint of complete 'incompetence' after she trusted them to auction a collection of valuable coins left to her son by his late grandfather. When Harriet Scott's teenage son received the gold coins worth £18,000, his mother made the understandable choice of handing them over to Britain's oldest company, established in 886AD, to sell them off. But after a miserable ordeal, which saw the firm lose 18 of the precious items for seven nerve-shredding months before stalling on paying interest on the delay, Ms Scott has been left thoroughly fed up with the institution. With her son, then 18, preparing to leap into the demanding world of acting, she was keen to get his adult life off to the best possible start and sent the gift to the Mint's auction department in December 2023, as the trustee of his will. Things soon went pear shaped, however, as the firm, based in Llantrisant, Wales, went quiet for six months before handing Ms Scott the bad news that they had only sold £5,160 worth of coins. Even this disappointing sum proved hard to pin down, with the Mint going a further three months without paying her, and yet claiming they had. Ms Scott, who is in her 50s and lives in Bristol, said that both the bank managing the will trust and her personal bank insisted that all the details given to the firm were correct and there had been no sign in the accounts that they had tried to transfer her. After threatening to go public, she eventually received the cash, but she was already feeling 'irritated' by the company when she received some more bizarre news. After a miserable ordeal, which saw the firm lose 18 of the items for seven nerve-shredding months before stalling on paying interest on the delay, Ms Scott has been left thoroughly fed up with the institution She told MailOnline: 'It was incompetence, the fact that their finance department, I can't believe for a minute, the finance department of the Royal Mint Auction House hasn't paid into a will trust before. 'I got the money, and I was feeling a little bit rough about everything, and then almost immediately, I had an email from the Head of the Auction saying that they weren't going to sell any more of my coins because they were restructuring.' This was something of a blessing in disguise for Ms Scott who happily took the Mint's recommendation of a different auction house in the hope they would finally sell the rest of the lot. But then the coins disappeared. To her horror, 18 of the 21 coins to be handed over to the new auctioneers were unaccounted for, prompting a scramble to figure out where this substantial will gift had got to. The Mint then came back to Ms Scott in October with good news and bad news. The good news was that the missing items had been sold in an earlier auction in March. The bad: neither the coins nor the money nor any record of the transaction were anywhere to be seen. The firm paid her the £11,090 they said the rest of the items had fetched at auction, but Ms Scott was left deeply uncomfortable about the disorganised way in which they had handled her son's will gift. The total figure of £16,250 fell some way short of the £18,000-£20,000 Cambridgeshire Coins had estimated the gift at, and her subsequent inquiries have led to the discovery that the coins all went for the lowest amount. She was also left demanding seven months' interest on the late payment - to the tune of £350. 'At this point I was really worried,' she said. 'Then I had an email from the Royal Mint with a list of all the coins, saying they had been sold, but there were no lot numbers. 'They weren't the correct coins. It was a complete s*** show. 'And I said, "a) my son's lost out on a lot of interest here, but b) I'm feeling very uncomfortable about the whole situation", and I said I didn't want to talk to them again until I'd asked them for emails and things.' After a futile attempt to get the truth via a series of requests for personal data, Ms Scott was finally granted her interest request in January - but, five months later, the sum has still not been paid. A spokesperson for The Royal Mint told MailOnline: 'We have fully investigated this matter, and we can confirm that the collection consigned to The Royal Mint by Ms Scott was sold at auction and all payments for the coins have been made. 'The agreed interest for the delay in these payments has also been processed as a matter of urgency. 'The Royal Mint is committed to maintaining the highest standards of customer service, and we sincerely apologise for any inconvenience caused.' But, for Ms Scott, the time for making amends has elapsed, and she just wants to move on from the nightmare. She added: 'No [I don't want an apology]. I really don't want anything to do with them again. 'I want this little bit of cash for my son, and then that's it.' 'There's something very bogus about the whole thing,' she added. 'The thing that has made me more stressed than anything is that, from a legal point of view, I've been put in a position where I'm supposed to do the best for my son's inheritance. 'And I have to jump through many hoops to do this, and you end up feeling that he's kind of been ripped off. I could have done better. 'If I'd known how bad they were, I absolutely wouldn't touch them with a barge pole. I would have gone straight to Sovereign Rarities [the second auction house], who are absolutely superb. 'But it's a public body, isn't it? This is a government-run thing and you're thinking our taxes are going towards this. 'It's completely amateurish, which is a real shame.' 'Everything's going towards helping my son and his progress as an actor, because he's going to be really poor,' she joked. 'I've just been left with a very nasty taste. The saga comes after The Royal Mint confirmed in March that around 80 people at their Llantrisant site would be affected by a round of redundancies. The firm said: 'We can confirm that we are consulting with a number of employees as part of a strategy to secure the long-term future of The Royal Mint. 'We deeply value the contribution of all our employees, and our top priority is to treat our people with respect and look after their wellbeing throughout this process.'
Washington Post
3 days ago
- Business
- Washington Post
Records of dead people show how the pro-Trump spin machine keeps going
'We're also identifying shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud in the Social Security program for our seniors, and that our seniors and people that we love rely on. Believe it or not, government databases list … 3.47 million people from ages 120 to 129, 3.9 million people from ages 130 to 139. 3.5 million people from ages 140 to 149. And money is being paid to many of them.'
Times
20-05-2025
- Times
Yes, lazy colleagues are a nightmare
Performative cc'ing; snack theft; taking calls on speaker; aggressive sneezing. There are lots of things to wind us up at work, but colleagues 'not competently doing their job' tops the list, according to a new survey. YouGov (commissioned by Acas, a workplace specialist) polled 1,023 employees in Britain for a look behind the velvet-look curtain into the simmering resentments of our nine-to-fives. Incompetent colleagues were in the top three for 49 per cent, just pipping colleagues who take credit for your work (with 44 per cent). There's a fine line between incompetent and lazy. A colleague who's unintentionally incompetent is forgivable (provided they're not being paid more than you); one who shirks their share isn't. I had a colleague who feigned incompetence when the
