The recession and me

I hate to admit it, but the effects of the world-wide economic disaster are slowly starting to show up in our everyday lives…in places we least expect to find.

To start with, I’ve never bothered much about this whole financial fiasco because,
a) I don’t own any stocks, shares or other ridiculous make-lots-of-money-by-simply-waiting products, and
b) because let’s face it… It’s not like it’s the end of the world or anything; I mean statistically speaking, so far more people have died in car accidents last year than because of this ‘crisis’. Heck, I think global warming is a bigger deal than this, and you don’t hear a lot of noise about that!

Now don’t get me wrong. Almost every person I know, knows at least someone who’s either lost their job or on forced-sabbatical. And just for the record, I work for less pay than I did last year too, so there.

And another part of these drastic measures every business, financial organization, and academic institutes use is the introduction of ‘cost-cutting’ measures. In plain English, it means they try to find places where money is wasted and try to minimize it….such as free-coffee-after-seven schemes, or that free bus ride from your office to the nearest public transport, and even those complimentary vouchers you’re entitled to.

And here, in the picture below, is the lousiest example of cost-cutting I’ve seen so far:



Shown above are billing invoices from a popular online store (I’ve deliberately blurred it and masked the name for obvious reasons; if you can still read it – good for you – but please don’t tell them. The last thing I need right now is legal trouble)

The one on the left is the regular A4 sized invoice everyone knows and what we used to get until a few months ago.
The little scrap on the right, at less than half the regular size (even the width has been trimmed) and written in such tiny fonts that your eyes hurt, is the new invoice I got with my stuff this evening.

Now I’m not too sure if there’s another logical explanation behind this, but given the current scenario I’m willing to bet that some genius at the billing department there decided they’re wasting too much paper on the invoices – so what if customers get tiny, hard-to-read invoices – all that matters is that there’s now 60% less paper they need to send customers. Besides, customers probably just throw them away anyway.

Which gets interesting when you think about it. When Greenpeace shouted their voice hoarse over deforestation and saving paper; I don’t know how many people thought about it. And yet when the cash register starts ringing trouble, every means possible become perfectly acceptable.

Hmm, wonder how much did they save on the rest of my invoice?

14 comments:

Rayees Ahamed said...

ROTFL, invoice kanjathanam is is too much ;)

Aersh said...

LOL... haha...u r one heck of an observer.

infact on the other day, i was listenin to d radio and de were discusin cheap nd inexpensiv datin!!!! think of that now... this crisis has got on our love lives too!!!!

good thing taht here in India there is not mch of an effect.

p.s. I HAV PUT A NEW POST. CHECK IT AND IF U LYK IT THEN FOLLOW MY BLOG TOO...
http://writingonthesands.blogspot.com/2009/02/new-day.html

Intern said...

haaha. if it continues like this then we'll be having currency notes half its size :P

Anonymous said...

lol @shimmer :P

as for the recession, i am a jobless student.. so all that I have seen of this recession is on the blogs and in the news.. :)

-=A.R.N.=- said...

@rayees
Yeah...can't believe they'd come up with something so corny.
Or maybe there is another explanation for all this?

@Aersh
Dude...half my friends in India are experiencing some kinda pay slashes. So its not like there's no impact in India.
But true that they probably wouldn't come up with something like this...


@Shimmer
Yeah...or maybe get rid of them all together

-=A.R.N.=- said...

@thepinkorchid

Actually this is the first time even I'm impacted by this so I'm not surprised. Anyway, this is more hype than hoopla

A wo(a)ndering mind said...

hahaha.. now because of cost cutting i get no more paper bills from most places.. good.. considering the amount these people waste here, atleast this way we save a few trees in brazil

Mohammed Musthafa said...

lol....dunno if all this is more hype than hoopla....but yah...kinda ridiculous wht ppl will do to save cash....gud post!

-=A.R.N.=- said...

@manasi
That was exactly my point...when everyone shouted hoarse over saving paper for environmental reasons, no one cared.
Yet when there's money to be made, its okay now..

Btw, even Deutsche Telekom is cutting back on itemized bills.


@Musthafa
Yeah, you know I do think it is hype...
Especially if you see what the news channels do with it.
:)

And thx!

Aersh said...

thnx so mch followin ma blog.

i don think dat u kno but i mostly put stories in my blog and less of non fiction. but from no onwards u'll find more of non fiction.

actually m an author nd tho m still 17 i write stories for many magazines and newspapers.

thnx once again for followin ma blog. waitin eagerly for ur nxt post. c ya

Unknown said...

Lolz bro!!
that was smart thinking and very smart observation :D

Sheeraz Ahamed Khateeb said...

Gr8 post yaar... Costcutting is everywhere these days... u know our office has cut BISCUITS & SNAKCS... he he.. they would hardly save 100 Dinars....

m said...

How nice it would be, if they had decided "not sending invoice at all" instead of sending a tiny invoice! *sigh*

-=A.R.N.=- said...

@Aersh
Good to know you're actually an author.
I once started on a writing job...but then I quit coz I needed to write stuff I had no interest in.


@Issam
You've no idea..
:D


@Sheeru
Yeah...we're debating on whether our place would ration out toilet rolls as well
:)

@Ela
Actually, I already paid..and this was just an FYI invoice stating that.
So in that case, I had no choice wishing for it not to come.