Hi there fellow bloggers, I have been on this site for quite a while now, and it's only now that I feel moved to write something about my job; I usually like to keep my work life and private life separate.However I want to share with you something that irritates me, and that is when people say 'have you got nothing else better to do?' I work as a local government officer helping to ensure that trading standards laws are followed by traders, such as the Trade Descriptions Act. I recently went to investigate a complaint we got from a member of the public; a market style shoe shop outlet was selling shoes described as leather when they were not leather. I went along to the shop and noticed that there was one line of shoes (£6.99) described on the hand written price label as 'leather' when it was only the sock inside the shoe that was leather, the rest was synthetic. Another line of shoes (£2.99 for girl's sandals) was similarly described but had no leather in them whatsoever. Having assessed this situation I decided that a letter of warning would be sufficient to deal with the situation, and this is the usual course of action with an initial misdemeanour. I introduced myself to the shop keeper and explained to him, in which I thought was a reasonable manner, that shoes have to be substantially leather to call them leather. for the next few minutes as I was trying to make notes, he went on a tirade, asking me time and again, 'have you got nothing else better to do?', and saying in a derisory tone, that no one expects to get leather shoes for £2.99. I explained patiently that it may be relatively minor, but it is still wrong and needs sorting out, and after all, people just love a bargain do they not?

I would add at this point that the question 'Have you got nothing else better to do?' is designed to be an attack rather than a genuine question; if you think about it, you cannot answer it 'yes' or 'no' without making yourself look silly.

He then added to the tirade by asking if I had come all the way from my office to his shop 'just to deal with this'. I said that I hadn't. All this made me decide that this guy needed action which was a bit firmer, we always take into account people's attitude when deciding what action to take. I started taking one of the hand written signs as evidence, the trader came across and pulled it out of my hand, and he basically spent the rest of our encounter being obstructive and unhelpful. By the time it came to this, I was NOT HAPPY at all!

The point I am making- and this is a word of advice too- In your life you will probably end up having dealings with officals of one type or another, ranging from the bobby who stops you in your car, to a tax or health and safety officer etc. The circumstances of these dealings, in your eyes, may be relatively insignificant, such as going at 37mph in a 30 limit. However, whatever you do, don't say 'Have you got nothing else better to do?' because this will risk escalating the situation. What may have begun as a verbal warning may end up being a formal letter of caution or more. You see, when you say that, you are making the officer feel small. He may be doing his job really well with professionalism, and someone bellitles all that by saying he has got nothing else better to do. So ok, I admit that going at 37mph or misdescribing shoes as leather is not exactly as serious as murder, but there are people out there who's job it is to investigate murder, and they are called detectives. Meanwhile, there are also people out there who's job it is to investigate misdescribed goods. Their job does not stop when and if someone gets murdered.