Pharmacy chains like Walgreens and CVS have gotten very good at automating the process of ordering and picking up prescriptions. But after receiving a recent message saying that a prescription was ready, I realized there is definitely room for improvement. Here is the information that I’d like to see in the automated phone messages or […]

While I don’t shop at warehouse clubs like Costco, I tend to buy a lot of items on a given shopping trip to Trader Joe’s. In fact, I saw an article recently that estimated Trader Joe’s average basket size at around $48. It follows that for every person like me, who buys $80-100 during each […]

For reasons too complex to explain here, I needed to purchase an item from a UK-based website. However, when we tried to place the order, the website said they couldn’t ship the specific item to the US. Confused, I called them up to ask for an explanation. I spent a good 15 minutes on the […]

When I click on the printer-friendly view for a web page, I expect to get a simplified version of the page that will print cleanly. Most sites that offer a printable view do this fairly well. However, some sites add a very irritating feature to the mix: as soon as the printer-friendly page loads, the […]

For a cell phone company, providing coverage maps online is a no-brainer. After all, there’s no point in wasting resources on prospects who don’t live in your coverage area. Cell providers may even require you to provide a zip/postal code before you can browse for phones and plans, to ensure they have service where you […]

The fitness center in my building is pretty decent. There’s usually enough equipment for everyone, and it sure beats paying for gym membership and having to venture outside in the winter. But there’s one thing that really annoys me: some mysterious overlord controls the temperature, and you can’t adjust it. Why not? Because they put […]

Southwest has a neat feature on their website called “Shortcut to low fares”. Basically, you select the departure and arrival cities, and it shows you a calendar view with the lowest fares for each day. This works great, except for one problem: there’s no way to display nonstop flights only. Why does limiting the search […]

While researching a fairly boring IT product, I ran into a site with a product picture labeled “actual size”. Making that sort of claim online is always a bad idea. You see, the image has the same number of pixels whether you’re viewing it on a regular desktop monitor, or a small laptop or netbook […]

It should come as no surprise that having annoying people right outside your door is bad for business. For instance, I tend to avoid one store that always has an obnoxious beggar on the corner, only a few feet from the entrance. But when I think about the various types of people that can scare […]

I see a lot of articles and blog posts that end with “stay tuned”. This phrase drives me crazy, although I’ve probably used it once or twice myself in the same context. There are several things that bother me about it: it’s vague, it’s overused, and it seems to take control away from the reader, […]