health and fitness: juillet 2015

vendredi 31 juillet 2015

It will cost £15 to return a pair of TOMS espadrilles

So much for customer services from an ‘ethical’ brand

I ordered a pair of TOMS espadrilles costing £34.95 through the company’s UK website. Its policy of donating a pair of shoes to a child in need for every purchase swayed my decision.

The shoes arrived promptly, but I was surprised that they were shipped from the Netherlands. They were too small. The parcel contained no returns slip or label. The bottom of the order gave an 0800 number to ring to start the returns procedure. The telephone number was not recognised and the contacts given were Dutch.

from Health & wellbeing | The Guardian http://ift.tt/1MYUbK1
via health

Dear Jeremy – your work problems solved

Our careers expert – and you the readers – offer advice to someone who lacks direction in their career and a worker worried about being seen as a pushover

I am about to finish a master’s in history at a very good university and also have a 2:1 in history from another great university, both Russell group institutions. I have a year’s experience of working as a fundraising manager for a national charity, giving me a wealth of experience in different areas – for example, public speaking, event management and customer care.

from Health & wellbeing | The Guardian http://ift.tt/1MYUcOi
via health

Shall we buy a NutriBullet, costing £90?

My partner wants one, but I think it’ll end up at the back of the cupboard with the sandwich toaster

Every week a Guardian Money reader submits a question, and it’s up to you to help him or her out – a selection of the best answers will appear in next Saturday’s paper.

This week’s question: We’re squabbling over whether to buy a NutriBullet blender, costing £90. My partner reckons we’ll start drinking loads of healthy smoothies. I reckon it’s just a fad. Will it end up in the back of the cupboard next to the sandwich toaster? Did you regret buying one – or do you love it?

from Health & wellbeing | The Guardian http://ift.tt/1MDa101
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‘I was cross that my child had to beg the prime minister for a drug’

Sue Barnley’s son has a rare fatal disease. Her family is having an increasingly bitter fight to get funding for his treatment

In the photograph that has pride of place in the living room of Sue Barnley’s home, her son Harry is standing, all blond curls and cheeky grin, dressed as Woody from Toy Story. His brother Jack, two years older, is beside him, channelling Buzz Lightyear. For Sue, 45, the four-year-old picture belongs to that innocent time before Harry, now nearly seven, was diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a rare muscle-wasting disease that mostly affects boys. Now she and her husband, Tom, 39, live with the knowledge that Harry will be in a wheelchair before he is 12 and will probably die in his 20s.

“When we finally got the diagnosis in July 2013, it was hideous,” says Sue, a former sales manager from Farnham, Surrey. “We were in grief for the life Harry would not have and the hard path he would take. The doctors told us, ‘Duchenne is 100% fatal so you need to go away and enjoy your little boy and give him a good life.’ We were told not to pin any hopes on research.”