Losing your mobile phone is disruptive enough. Lose your wallet at the same time, away from home, and suddenly many of the things you take for granted become impossible. You have no access to money, no means of payment, no maps or messages, and no easy way to contact anyone for help. When both were stolen from me near King’s Cross station at the end of September, I discovered just how complicated getting back to normal could be.
A day of two halves
30 September began well enough. I travelled by train from Cambridge, where I live, to the Bedford Square studio of Bloomsbury Radio, for a recording in connection with the 26 project honouring the bicentenary of University College London. UCL student Aleksandra Grebe and I were interviewed about our contribution to the booklet 26 firsts.
After the interview, I walked back to King’s Cross through sunlight and thoughts of early lunch. My mobile’s map guided me to Euston Road along streets and squares I wasn’t that familiar with. At the King’s Cross concourse I made eagerly for Upper Crust, opening my leather shoulder pouch in search of the wherewithal.
My wallet wasn’t there.
My mobile phone wasn’t there.
Snarl.
Still in the pouch were my ticket back to Cambridge, my railcards, my pensioner’s bus pass, and the keys to my bike and to the house.
I found a seat near Platform 9¾ and parked myself to take stock of things.
Right. So I could get home without any difficulty.
I knew we had some leftovers in the fridge. They could make up for the fact that Upper Crust was now out of bounds.
I scribbled in my notebook a list of things to do.
- Report theft @ KGX
- Report theft of cards to bank
- Report theft of EH & NT cards
I wasn’t sure how to report the theft at King’s Cross. An information kiosk advised using the phone number 60106. That would have to be by the home landline.
I made the journey home, as per the original intention, by train and bike. It was a troubling experience to ride past Mill Road Co-op and know that that, too, was now out of bounds.
Delayed lunch was ham sandwiches, biscuits, and chocolate. I hope that came after reporting the theft.
The first stage was to pick up the phone and ring that 60106. An automated voice told me the network didn’t handle local numbers without area codes.
I remembered reading, a few days earlier, John Elworthy’s account in East Anglia Bylines of Cambridgeshire Police and its new application of artificial intelligence to the reporting of non-urgent crime. I found it online. It asked where the incident had happened, and what was the postcode. From Google Maps I found the postcode for King’s Cross station, and found it again from King’s Cross’s own website when the police site asked for confirmation. At some point the app advised me that I was reporting an incident that had occurred outside Cambridgeshire Police’s patch.
I forget whether I made the report to the Metropolitan Police or the British Transport Police. Later emails indicate that both are involved. See it, say it, sorted.
Then the report to the bank, to stop and replace the cards. I suppose I made it by phone. I have neither scribbles nor emails from it, but judging by later events it went smoothly.
My wife Clare was away at the time, in Brussels. I told her of the theft in a WhatsApp message from my laptop at 17:25.
Ordering the replacement phone was an evening job, done via my laptop. I specified that delivery should be to the named UPS pick-up point, a shop at the other end of the village.
A new mobile phone
WhatsApp on my laptop was fine for a fortnight. Then it logged me out and told me I would need a mobile phone to log myself back in.
I’d had no news of the replacement mobile on order. I looked for ‘Fairphone’ in my email. A message that I’d missed on Friday 2nd told me that delivery was expected on Tuesday 6th, and offered a ‘Track’ button. Clicking on this brought me the information that the package had been left at the front door on Tuesday 6th, but the photo bore no resemblance to our doorstep.
A phone call to the address I’d expected to collect from confirmed that they were in that line of business. I went and asked. They referred me to next door, and pointed south. Next door was a Chinese mini-market, who knew nothing of the matter. I asked at the original shop again. This time they pointed north: an Indian mini-market, who likewise knew nothing of the matter. My third enquiry at the original shop led to the explanation that the delivery must have been to the shop on the south side that was actually next door but one, the shop beyond the Chinese mini-market. This place had a UPS sign outside. I went in and was encouraged by the resemblance between their counter and the UPS driver’s photo. I asked about my parcel, showing a print-out of the information I’d had. My parcel was the second thing they produced.
My next port of call was an EE phone shop. They fitted a SIM card that would allow me to keep my number. I spent the afternoon setting the new device up, with a back-and-forth of verifications between the new mobile and the laptop. Everything about the new mobile seemed that little bit more complicated and harder to control than on its predecessor.
I ended the day with WhatsApp installed on my new mobile, but I couldn’t read all the messages there. Also, attempting to link my laptop to WhatsApp was frustrated by differences in terminology between the two devices. Eventually, WhatsApp had had enough of my attempts and advised me to come back later.
Next day, I switched the new mobile on with immediate frustration. Everything I tried to do with it was blocked by pages announcing that it had contracted varying numbers of viruses and claims about sites I knew I hadn’t visited. There were offers to purge it of these things if I clicked the button marked ‘Install’.
Evidently I’d misclicked at some point and brought down one or more rogue apps. Did this explain the previous day’s waywardness?
Attending to this myself would probably make things worse. Best take the phone to EE again.
Pending that, I found the manual online and printed it out.
EE confirmed my suspicions. The man behind the lectern recognised the rogue apps straight away. They’d probably come in, he said, when I downloaded a QR code reader. Such things were not needed: the phone’s camera should be able to read QR codes. Learn something new every day.
New cards and wallet
The replacement bank cards arrived a week after the theft.
Emails from milk supplier Milk & More, saying our regular payment to them had failed, continued after I tried registering the new card with them. I bought milk, fruit and bread using (with invitation) the stash of coins Clare keeps on her chest of drawers.
After another email from Milk & More, I had another go at entering the new card details. The update was immediately rebuffed, with advice to ring the bank.
A call to the bank, lasting 48 minutes, found no reason for the failure of the card update. They advised me to ring Milk & More, who offered to bundle home-delivered eggs into our regular delivery.
Then two sets of emails from Milk & More took different sides. One accepted the payment update, one rejected it. Since resolved by switching to the other card.
I’ve done this much to prevent a future theft: my new wallet is small enough to hide in a zipped pocket in the pouch. I bought it before the new cards arrived; Clare produced her card for our joint account to pay for it.
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