Have you ever actually said something that wasn"t critical Andrew? We just seem to be constantly inconveniencing you, which might be fair enough if we were PokerStars or Sky, but we"re not, we"re just a bunch of recreational poker players that dedicate a lot of our non working time in an attempt to pull together something pretty special on your behalf. Apologies that we constantly fail you.
Although out of character, not your finest post Des
If one assumes that I"m allowed the occasional bark, as is everyone"s right within APAT, then I"m not unhappy with the post Brendan...and I"m sure I"ve done worse.
I feel the economy is a bit worrying, the jobs situation also....but I don"t believe APAT adding an event to a festival late in the day, or changing our position on side event reservation should be described as worrying.
Now that"s just my opinion and we listen to everyone"s opinion - which frequently differ as seen even in the last few posts.
So I guess what I"m saying is I / we are entitled to show a bit of frustration also.
Sorry Des but you can"t have it both ways. The "we"re just a bunch of recreational poker players that dedicate a lot of our non working time " line doesn"t cut it anymore.
APAT is a business of which you are a Director (according to Companies House). APAT is a Business that charges customers (us recreational players) fees.
As a paying customer I am very disappointed that you spoke to another customer is such a manner. As a customer with choice, I will not being playing the event.
Stuart - we"re a business borne from people on both sides (management & customers) having a passion for recreational poker.
The management team are in amongst our customers and know most of them on a first name basis. We also listen intently and have a solid record of making player focused decisions based on feedback. But feedback is a two way thing and I feel I am entitled to be part of that discussion and in a human way, not like some corporate dummy. You and I have known each other for years and spoken many many times at events, so you know we aren"t just another corporate entity.
Remember also please, APAT is not my day job and the amount of decision making that we take based on business priority is negligible in comparison with anyone else in this industry. APAT simply makes very little money from it"s members and that"s fine - but it can sometimes determine our resource and priorities.
We"ve created APAT's biggest and best ever festival with the WCOAP and in doing so I know that the administration of seats etc will be an absolute nightmare - so forgive me for being frustrated when the best automated solution that we have is questioned, alongside a couple of amends to the schedule suggested by members in the past two weeks, and the addition of one more event.
Of course you"re entitled to not attend if you don"t agree with the way I run APAT but I hope you don"t take that stance. It doesn"t gain anything and frankly the
stories keep us going for months.
But joking aside, if you"re doing so because I"ve stated my opinion to Andrew, then I"d have to say that I think I"ve earned the right to engage with "people" I know very well in both a positive and negative way. Without that APAT becomes no more than a job to me and I"m lucky enough to have one of those already.