Debs cans jugs, but thite still on thong

Search engine worse than the Reg's?

By John Lettice, 4th January 2002

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The strange search results debenhams.com produced for the word "jugs" are no more. Mysteriously, the site went down for engineering last night, and on its reappearance "jugs" was just returning boring old coffee maker and kettle results. But the hilarity continues - try "cans" or "biscuit" or "espresso."

No, we don't know what's rude about biscuit either, but we know someone who says Americans do. Espresso? Our sheltered lives have shielded us from that one too, but among the interesting things it kicks up is "black 'bamboo' thong." Ouch. "Cans" meanwhile produces the traditional list of slightly risque ladies' underwear, while "biscuit" produces a wide range of largely innocent ladies' clothing, none of it biscuit-coloured, as far as we can gather. So we're none the wiser as to what's rude about biscuits.

But maybe the Debenhams search engine is just mad. Meanwhile, a reader writes alleging that BBC 24's lunchtime news bulletin today ran an item about Debenhams and the Euro. A 15 year old was reported as attempting to buy some gear with £10 worth of Euros, and discovering that Debenhams' tills were wrongly set to value this at around £130. He pointed out this was wrong, but the checkout staff insisted that the till must be right.

So he did it another seven times. Debenhams luckless IT department has now apparently corrected this, so there's no point in you trying. Warning we are unable to verify this story, as in order to listen to the bulletin at bbc.co.uk we believe we'd first have to download that nagware from hell, Realplayer. ®

Related story:
Debenhams techies hit on jugs?

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