I've been 'in the market' for a new mobile phone ever since, well, I read down the list of specifications on the Nokia N95; compared it against my trusty Nokia 2650 flip-phone and... Yeah, it was like comparing a Swiss Army Knife with a teaspoon.

This was about three months ago and far from the craving fading with time, distance and the whole 'unlocked handsets cost twice as much as the average desktop PC' business - my condition worsened. Until, eventually, after serial number-crunching that'd make even the most creative of creative accountants weep, I figured out there was no way I could afford an N95. Either by contract or outright, they were just too expensive.

So I set my sights a little lower - at a handset that had everything, in my opinion, that the N95 had and I wanted - just without the 3G, GPS extensions and 5mpx camera - an LG Shine.

This was a good start. I'd done my homework; clarified all of the elements that made me both disappointed in my old handset and greening around the gills with jealousy over the N95; made myself a checklist of 'wants' (expandable memory, Bluetooth, media capable - video, image, mp3 tone); things I was prepared to compromise on (lens, 3G, GPS, mpx resolution), knew exactly which Plan I wanted to go for and off I went to buy myself a Porsche instead of a Ferrari.

I wished I hadn't.

This rest of this service review relates to the ONLINE Orange Shop. I have visited Orange Shop branches in the past for top-up vouchers and found the staff pushy, contract sales motivated and extremely rude when faced with customers. Especially customers who wish to purchase the intangible (call time) yet necessary (what do they shift during the 12 days of Before Christmas? Six Geese a-Texting? Five Ri-i-i-ngTONES?). I suspect they sell a lot of PAYG phones. PAYG phones that require subsequent purchases of additional call time. Call time which the staff in the shop where you bought the PAYG from in the first place are reluctant to sell you out of indifference to the PAYG system.

I will call this machine of retailer discourtesy The Indifference Engine (with apologies to Charles Babbage)!

This Indifference Engine is the reason why I don't go anywhere near Orange Shop high street branches. No, thank you. I'd rather be berated and brow-beaten into buying a Mars bar with my top-up at the corner shop.

So when it came to me buying a new PAYG I thought I'd do it online, through the Orange Shop at the Orange website - http://www.orange.co.uk - as I've been buying my call time through there without any problems for the last year or so.

This was going to be a simple, effortless procedure. I would log in; I would buy my new phone; it would be delivered and I would be content until Nokia start making phones that were Lightsabers or morphed into robots from SPACE.

So I logged in - clicked on the 'Upgrade Your Phone' link where I was dumped at a page with a completely new log in screen which required a 4 digit PIN that I hadn't set up.

This new log in screen also contained all of the details required for me to set up a PIN - I would have to ring a helpline number. Which is where the trouble begins:

I rang the helpline number - it cut out.
I rang it again - it didn't cut out this time, an automated voice cut in instead to tell me that I didn't have enough credit on my phone to ring this helpline (calls charged - to customers - at 25p per min) THEN I was cut off.

Seeing as I'd put £20 on my phone a few weeks ago and hadn't used it at all since, I was slightly irritated and tried the helpline again only to get the same automated message before I was cut off.

Now I was definitely irritated, so I tried to check my balance online and received a series of 'service unavailable' errors every time I tried to check my account balance.

With hindsight, this should've been the point where I quit; ended six years of Orange custom and either found myself a third-party retailer or moved networks. Unfortunately I persevered. I decided to go the long route, sort out my 'upgrade' status later as I only wanted to keep my old number and transfer my existing credit over to the new phone and buy the phone.

I returned to the shop options screen, clicked on the 'New Phones' link under the PAYG menu and proceeded through a long series of crashes, 'sorry this page is unavailable', self-emptying baskets and chaos until I battled through to a point where I had a screen listing EXACTLY what I wanted with a big, orange button that bore the legend 'CHECKOUT'.

This process took a little over 45 minutes. In real terms to fill a basket in a webshop with one phone, one call time deal, two accessories and one insurance plan took me 40 minutes longer than my monthly grocery shop at ASDA.co.uk and that's 44.5 minutes longer than it takes me to make a preorder at play.com! This is Sparta-- The Internet! This is unacceptable!

And we're still not at the payment screen.

Payment appears to go well, aside from the fact that if you have a postal address that's not recognised by the Orange auto-address database which references ONLY via post code and house number. This isn't a problem if your credit/debit card address matches. Mine didn't.

Basically, if you have a house name, county boundary change or are in the wobbly spot in the middle of the Royal Mail's database where your post code is in the process of switching to a new sorting area - you are going to be in so much trouble with auto-address systems. Especially ones like the one on the Orange Online Shop which will NOT allow you to amend your address to match your billing address, it will just keep sending you back to put your post code and house number into the designated fields.

It is so frustratingly stupid that you will end up shouting obscenities at your computer screen. I have used retailers with auto-address generation facilites before but I've always been permitted to alter the output to include essential field information. The fact you can't do this with the Orange Online Shop is a massive downside to shopping with them.

However, I persisted because I'm stupid. I proceeded through the next two screens for dispatch and delivery dates then hit the 'buy' button. And for three whole minutes I thought my attempt to buy a mobile phone direct from the network had been a success - I had confirmation screens and everything! There would be a confirmation e-mail in my inbox too!

I went to my inbox, downloaded my mail and there was the ALERT e-mail. My hour-long struggle to complete a simple purchase over the internet had been a massive failure - and I had to ring another number to get it all sorted out.

After I'd finished bashing my forehead against the wall, I rang the freephone number from my landline. On the first attempt this too, as all first calls to call centres must go, cut out without warning.

On the second attempt I got through to several minutes of horrible 'on hold' music and finally I spoke to a human being. Who suggested I go through the 45 minute shopping nightmare again as the payment didn't go through.

I suggested to the human being that perhaps it didn't go through because of the address issue? "Oh no," He said. "No one can buy anything through the website without problems. It's got glitches."

Yeah, an hour's worth.

However, the human being reassured me that if it didn't work this time I could call the freephone number; they'd put it through manually and everything would be OK.

On the second attempt I shaved ten minutes off my first attempt, hit the 'buy' button and nothing happened. Ok, I tell a lie - I had five minutes of 'processing' animation then got kicked into a 'sorry this page is unavailable' screen.

Freephone time. Again I got to speak to a human being after the usual button-pressing assault course and the order was entered manually this time as neither order had been processed. Which should be the end of it - it's not.

My hope of the advertised Friday delivery doesn't stand a chance - because of the 'issues surrounding' my order it will now be subjected to a 5-7 working day assessment by Orange's own anti-fraud department. 'Issues' I might add that Orange themselves caused. This scrutiny is carried out on all transactions OVER £10 in value - which begs the question why, when a 5-7 day 'assessment' is included the Orange Online Shop were offering delivery slots within 48 hours of ordering for items in excess of £10 in value? In the meantime I don't know if I'm going to be billed for one phone, two phones or three phones and I have received no written/e-mailed confirmation that my order has been processed.

Though to tie up the balance issue on my PAYG account on my current phone - I checked the balance in the early hours of the morning when the site is less busy and found my account to be in credit by £21.80.

In first conclusion, the Orange Online Shop exists only to make things difficult for consumers. Their automated address and helpline 'services' are aggressively unhelpful in the extreme. The failsafe 'repeat your order' process has shades of The Silence of the Lambs ("It puts the lotion in the basket.") and constant referral to call centres barely disguises the honest truth that Orange can't maintain an operable, functional e-business front end.

It shouldn't be easier to buy a product from a third party than direct from the provider - Orange prove that, in practice, it really is.

In person and electronically, Orange present a paradoxical and impenetrable retail experience. No one should be left at the end of a transaction wondering what/if they've bought; without concrete delivery times or confirmation (failed or otherwise). In addition their insistence that covering their own system and administration errors is 'fraud protection' is nothing short of laughable.

Avoid them on the high street. Avoid them over the internet.