Mention the name "Gene Woolsey" to operational research scientists of the 1970s and 1980s, and you will probably get the reaction that he spoke and wrote great deal of common sense, mostly in "Interfaces". One of his stories is how he did a study in a particular factory, and a couple of years later returned on a visit. He said that he wanted to creep away quietly; the solution that he had proposed had been pinned on a board, and was being followed to the last detail. In the intervening years, the environment had changed, so all the external parameters of the model were different, making the solution totally inappropriate.
I thought of Gene last week, when our gas company sent us "Your Annual Gas Statement". It reads
"We've tried to make it as easy as possible to understand."
"Your usage: From 25 Aug 2009 to 24 Aug 2010, you used 15396.49 KWh of gas.
If you continue to use energy at the same rate over the next 12 months, we forecast your cost will be £568.21"
What wonderful precision! Especially as the power consumption is based on reading a meter which is accurate to +/-1 metric unit, and one of those is between 11 and 12 KWh. So, the meter can't determine whether we used 15390 or 15400 KWh, so the last three significant figures of their record are unnecessary. That translates to making the pence in the forecast unnecessary. But these errors are tiny in comparison with the assumptions that we will continue to use energy at the same rate.
It worries me that somebody has thought that this information is intended to be useful. If it was someone from the O.R. department, then I suggest that they creep away quietly now.
If you are from, or know someone from, the O.R. department of British Gas, do let them know of the abuse of forecasts.
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