Byline: DIANE BENUSSI

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The other day, I found myself in the embarrassing and greatly inconvenient position of being locked out of my car. I'd pulled up, briefly, to speak to a friend and the driver's door clicked shut - with my "key-less entry system" in the glove pocket and the engine running.

When I tried to open the door, I couldn't: it had locked automatically. My handbag was inside, as was my mobile phone.

An engineer I spoke to (on my friend's mobile phone) told me "this can't happen". When I assured him it had, he then insisted "it won't ever happen again".

The garage subsequently said the same, explaining they'd tried for three hours to "make" the doors on another car of the same model - a high-end Jag - lock automatically, but had failed to do so.

What point exactly were they trying to make?

That I'd imagined the locked door? That I'd somehow done something to the vehicle apart from allowing the driver's door to close while I was chatting to my friend?

What annoyed me even more than the disruption to my day was the patronising attitude of the men I dealt with. Repeatedly stating "this won't ever happen again" was, I presume, their way of trying to smooth the ruffled feathers of a lady driver who really doesn't have a clue about cars and technical stuff.

Porcelain Bangle

Would they have spoken down to a man in the same way? I doubt it.

A little while previously, I had taken my car into the garage because my sat nav wasn't working.

There was a bloke standing there when I walked in, but despite being engaged in doing precisely nothing, he barely looked at me, let alone asked if he could be of help.

These are just two examples of men's continued patronisation of women that I come across on a regular basis. Perhaps the penny hasn't quite dropped that by 2020 it's expected that the majority of millionaires in this country will be female.

That means a lot of women with a lot of money to spend on luxury products and services.

And, guys, here's the rub: the days are long gone when a woman could be palmed off with a sub-standard product, inveigled to pay over the odds for a gadget or placated when things go wrong with a metaphorical pat on the head.

Today's women don't take kindly to condescension: they expect first-rate service, whether they're buying a top-of-the-range car or a financial package.

My position on the advisory board of one of the major banks has revealed how generally poor such institutions are at offering women finance to set up or expand business ventures, preferring instead to take a punt on men.

This is despite the fact that women are a better bet because they tend to be a good deal more practical and forward-thinking than men.


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The banking establishment still refuses to take women seriously enough, believing that we can be nurtured as customers with champagne and roses instead of good service and respect for our abilities and achievements. Well, I'm telling you now; we can't.

Diane Benussi is managing partner with Benussi & Co, a Birmingham-based matrimonial law practice


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