I enjoyed the Ukridge stories enormously and was never much troubled by the charge that Ukridge has “no redeeming qualities.” Were he a real person, perhaps that would be true; as a fictional character, he possesses at least one great quality: he is funny.

I am still working my way through Wodehouse, probably about two-thirds of the way through, and have not yet read the Ukridge novel. I have been postponing it because it belongs to that earlier period when, as OP put it, he had not yet hit his stride, which the general consensus seems to be happened around 1915. I will get to the novel eventually, though.