Returns are on My List

And in a bad way.

Now that I'm working retail again, I have to deal with returns quite frequently. That's not a problem, as long as you have your receipt, or at least the tags on the garment or item purchased. I understand what a hassle returns are (or can be) for the customer as well as for myself, so I try to be extra patient and polite. But sometimes, I just get frustrated.

Take for instance a customer (this customer may be real or imagined) who brings in a shirt and jeans. The shirt is coming apart and so were the jeans. Understandable problems and a good reason to return clothing. However, the garments were a few months old (by the date on the receipt) and had been worn numerous times and smelled like cigarette smoke. We were unable to process the shirt for the customer, but did manage to give a cash refund for the jeans. And now we have to try to re-sell smoky, worn-out jeans at a price upwards of $25. The garments were not even purchased in this town, but a town several hours from here.

Take for instance another customer, also perhaps real or imagined, who brought in a pile of baby clothes that were not only worn several (hundreds of) times, but also worn out, stained, and smelling of cigarette smoke. Obviously not brand-new and just the wrong size. The manager stepped up in that instance and took care of the problem, saying that we could not offer a refund or an exchange, but she had to say it was because we didn't carry those brands of clothing.

I later asked if there was no policy against severely worn clothing and returns / exchanges. There clearly is not, because the customer is #1, and that's what my manager told me.

I know it sounds like I'm being a big meanie. I'm really not trying to be. I understand that you have to return things. I return things. But only if they truly didn't work out. And I don't wear it and wash it and smoke on it and spill things on it for a month or two before I decide if it didn't work or not.

There is one problem, though, that I don't know how to solve. If a garment is really new, say less than a month old, and truly begins to break down in a way that it shouldn't, what is the customer to do? They paid good money for a piece of clothing that ought to last a good while, and it starts falling apart. Should that be a problem for the store to handle or for the manufacturer? Should they contact Tommy Hilfiger or Levi's or Sag Harbor or whatever? Do you see what I'm saying? So, there are problems at every turn.

What do you think?

Fantasy Football is on My List!!!!

But in a good way.

Actually, Super Mario should be writing this. I think he forgot that he is a blog member here. Someone ought to remind him. :o)

Super Mario LOVES Fantasy sports. He does football and baseball each year. Last night, I called him from work, and he said he had won something through Fantasy Football. He can't remember exactly what he signed up for or how he had won it, but it had to do with a local radio station. The radio station notified him and let him know that he had won FOUR FREE ROUNDS OF GOLF!!!!

Super Mario is also on my list for many reasons, but for one because he is constantly winning things. I don't know how it happens, but it does. Little door prizes at school. $100 for computer surveys. Once, in Iowa, he won tickets to see Mamma Mia! through a local radio station. When he was a teenager, he even won a trip to Nashville! I can hardly wait to see what he wins next.

Cingular follow up

You may remember from a previous post that after many calls and conversations, Cingular refused to send us the $1.17 refund for a credit on our account, nor would they just close the account with the credit on it. So we got an account statement every month for years after the account was closed.

I'm happy to report that although we gave them no forwarding address, somehow a check in the amount of $1.17 was sent to us through Mom & Dad Henrichsen's address.

Yeah! Finally, an end to the long saga.

But wait. An additional $1.17 check also showed up. Do we dare cash them both? Or will that set in motion a series of events ending with us being turned over to collections agencies, credit scandals, and denial of a home loan application next year? I think they are teasing us.

Thank You Notes are on My List!!!!!

I know that might sound silly!
Who invented thank-you notes? I would really be interested in the history of them, so if someone knows, please enlighten!

OK, so thank-you notes are not ALWAYS on my list. They're only on my list under certain circumstances.

Yesterday, I dropped off some food for some of our friends from church. They had experienced a death in the family last week. I walked in and saw the widow and her children (who are all grown) sitting a table littered with lists and thank-you notes. I thought how un-offended I would be if I never got one of those notes. Should families in such stressful situations be required to send thank-you notes for flowers and meals? I don't know . . . perhaps it is a chore that will take the family's mind off things for the moment. But it is my opinion that the principle of the situation stands.

Another time that I believe there ought to be some grace given when it comes to thank-you notes is after someone has a baby! Getting thank-you notes out after showers that happen before the baby are not such a problem. But after that baby gets here! Whew! I think that up to one year after the baby is born should be an acceptable time to send out thank-you notes.

A brief update

A quick update on the issue I had with Verizon Wireless.

I faxed Verizon the information that they requested (power of attorney and letter from doctor) so that I could cancel Marty's phone without the cancellation fee. A few weeks later my statement showed that they were charging me for breaking the contract. Dad happened to be in town again, so he called again to see what was going on.

Mysteriously, even though I had faxed all of the information twice, that letter from the doctor didn't make it. Hmmm. Dad re-faxed it.

I got a call the next day. They didn't really think Marty's health issues were serious enough. I was even asked, "Well, is it terminal?"

A few more weeks with more hoops and paperwork and I finally found out that they would waive that cancellation fee.

The account now shows that they owe me $20.

That's what I was trying to tell them in the first place!

Upscale hotels

Sonnet's post noted that her letter of complaint had been unanswered. This reminded me that I wrote a letter a year and a half ago to the Mayflower Hotel in Washington D.C. that was never given the dignity of a response either. Not even a terse dismissal. But then, I guess it makes sense that if the establishment in question has provoked an angry letter in the first place, I shouldn't be too terribly surprised that nobody has the time to actually provide any minimal attention to a previous customer.

My experience was during one of the AMA's meetings. My room was paid for at an extremely high price, by my standards. I thought this would entitle me to, say, a functional shower as well as problem resolution, but I was mistaken. By the end of the stay I had spent what seemed like hours on the phone with tech support trying to get the internet connection in the room working, I had missed a shower because the handle fell off in my hand, and there had been several other small but understandable problems like maintenance needs on lights. When I went to check out they had generously credited my account for some but not all of the internet charges to my room, which all would have been reimbursable anyway. The problem was, with the internet/phone "package" credited, all my individual phone calls were charged separately and because they were personal, they were not reimbursable. So, by being generous, they had effectively increased my personal expenses substantially. I tried to explain this to the front desk, but they didn't get it and treated me like I was just scamming them. After several attempts to spell it all out I was at risk for missing my flight, so I left thinking a letter would probably help.

It has been a year and a half and I'm still waiting for a response.

Apart from the Mayflower, I've been annoyed by this class of hotels in general because of their nickel and diming you to death... or more aptly, dollar and five dollaring you to death. You would think paying hundreds of dollars for a night's stay would entitle you to make a local phone call from your room without paying a dollar. Not so. You would think there would be a continental breakfast or something. Not so. You would think you would be allowed to carry your own small bag to your room without being pestered incessently by someone who wants to take it for you and hang around your room pointing out features like the thermostat until you give up and grease their palm. Not so.

This is why I prefer to use Priceline whenever possible for hotels. I've had a pretty good experience and the hotels I have gotten there have been more reasonable. For example, Marriott's Courtyard hotel in Washington DC was only a couple blocks from the Mayflower but included free internet service, free continental breakfast (including a waffle bar, and other warm foods--not a scrimpy tray of bagels and donuts), and free local and toll-free calls. If I can just get free toll free calls (should be an oxymoron if not free, I know, but it's more the rule than the exception!) I can use my calling card to get 4 cent rates anywhere.

I wonder if the Courtyard hotel would have answered a letter...

I Heart Regular Roast Beef

Arby's. Mmmm. I know, it's terrible for me. But, mmmm. Tonight I was hungry, and it was late, and I didn't want to wait the hour it would take to pull something out of the freezer and get it ready.

9:49.

Arby's closes at 10:00.

I pull up to the drive through screen at 9:55. It took a minute (I think they were hoping I'd change my mind and go to Taco Bell), but then I heard, "Welcome to Arby's. Can I take your order?"

It took a few minutes to get my food ready because they were making it fresh for me (well, the beef was already slaughtered and roasted), but I was still driving back home by 10:00.

As I left the window, the employee locked the window and began turning out lights.

My fries were so hot they burned my tongue a bit. And she'd gone ahead and given me a few packages of Arby's sauce. Mmmmm, Arby's.

Taking on the Giant

I've been putting off doing this. But I'm still irritated. I'm mad at Wal-Mart. Here's a letter I recently wrote and sent to the manager of a local store:

On Thursday, June 15, I purchased two 32 oz. bottles of hydrogen peroxide from your store. Upon arriving at home I discovered that one of the bottles was lacking its tamper-proof safety seal. On Saturday June 17, 2006 I returned to your store to return the defective bottle of hydrogen peroxide. I expected the return process to be straight-forward and easy based on Wal*Mart’s published policy.

Instead the attendant at the customer service desk, Keasha, proceeded to accuse me of trying to return water instead of hydrogen peroxide. I recognize that water and hydrogen peroxide have similar physical properties, so although I was taken aback, I was not upset when she initially asked if it was water in the bottle. I assured her it was indeed hydrogen peroxide and again explained my reason for returning it. Before accepting the return Keasha called over her manager, who in turn called someone from the pharmacy. I’m sure that these actions were according to protocol, but I found it quite offensive that when each of these individuals arrived Keasha said, “She wants to return water.” The pharmacy representative confirmed that the bottle contained hydrogen peroxide and authorized my refund of $1.03.

I understand that loss prevention is an important issue for a major retailer like Wal*Mart; however, I think the way I was treated was offensive and unacceptable. I shop at Wal*Mart because of the reasonable prices and the convenience of your store to my home, but after my recent experience I don’t anticipate returning to your store. Additionally, I will be sharing this experience with my friends and family.

I appreciate your time in addressing this issue.

So far my letter has gone unacknowledged. And that bugs me too. I wasn't expecting free stuff, but I'd appreciate a letter of acknowledgement. Apparently Wal-Mart doesn't care about me and my $1.03 or how many other dollars I might or might not spend there because they make plenty without me anyway. Nevertheless, my Wal-Mart boycott has begun (at least of that store, I'm ambivalent about other ones).

A softer, gentler hate

John recently asked if I still hate Microsoft after getting my Xbox 360. Well, yes. But it's a softer, gentler hate.

I'm not a big gamer. I like games, sure, but I'm not the type to put in the number of hours to justify owning a $400 piece of "ultimate" gaming equipment. The trick about the 360 is that it is a bit more than just gaming, it's more "entertainment" equipment. They advertise that connected to a Windows Media Center PC, the Xbox 360 can access your photos, videos, and music from the computer and play it on your TV. Cool. That was the selling point for me. Not to mention the fact I could get a "free" 360 by doing a bunch of online offers. I'll save the details of the so-called free offer debacle for another post, but suffice it to say that I got my 360 and it was reasonably priced.

Now, here's where the softer, gentler hate comes in. The 360 doesn't come with any games. So, you have to fork over another $60 to buy one if you actually want to use it for its primary intended purpose. Cha-ching. I didn't care too much since I just wanted to connect to our family media and be able to browse all the family vids I had edited, listen to our whopping music collection, etc. while at the TV. I connected the USB wireless adaptor and... nothing happened. You see, they forgot to mention that to connect your PC to the 360 you either have to wind an ethernet cable through all the rooms of the house to connect the two, or BUY a Microsoft proprietary wireless adaptor. My perfectly good, high quality Linksys adaptor would not work. Price for a MS adaptor: $100. Cha-ching.

To avoid the cost of games and ridiculous proprietary MS peripherals, I rented a game from Blockbuster ($8 for 2 days--and people DO this?) and wound the obligatory 60 feet of cable through my house. I installed the necessary software and it worked without problems. I happily sat on my couch and accessed photos and music from the computer. However, when I went for my family videos the 360 reported that it could not play the video because the appropriate codec was not installed. AVI is not an obscure video format. In fact, I believe Microsoft made the format in an early version of Windows. Regardless, after a quick fact-finding trip on the Internet I found that indeed the only videos my 360 would play are MPEG (but not MPEG 4) and WMV--Microsoft's proprietary licensed format that uses digital rights management.

WHAT? Unbelievable! Further, using the 360 controller to control playback of DVD's or music is a little tricky. But don't worry, you can buy a handy-dandy Microsoft Xbox remote control at Walmart for only $30. Cha-ching. The fact we HAVE a handy-dandy Microsoft WMC remote control is moot. It won't work.

Hence, the hate.

But, please understand, this is not the vitriolic bitter hate I usually reserve for Microsoft, this is a mild hate tempered by the fact that I really like the games I've played so far, I like being able to download demos, access my music and other stuff. Basically, once you get the full story on what the costs and abilities will be, the 360 does it what it does really well.

A Couple of Things I Like

It's nice when products deliver what they say they do. For instance, don't you hate it when you pick up a bag of tortilla chips that says, "Restaurant Style!" but they are not at all that way? They're not thin and crispy, like those freshly fried at your favorite Mexican eatery. Well, Super Mario and I have found some that live up to the claim! Unfortunately for the rest of the world, they're only made in our neck of the woods. They're called Nuevo Laredo, are only $1.00 a bag, and they are outstanding! It's as if someone brought them to us in a paper-lined basket with a little bowl of salsa. I don't know how many bags we've gone through, but each time we eat them, we say, "Wow! I cannot believe how much these taste JUST LIKE the ones you get in the restaurant!" I hope they make it to your neck of the woods very soon.

Also, it's nice when a company delivers what it says it does. Not like our old garbage company. My kudos go now to Netflix! Super Mario and I LOVE Netflix! I like it so much because you can get any movie in the world there, or so it seems. For instance, once the LDS missionaries let me borrow the movie Charley. I loved it. It tugged at my heartstrings. I thought that it would be great to see more movies like that, but where in the heck am I going to find them? Should I go hunting around my new town, trying to find some more missionaries, just to roll down my window and ask, "Hey, do you have some Charley-esque movies that I might borrow?" But after doing some research, guess where I found a bunch of them? Netflix! Not to mention other things that my local vidoe store doesn't carry. Things like documentaries on all kinds of things, especially historical things, which is what I like so much. Or television series. Or, for Super Mario, WWF Allstars 1985 (or something like that). Netflix is amazing! And we get the movies so fast. If you don't have Netflix, you should try it! Really. It is great.

After our trash service fiasco, it's nice to have something to sing about!

I HATE Microsoft

Time after time they have betrayed me. Most recently, we needed to restore our computer to its original factory settings because a bunch of programs refused to work anymore. Neither reinstallation, tech support, nor system restore could do anything for the situation. So, I went to the ol' Microsoft "settings and transfer" wizard to make the restoration easier.

Trash. Turns out, it didn't back up both profiles, just one. And it didn't back up all our programs, just Microsoft's. For example, we prefer Firefox for our browser. It dutifully backed up IE's settings and ignored Firefox's and Opera's. Well, I should have expected that, right? Well, I specifically went to their website trying to find out if it would get all the profiles and programs and I found NOTHING. Their help files are absolutely ludicrous and have been since the advent of Windows.

Trying to restore Outlook was an even greater joy. I put phrase after phrase into the help box and it would constantly access the internet to pull to the "latest" information and bring back absolutley nothing of relevance or use.

Restarting Media Player reminded me of one of my pet peeves about all software vendors--they all put shortcuts in every conceivable location across your hard drive and change your program associations so if you open any kind of media remotely associated with their software (even if it was CREATED in different software) it will open in Media Player. Some companies go so far as having a "check all" button for file associations but requiring you to uncheck every box manually rather than providing a "check none" button.

Reinstalling Microsoft Money is the kind of tribulation I can only hope builds character, because it sure didn't help my blood pressure. They make it difficult to figure out during installation how to avoid installing the half-gig of video and audio files to show you how to use the program. Did they consider people may actually already know and want to bypass their bloat? No! In fact, despite my going to the trouble of disabling the audio and video installation, I find every time I open a feature for the first time, there's that grating voice telling me in the most obvious terms how to do what I've done for years.

Did I mention I hate Microsoft?

Windows Media Center software? Trash. I paid extra money for a remote control that would supposedly control audio and video on the computer. Well, it does if you only intend to use 2 of the 65 buttons. Stop and play usually work. Rewind, fast forward, and the other buttons: not so much. But my biggest gripe is that when you put in an audio CD it cheerily offers to rip it to your hard drive, but only using Windows Media Audio format. You have to pay extra for the mpeg codec--despite that we have the mpeg encoder installed on our operating system from other software. Microsoft, apparently will have nothing to do with my legally owned existing codecs--I have to buy it from THEM.

You may have heard all the hype about Vista, the next Windows version. Well, I certainly hope they get around to fixing the problem I had while using Windows Explorer the other day. I was deleting folders in the left panel while the right panel showed the contents. It deleted all the contents first, but then gave me an error message because the folder was not empty--apparently unable to delete the hidden thumbnail index file because it was a protected OS file. They've had HOW many years to fix the most basic aspects of the operating system? I don't care if Windows Vista makes my computer stand up and do a gig, I don't want more of the same crap if I can't delete a folder without their technology having a breakdown.

Internet explorer has a new beta version out--from what I understand it just steals all the innovations from Firefox and sets your browser search to MSN automatically not giving you the specific option during setup to choose another provider--say, Google, the most popular search engine in the world. Well, if you can't beat 'em, bully them, I guess. Seems to be the long standing MS mantra.

This is one of the largest and richest companies in the world right? How can they consistently and bitterly disappoint me with nearly everything they do? And their stock has been going down... I wonder why?

Wrongs Made Right

A year or so ago I was traveling by van to a conference with some of my colleagues. On the way home we stopped for lunch at Perkins. It was busy. Sunday brunchers filled the restaurant. We understood that we would have to wait a bit. We waited. And waited. Still waiting. Finally when the place was completely empty we were shown to a table. We waited. And waited. More waiting. In all, we spent nearly 2 hours there—only 30 minutes of which were we eating. We were all pretty disappointed.

I was the only one disappointed enough to call their national customer service number. But I emphasized that my feelings were shared by the other 5 people in my party. The person I spoke to took my information and apologized profusely.

A few days later I got a message from the manager of the restaurant we’d been to. She apologized for our treatment and asked me to call her back. I didn’t return her call immediately, but she wanted to make sure things were made right, so she persisted in calling until she got a hold of me. She sent 6 vouchers for free meals. Unfortunately, although she had said they’d be good at any Perkins, they did say they were only good at hers.

So I called the local Perkins restaurant and spoke to the manager. I explained the situation and asked if he would accept the vouchers we had—acknowledging that he had nothing to do with our complaint. He told me to come in and he would give me vouchers for the local restaurants in exchange for the ones I had. After all, he said, Perkins is a brand name, and he didn’t want us not eating at any Perkins because of a bad experience at one.

As I passed out the vouchers to my colleagues, they were all quite impressed with what my complaining had accomplished.

Next story: For the ward Christmas party I was in charge of the hot apple cider. So I went to Food Lion and bought a lot of cider. Turns out, it was too much. I returned to said grocery store with the receipt and 4 unopened gallons of cider. The woman at customer service had no problem accepting the return. She just didn’t want to give me my original receipt back. “I need that receipt so I can be reimbursed for everything else I bought but didn’t return.” She kept trying to tell me that there was no way she could give me the receipt back. Finally she logged a record of the transaction into the computer and that apparently fixed it all. (Why didn’t she do that in the first place? Who knows?!) But then I did the unthinkable—I asked for a receipt or record of the return for me to keep as well. Again, she believed that this was out of the question and would require the alignment of the planets and world peace and an end to world hunger in order to accomplish. I argued back that I NEEDED it. Couldn’t she just make me a little copy of that transaction she’d just recorded in the computer. Nope. And then she decided that she’d have to ignore me and help the next 4 people, who had gotten in line during the time she’d been telling me that I was asking her to turn water into wine, before she could possibly attend to what I needed.

Thirty minutes after entering the store with 4 gallons of cider I was able to leave with a refund and 2 receipts.

Again, I called the national customer service number. They listened to my complaint. The next day the store manager called. He apologized for my treatment and confirmed that everything I had asked for should have been no problem. To show that Food Lion still wanted my business, he had a $10 gift card waiting for me at the store.

No boycott needed for Perkins or Food Lion. They addressed the problems and did what they could to make it right by me.

Would you like fries with that?

Coach just had that post about covering the uninsured, and I attest once again to my lack of knowledge regarding that subject. But let me pose another question: How about properly covering the insured?

A friend of ours just had a partial masectomy. The surgery was at 3pm yesterday. She got home from the hospital around 8pm. She also had some lymph nodes removed. Here's your surgery, ma'am. Would you like fries and a shake to go with that?

What is up? Perhaps someone like Coach and others in the medical field can explain it to me. Is it not rather invasive surgery? And she didn't even get to spend the night? Is this typical, or a hospital by hospital, or worse yet, insurance by insurance case? I would hope that drive-through surgery is not protocol.

Again, this is my ignorant-regarding-subject .02! Oh, and I hope I spelled all the words right. I haven't figured out spell check on blogger.

Free Favorites

I can get really excited about certain products: free ones of high quality. I like free. That's all I ask. ;-) It's an amazing thing when a company can provide services funded on advertising alone--and that advertising is unobtrusive and actually HELPFUL when you want to find particular products or services. It's a win-win. This is how capitalism should work.

Google, specifically is on my favorites list.

I recognize the company has a few sticky points, but in general they make me very happy. And since many people probably don't even know how cool they are, I'm going to tell you.

First of all, Picasa is their photo organizing software. In a completely accessible fun way, you can navigate through your photos, back them up, print them, and touch them up to give special effects like this:

All our contributor photos on our family blog were created in Picasa.

Second, Google Earth and Google Maps are very fun for mapping. If you search for an address on Google it gives you the option to map it in several different mapping websites. Its own mapping site allows you to drag the map, overlay satellite images, and search for particular establishments on the map. Very, very cool. Google earth adds to this the ability to zoom in and out on 3D topographies like the Grand Canyon or Manhatten. There's no good way to describe this but as exceptionally cool. You can look at Manhatten, for example, and then put overlays on for roads, lodging, dining, etc. You should probably have a high speed connection for maximum coolness.

And if you want to add your own buildings to Google Earth, you can. You first create 3D models in their free software called SketchUp. It's pretty easy and fun by itself. If you upload your creation, anyone can see it in Google Earth when they enable the Google Earth Community.

Gmail is a slightly unconventional e-mail client, but it's the best free webmail out there, in my opinion. It doesn't look particularly flashy, but it does what it does better than anyone. It organizes conversations, makes finding relevant messages instantaneous, gives plenty of storage space, and allows free pop forwarding and client usage. If you want an address and need an invitation, let me know.

But my favorite use for Google is just the pure search. I like their Toolbar and Desktop Search software to make it more powerful, but they aren't even necessary. Desktop search indexes the files on your computer so the Windows dog doesn't have to dig for 15 minutes to do a single search. You just type the term and all your docs with that term are listed instantly. My loyalties have just been dramatically shifted away from Microsoft to Google forever.

Plus, you can just type "define: synectoche" in a Google search and it gives you dozens of definitions from around the web. I type "weather: iowa city" and it tells me. I type "5 kg in pounds" and it calculates it for me. Look at all the cool stuff it does.

Google is my hero. You can download most of these programs for free from here.

Do You Want Some Money?????

I try to watch the second hour of Good Morning America each day, from 8-9AM. A series they are doing this month is "$100 a Day in May." One morning, it was about finding unclaimed money you may have floating around out there somewhere. It may be a security deposit you never remembered to pick up, or some such thing. I looked in every state that I live (though if there was ever money for me to be had, I pretty much scraped it up before I left whichever state it was), but found nothing for myself. However, I found some funds for my aunt and uncle and some for Scott's mom - a pretty substantial chunk of change, in fact!

To find out if you have any unclaimed funds, just go to
unclaimed.org
and click on the state where your funds might be. Since you only have to put in names, you can search for family members or even friends and neighbors! One lady on GMA had found unclaimed funds for most of the people in her neighborhood! I suggest charging a commission if you do find other people's money!

Anyway, just something fun to do, and since I really DID find some unclaimed money, I wanted to pass this along!

Just something to think about

If you married folks are anything like Marty and I, you have some household accounts in one persons name and others in the other. And really that's just because one or the other of us set up the account (whether water, cell phone, electricity, etc). In general this has worked fine for us. I take care of paying the bills, so I write the checks or know the account passwords to work with them all online. If for some reason I've needed to call customer service on an account in Marty's name, he's taken care of doing it.

But recently I've run into some problems with this.

These days Marty is unable to make those calls regarding accounts in his name. So I need to take care of them.

A few months ago we signed up for automatic bill pay for Marty's cell phone (Verizon) because they dangled the carrot of a free $2o. Last month Marty called to find out when we were going to see that $20 credit they'd promised. He was told it would be applied to the next month's statement. So this month when there was no credit, I knew we needed to call back.

I called them and gave them the account information and Marty's name. "Are you Martin?" I answered honestly. "Hmmm. I don't see your name listed anywhere on this account."

"I know. It's not. My husband is in the hospital in critical care. He can't do this himself."

"I can't give you any information about the account if your name's not on it."

"I'm not asking for information. I just want you to apply the $20 credit that he should have."

And on it went. She got meaner and I got more frustrated. Finally, I hung up saying I'd be canceling the account the next day. She snidely told me that I wouldn't be able to do that either.

I hung up and cried. Dad called to complain about the treatment I had received. He was also able to get that $20 credit taken care of and find out how to go about canceling an account when the account holder is incapable of doing it him or herself. Here's what they want: 1) I need to have legal power of attorney and 2) to break the contract without penalty I need a doctor's letter saying essentially that Marty is unable to speak on the phone.

I've got the doctor's letter. Still working on the power of attorney. I've been talking to one of the hospital's social workers to help with this part. But the problem that I'm running into is that the doctor in charge is being extra cautious and wants to be sure that Marty is fully aware of what giving me power of attorney means (which I'm fine with), but he doesn't think Marty has gotten there yet (which is where I disagree with him). Here's the thing, Marty and I have talked about it. He's fine with it. But the doctor keeps saying wait. And now today he's post-surgery and more drugged up and less interactive and aware than he was on Friday when I last talked to the social worker!

I'm not sure how this would work if Marty were incapable of authorizing me to have power of attorney for him.

Cover the uninsured

Folks that know me understand that I'm a fan of health policy. And we have a big problem with people not receiving adequate healthcare in this country because they don't have insurance (or have bad or incomplete insurance). Last week was "Cover the Uninsured Week" and we had some speakers at the med school.

But considering my personal experience, I wonder whether the folks who steer clear of insurance companies don't have the right idea after all. This last week the Boss tried to get our insurance company to reimburse for some covered prescriptions that we paid full price for (because they hadn't yet given us our number). I wasn't actually on the phone, but it seemed that the lady was calling the Boss a liar when she said she had already received a check from the company for the wrong amount. Her screen told her that they had denied both claims and the fact that Boss claimed to be holding the stub of a check complete with account number and claim number was moot. Why an account number and claim number is not sufficient to access the relevant records in a database is anyone's guess. My theory is that the company is trying to increase the number of insured Americans by decreasing premiums after doing away with all business records.

Behold, The Trash Man Cometh . . .

OK, so this really only has to do with my neck of the woods, but since I'm supposed to use this blog to share my grudge . . . I'm gonna.
We recenlty changed garbage pick-up companies, and here's why:
Our last garbage company would hardly ever come to pick up our trash! Some weeks they'd come on both scheduled days, others they might come on one of them, still others, not at all! The last straw occured last week. We had our trash out on our scheduled day and prayed for the trash man to come. He didn't. We left it out for the next scheduled day and figured the trash would be taken away. It wasn't. The next week, the same thing happened. There was no sign of our garbage pick-up, and we have no idea why. I suppose we could have called, but we'd heard other people on our street complain about the service, so we just did the next best thing and dropped them.
I want to tell you that we are so much happier with our new service! They show up before the sun is up on the scheduled pickup days, without fail. You just never realize how nice that is until you go for about three weeks with NONE AT ALL!!!!!

Internet Freedom

I don't know if anyone has heard of this yet. My friend Sara e-mailed it to me (she works in the senate). I was going to send it around as an e-mail, but I thought this would be better. I did sign the list. I feel that this is important:

www.civic.moveon.org/save_the_internet

The rest of telecom

I can't really think of a telecommunications company that hasn't at some point annoyed me. When you can get an entire industry to buy-in to the ridiculous concept of having 2 year contracts for a service, the consumer is sure to get ripped off. I guess they all have to buy-in because consumers are too stupid to realize that a lower price with a 2 year commitment isn't a better deal. If that's what the customers are signing up for, that's what everyone will be offering.

It extends to other services too. Like wireless internet access from T Mobile. I signed up for 30 days free before going on a trip once so I could use their service in the airport. Imagine my surprise when I got a bill for $30 dollars not long afterward. I called them and they said I had signed up for the one year contract at $30 per month. I said, no I didn't. They said, yes you did. I said, there were choices on the signup page and I specifically opted for a pay as you go plan that got me the free 30 minutes rather than the one that has the contract. They said, nuh uh. And I said, uh huh. And they said, nuh uh. And I said then cancel my service. And they said, you owe us $200 for cancellation--per the terms and conditions of this offer.

I said, you are evil. And they cackled mercilessly.

So, I disputed the charge to my credit card. So far, that has worked well. I've probably disputed 5 or 6 different charges over the last several years, and they have always been in my favor. The trick is, you have to keep the terms and conditions when you sign up for something so you can prove that you aren't just trying to cheat the company and they are, in fact, evil. So the T-Mobile story has a happy ending. I win, they lose.

The last telecom story for now is AT&T calling card. Basically, they annoy me for 2 reasons. 1) You buy minutes at a certain rate and then they use the minutes as currency in arbitrary ways. When I first signed up, it cost 15 minutes extra to make a call from a pay phone. At 3 cents a minute, that was cheaper than putting change in the phone and way more convenient since I have the calling card number memorized. But then after I bought a thousand minutes, they changed the pay phone surcharge to 50 minutes. No notice. No recourse. Just, suddenly, what you paid for becomes depreciated to a third its original value. And 2) their calling card will only work sporadically with our cordless phone at home.

Whatever happened to just paying for a service and both parties feeling like the business transaction benefited them?

Vonage and Sprint

After reading Coach’s post about Cingular I was reminded of my own telephone woes. When we moved here we got Vonage service for our home line. I mostly like the service itself. It’s a pretty reasonable monthly price for all the domestic calls I want to make. If we talked on the phone I’d think we ought to keep it. But we don’t. And we both have cell phones, with contracts.

So I came to the conclusion that we have too many phones, and the home line drew the short straw. This is when I started getting irritated at them. First I noticed that their policy is that you need to notify them that you want to close your account 10 days before the next billing cycle starts or you get charged for another whole month. Second, because we want to cancel after less than a year, we will be charged a “cancellation fee.” Then I thought, “Well, maybe I don’t want to cancel.” (Look at me playing right into their hands! Aaaah!) I looked into changing our plan to a cheaper one. That has a fee too.

Again, canceling the account seemed like the thing to do. But you can’t cancel online, so I called the number their website said to use to cancel—their 24 hour customer service line. But when we called that one they told us we had to call another number to be able to close our account. We called that number and got a message that this line was only answered during standard business hours. Aaarrrgggghhh!

So here it is, almost a month later and we still have Vonage.

And while I’m on the topic of phones, I might as well tell everyone why I don’t plan on sticking with Sprint when my contract is up in a few months.

Last year I was doing things on my account online and I got an offer to take a survey and get 100 free anytime minutes. Great! I like free minutes. Plus, I was using up most of my anytime minutes on a monthly basis at that point. So I took their survey.

Because I got those “free minutes” this somehow made it so that for the next FOUR MONTHS all of my minutes became “mystery minutes.” I could not check my usage—not by calling their little number or by checking my account online. If I called a Sprint store, they could tell me, but that was it. So every month I’d call the Sprint store to check on my minutes and complain that I couldn’t check my minutes myself.

And then, on the fourth month of dealing with this, I called to check my minutes, and they told me I was 97 minutes over. What?! I threw a fit. Somehow because of the stupid system of theirs, the 100 free minutes were now costing me 97 overage minutes! Could I apply those free minutes (which I had never used any of) to this, I asked. No, they were a special offer and if you don’t use them, you lose them. Eventually I was mad, loud, and obnoxious enough that the manager gave me a credit for those 97 minutes and warned me that he wasn’t going to do it again and any minute I was on the phone for the rest of the billing cycle would be an overage minute (unless it was a night or weekend).

Does anyone have a cell phone service that they can really recommend?

About Cars and Buying Cars

Wow! I love My List, ya'll! This is my second post in one day!
I wanted to let consumers know about a great vehicle - the Nissan X-Terra. Actually, my family and I have all had great luck with Nissan - my brother and parents both drive one, and until recently, I drove the X-Terra, and I loved that little thing. I bought it to be my "fun single girl car," and that's exactly what it was. Eliza and I were girls-about-town in my blue beast. When I bought it, the sales guy said, "These things are little tanks," and it's true. An X-Terra, the best I understand, is basically a Nissan Fronteir truck frame with the X-Terra body. I bought it in Little Rock, AR in 2000, and drove it from AR to San Francisco in 2001; from San Fransisco to Eastern Washington and back in 2002; from San Fransisco to Iowa in 2003; from Iowa to Arkansas and Texas and back to Iowa in July of 2004; from Iowa to Texas (when we moved) in August of 2004, and from Texas to Arkansas and back a few times before we traded it in for the van that we now have, which was September of 2005. And that X-Terra never, ever gave me a bit of trouble. All that driving, all those miles, and my trusty X-Terra was there for me. My brother commented on how well it handled mountain driving as we passed through the Sierra Nevadas and other various mountain ranges on our way from CA to IA - while other vehicles were sucking gas, my X-Terra stayed smooth and steady, passing other cars as though they were standing still, and we were hauling a U-Haul trailor to boot! Sadly, I had to part with my lovely SUV in favor of a more family-oriented vehicle, though we have not been disappointed with our Dodge Grand Caravan, but I do miss the fun I had in my little X-Terra. I guarantee that it would do you well should you purchase one.

As for the car-buying experience, we went to CarMax when we made the trade from SUV to minivan, and I highly recommend going there! I couldn't believe how easy it was - the price you see is the price you get. There is absolutely no pressure to purchase a car. Our sales guy was like, "These are the cars we have that you are saying you want and that are in your price range. If you like one, great. If not, no problem." When we need to change vehicles again, or purchase an additiona vehicle in the future, we won't think twice about going to CarMax. It was the most pleasant and easiest car-buying experience I've ever had.

What's Real and What's Not

Just found
snopes.com
It seems to be helpful in distinguishing what offers are real and which are not regarding unsolicited e-mail promotions and pop-ups. Thanks to Coach's post regarding free stuff on the web, it has become a recent interest of mine. Others might find snopes helpful.

On The Pedestal

I've been doing a lot of cleaning lately. It's embarassing to admit how much certain parts of the house needed it. Particularly the kitchen. The range was charred, the fridge sticky, and the fossilized fingerprints on the cupboards weren't budging. Into this mess came two cleaning products that saved my sanity. (And perhaps my life, as the random mixture of household chemicals I was using before these beauties came along was probably toxic.)



Krud Kutter is amazing at getting up, well, crud. Like that greasy stuff that collects on the hood above the stove, trapping hair and dust and who knows what else, until it's thick and sticky and immovable. Immovable for everything but Krud Kutter, that is! It even dissolves those baked on drips on the burner pans. My sweet mother-in-law gave us a bottle of this stuff a few years ago. When that ran out, I bought a gallon jug of it because I never want to be without it again.

I'm not the first to praise Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser. All I have to add is that it's all true. Scuffs and marks that have resisted half-a-dozen cleaning products and acres of elbow grease were quickly (and easily!) rendered obsolete by this little baby. I honestly thought I'd have to repaint my kitchen cabinets, until I tried the Magic Eraser on them. I have no idea how it works, but you really just add water. It's amazing. (And disturbingly fun.)

I realize that my enthusiasm for these products may be a little excessive. I'm so used to being disappointed that I'm not sure how to act when a consumer product exceeds my expectations. It disorients me. (Or maybe it's the fumes from the oven cleaner.) Be that as it may, you really should try these out. And let me know if there are other products I really need to know about. Both of the above were recommended by members of our studio audience, so I bet there's more where those came from.

Cingular (or the former AT&T Wireless)

As if they knew I was ready for more posting material, Cingular went ahead and sent me a statement today for a cell phone account--an account we closed about three years ago. It shows an account balance in our favor: $1.17 credit, just as it has every month for all these years.

When Diana and I were married, we decided to economize on the cell phones. We figured with a pager and a land line, one cell phone ought to be enough. We therefore cancelled one of the numbers. I faxed Cingular (AT&T wireless at the time) a note notifying them they were no longer authorized to automatically charge my credit card, and we sent in a check covering the balance for the final bill.

But then they charged my credit card anyway. As if to say, "What are you going to do about it, punk?" they flaunted their disregard for my specific written and signed deauthorization. Despite that I had at that point a balance of $0 and had closed my account, they charged the amount that was shown due on my last statement. Peeved, I called the credit card company and disputed the charge.

Big mistake. They are still punishing me, as the statement in my hand attests.

Now, I feel like I've spent the better part of my adult life participating in customer service phone calls. It doesn't bother me particularly to call in to sort these things out, unless there has been a history of repeated incompetence in dealing with a problem. I quickly realized with AT&T wireless, that I was going nowhere fast. The CS person was so friendly and willing to help me out that she insisted on sending me a check. I was reluctant because I explained that with a charge in dispute, they wouldn't be owing me money in a week or two. They sent a check anyway. And then the credit card dispute was ruled in my favor. And then I owed them the balance again. So I sent a check again.

Magically, all these futile charges going back and forth to settle this debt created a dollar and seventeen cents from nowhere. But, as they explained several months later when I politely asked if they would stop sending me statements, they could not issue a check for less than $10, so I would never see that dollar and seventeen cents. And because the balance is not 0, the statements keep coming. Despite my repeated calls to them asking them to please save a forest by keeping the dollar for themselves and not sending me any more statements, the bureaucracy that is Cingular is incapable of troubleshooting this stuck cog.

We will not be sending them a forwarding address in June.

UIHC

University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics made the list long before the list even existed. Right now there is a payment sitting in my flag-up mailbox addressed to their billing department that will end a saga of unpleasantness that stretches back to September of 2004. That's right, it has been more than a year and half.

It all started innocently enough. My insurance changed and a doctor's visit was submitted with an out-dated card number. I was charged several hundred dollars when insurance was denied. I called to work it out and I was assured that it would be. I think my brain has blocked much of what followed during the subsequent months as a coping mechanism, but I'm pretty sure it involved a call to their customer service once or twice a month, being put on hold, occasionally disconnected, being the go-between calling the insurance company to say "they said that he said that they would...", meeting with actual people face to face who promised it would be taken care of, but it never was.

Every time someone tried to step in and fix this problem it got worse. Confounded to the n-th degree! During the most recent few months it was not unusual for us to receive 10 or 15 statements from UIHC a month. Sometimes 3 in a day. Why? Because they are insane. And single-handedly determined to let their inefficiency run the entire healthcare industry of these United States into the ground.

When the insurance issue was finally resolved (hooray) I happily sent my credit card number in on one of the dozens of invoices I had sitting in our family mail inbox. That didn't stop the madness. Weeks later I was still getting them. So I called and gave my credit card number to the nice agent over the phone who charged it and assured me it was taken care of. That didn't stop them either.

Finally, this last week, I got a call. I can only assume this dramatic change in who is initiating the ongoing effort to solve this problem means that the world is coming to an end. They pointed out I was receiving an unusally high number of statements and did I in fact owe them any money anymore? He actually asked me this. I said, "Please. Please. Please take my money and leave me alone." He chuckled. I think he may have thought I was joking.

The credit card charge was showing on the computer, but inexplicably it didn't go through. It wasn't denied. It wasn't stopped by any known force of the universe. It just mystically was not to be. So, I offered to send a check. And that's what is sitting in my mailbox right now with the little flag up waiting to end this chapter of my consumer angst. Hallelujah. The end. I hope.

Yahoo! Geocities

I thought I would venture into capitalism and see if posting my biochemistry tutorial online would generate enough traffic to make a few cents off advertisements. Well, I didn't get far out of the gate before there were major problems. I chose to host with Yahoo!'s Geocities, as we've had good experiences with them in the past. They only charged $5 a month, and as a promotion I could get 25% off of that too.

Well, I won't bore you with the details. Suffice it to say that Macromedia Flash generated files are not properly delivered from their servers, but they will not support this because it involves third-party software. Nevermind I have demonstrated to them that the compiled files work perfectly well from any other servers on the web and it is their advertising scripting (or something like it) that is probably to blame. After exchanging well over a dozen e-mails, they still have not solved the problem, cancelled my account as I requested when it became clear they could not help me, or fixed the incorrect credit card charges they had initiated (they failed to give me the 25% off that was offered when I signed up). Every message is answered by a new person who sends me a unique new irrelevant form response. It's been a delight. And for my persistent efforts, I'm hoping to eventually be rewarded with two $1.25 credits on my MasterCard. Hooboy! I'm such a sucker for principle.

Preface

Let's face it, it's hard to keep track of grudges. Forgiveness creeps in. Memories fade pleasantly into the past.... And yet there are so very many people who have annoyed us. So, in order to keep these grievances fresh and thriving, we plan to document them right here on the net where everyone can see them. Holding on to these grudges--every last one of them--should be well facilitated by a blog.

I've heard that angry customers tell a number of their friends about their bad experiences, but few happy customers share their feelings. That will probably be reflected on this blog too. Among the tirades and rants you may find an occasional account of excellent service or a good product review. Hopefully these tales will help you avoid bad experiences and allow you to patronize companies who deserve it.

The point of this blog is, in a word, consumer awareness. Well, two words. Maybe a hyphenated... consumer-awareness. Or compound: consumerawareness. Anyway, consumer, consume.