Youre all wet

Am I the only one who’s experienced this? I called up the water department with a question and got their computer. This isn’t so strange. It would’ve been stranger if I said I didn’t get the computer, a helpful man took my call, answered all my questions in a timely manner, and was very polite the whole time. If course, if this did happen, I’d probably think they were up to something, and were on their way to my house to strangle my cat. I’m not so worried about that, the cat can handle itself. I am however worried that I’ve gotten away from the point.

Anyway, once I got their less-than-helpful computer, it said For My Convenience I should log into my computer go on their website, and my questions could be answered anytime day or night. I tried this. Now I don’t know what their definition of convenience is, but it’s very far from the convenient that I know. When I went to their website, it told me I had to log into my account. I didn’t know I had an account? My water bill is paid by my HOA.

A setup issue

I was instructed to create an account. All I wanted to do was report a broken pipe, and I would never need this account again. But they wouldn’t accept this. They had to make sure I wasn’t some hooligan reporting broken pipes for fun and profit. Because this is so often done in suburbia. You know, six guys report a broken pipe, then sit on the stoop for twenty-four hours (because it always takes the city twenty-four hours to respond) just waiting for a water truck to go by. Wow! Some fun! Kids these days know how to live.

Either way, I clicked the button to set up an account. They asked for my name, address, phone number, email, weight, my children’s names, religious affiliation, number of dragons in the house, and if I was planning on catching on fire anytime in the next twenty-five years. The last one was hard. You just never know how you’re going to feel on any given day.

About the only thing they didn’t ask for was my mother’s maiden name. They saved that one for when I set up answers to the security questions. There has to be security questions. You know, in case some random kid tries to hack my account and report a broken pipe. Apparently, this is a problem. I’m planning to write my congressman about it. Well, I will if they don’t make me set up an account.

 Once I got logged in, I ended up scrolling through thousands of menus and pages looking for where to report a broken pipe. This was getting serious. Marsh birds were taking up residence in my lawn, and my neighbor was trolling in his bass boat. I gave up, and called the number again, was placed on hold and asked to log into my account. When I refused, I waited about five minutes, a rude lady answered, and I reported my pipe. At the end she suggested next time I go to their website, For My Convenience.

Order Easy NO!

This happens to me way too often. I recently ordered some stuff from The Great and Powerful, Amazon. Now I watch my bank account pretty closely, after a few days I saw that the money had come out of my account, and I went on with life. Next Amazon told me my order would be delayed. No problem, and after two weeks, most of my order arrived.

That was when my bank called. They told me there was an unlawful purchase on my account. They declined it automatically for my convenience. I went to look and it was the charge from Amazon. I looked back to see if there was a charge before. There wasn’t one now. I couldn’t figure it out. Was it charged or not?

Now remember I had the stuff when I went to my Amazon account to see what was going on. They told me a lot about shipping and tracking and other things I should know about, but not about taking my money. I tried to call them. Haa! That was a laugh. They don’t have a phone number. All of their customer service is done by answering frequently asked questions. Mine wasn’t one of those. I googled their number. A listing came up for Amazon Customer Service Phone. It took me to the same place as before. Then it had the gaul to ask me if this page was helpful. No, It Wasn’t!!!

Bank on it

 I had to know so I went into my bank. Actually inside! Where real people sit and count money, like this was the 1950’s or something. The lady told me there was no Amazon charge on my account. This was good. Then I asked they refused the charge from the other day. I purchase regularly from them. Check this out, they refused the charge because it was a duplicate. How can it be a duplicate if there’s no charge in the first place????

About this time most of you are probably wondering, “If you have the stuff, why the heck are you spending so much time worrying about the charge. Amazon makes billions. They can afford losing my rinky-dink purchase.” Ninety-nine times out of a hundred you’d be right. That other time is me. I can’t get away with anything. If I didn’t see this through it would probably be the end of civilization as we know it. I mean no more key-lime-pie ice-cream or anything. And anarchy without key-lime-pie ice cream just wouldn’t be worth it. So, I pressed on.

I searched again and after two hours I found it. Here it is: 866 216 1072. That is the number to Amazon 24/7 customer service. They may not put it up anywhere else, so I posted it here. Just one of the simple things that make Mr. Ohh! so wonderful.

That’s what she said

Would you like to know what they told me? Of course you would. Here it is straight from Amazon’s customer service script. Some items come from far-away fulfillment centers. When this happens, they ping your card to see if funds are available before shipping. Then they remove the ping and don’t officially charge the card until the item is delivered. This is for the customer’s convenience.

So, you see, me and my bank saw the ping and thought the card was charged. Then when I got the stuff, they tried to officially charge the card and my bank saw this as fraudulent and stopped it all for my convenience.

All this convenience caused me to make four phone calls, run through multiple web pages, actually go into my bank, and my rabbit to be fed late two nights in a row. Trust me you don’t want to know what happens when the rabbit is fed late. Suffice to say, I think she’s taking lessons from the cat.

Before all this computer crap, I would have just gone to the store. But now computers make it all so much better. Well, I have only one thing to say;

Please Stop Being So Convenient!!