Today I Consign To Hell -the All Saints version

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  • FirenzeFirenze Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    edited January 24
    @Firenze I hate to be the bearer of bad news but could your problems with the boiler and SG have something to do with the nationwide strike of BG engineers?

    Which may in turn be connected with the recent circular letter, assuring us that resources would be concentrated on dealing with emergencies such as loss of heat and hot water.

    Fortunately Polish plumber turned up next day and sorted it in 5 minutes. I am now watching the pressure gauge like a cat watches a mousehole.

  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    I am calling to cancel my brother's car insurance (my brother had a stroke, for those who don't know, and is in a rehab place for the foreseeable future and I'm handling his affairs) I called his insurance company and was told there was a six minute wait. I hung on for quite a bit longer than that, got connected... and the call immediately dropped. I called back, got told there was a 12 minute wait, and signed up for a callback. They called back after some time, I answered, and the call immediately dropped. I'm currently waiting for a second callback. This is so fucking annoying.
  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    OK, on the second callback I got through and was able to talk to someone. But they needed proof that the license plates were surrendered before they could cancel the insurance so I have to wait for that to come in the mail before I can do anything else. *sigh*
  • NicoleMR wrote: »
    OK, on the second callback I got through and was able to talk to someone. But they needed proof that the license plates were surrendered before they could cancel the insurance so I have to wait for that to come in the mail before I can do anything else. *sigh*

    What a bunch of hooey.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate
    edited January 24
    Ditto.

    ETA: How are license plates surrendered? Going to the DMV? And what would you say? "Sorry, the car's owner can't drive anymore"?

    Good luck with all this, Nicole.
  • The handyman who was supposed to have come Saturday to do a repair on a fence before we move called to say he could not make it Saturday and would come early Sunday morning. Sunday no show. No answer to phone calls. E-mailed me at 6 this evening wanting to do the repair next week-end. No, I will have moved by then. Now I have to find someone else who I hope can get it done before Friday. Sigh. Oh yes, and it is supposed to rain all week, maybe even snow.
  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    @Golden Key in normal times plates can be surrendered either in person at the DMV or by mail. In the time of Covid, they are only taking plates by mail. No reason for the surrender is required.
  • Nicole--

    Thx. I'd assumed they just went to the next owner of the car. But, of course, you're dealing with insurance.

    Best of luck!
  • NicoleMRNicoleMR Shipmate
    @Golden Key Thanks.

    BTW, no, in the US the plates don't go to the next owner when the car is sold.
  • TICTH the fucking virtual anti-assistant bots that have taken over the chat function everywhere, particularly with my internet service, so that I can no longer reach a fucking human being without being forced to justify my existence to an idiot algorithm that responds to "I can't sign in" with "please sign in so we can continue our pleasant conversation." And round and round and round we go.

    My work is pressuring me to pressure the internet people into giving me a fucking reliable WORKING connection that doesn't drop 50 times a day. But I can't do that if I can't reach a real human being, as the damned bots insist on throwing me to the "community solutions page" which is full of bullshit that doesn't pertain to my situation at all.

    Do I need to go down and kidnap a technician? Because I'm pretty sure they'd jail me if I tried. Plus they're all working from home, I expect, assuming they haven't laid off the lot to replace them with "virtual assistants."

    O brave new world, that has such assholes in it!
  • So sorry Lamb Chopped. I think there should be a choice that says, none of the above, that would automatically hook you to a human being, but of course, they do not think that way.
  • LC--

    There are many sites about how to reach a real live customer service person, (Duck Duck Go).

    IIRC: One thing that's supposed to work is to repeatedly say "Agent" when the system asks you a question. If the system is set up to handle this, you should be forwarded to a person. IME: If you're calling a pharmacy, telling the system "pharmacist" when it asks what you want (not one of the given options) causes it to say that it's going to connect you with someone who can help.

    Good luck!
  • Lamb ChoppedLamb Chopped Shipmate
    edited January 26
    Thanks. I actually tried the "Agent" thing on the chatbot, but nope. Ugh. I finally told it to FOAD, but that did no good either. Maybe tomorrow.
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    edited January 26
    Hermes. Not I should add any entity hanging around under that name, who I wouldn't want to offend. I am awaiting a delivery of printer ink. It was due on Friday, but I had a message saying there was an issue with the delivery, and action was required by me. Or they would try again yesterday. But they did not define the issue, so what action I could take to ameliorate it was not clear. I entered into discussion with the chatbot. I pointed out that the address was correct and I have a clearly labelled safe place. The chatbot referred the matter up the chain and said I would be contacted, taking my phone number and my email (again). Have I been contacted? No.
    They never left a card on Friday. I think the package should have fitted through the the letterbox. What on earth was the issue? And why did they not try again yesterday.
    I need this ink. My new, using tanks for ink, printer, doesn't like acetates, and I need my old, using expensive mini cartridges, old enough to know abou them, to make a rete for my downloaded astrolabe. The last attempt was too faint.
  • @Lamb Chopped That drives me insane too - absolutely insane. I sometimes find that in desperation a snail mail to Customers Services at HQ helps, but not always. Being referred to a community solutions page when at the end of your tether is just the pits. All sympathy from here.
  • Ethne AlbaEthne Alba Shipmate
    edited January 26
    Deep sympathy @Lamb Chopped .

    Mr Alba dislikes me using bad language ( I know) , but after one extremely expletive laden rant , that solved nothing, I took to the company’s Facebook place if only to salvage my marriage

    Result?
    Solved in minutes. Not even an hour.
  • They don't like complaints or criticism on their Fb pages - any and every potential customer/client can read them!
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    Hermes again. Delivery promised this afternoon. The email suggests that they would like details of my safe place, but only allow a set of options which do not include mine. I tired the chatbot to see if I could get a way of suggesting a none of the above option, but it insisted on trying to get me to choose a limited number of options I could ask about. My safe place is labelled with a plaque telling delivery people to use it and then lock it. A small cupboard by the front door, which has a matching plaque referring them to the cupboard. The first Hermes person who came here on many occasions worked it out for herself, but now I think they just go by their little computer and do not use their eyes. Lean it on the door step. Step back. No-one comes. Take it away. I'm stuck in all afternoon. No constitutional.
  • Hopefully, the delivery will take place satisfactorily, but, if it doesn't, might a visit to Hermes' FB page* be a good place in which to start complaining VERY LOUDLY?

    IOW, like the former president of the US when ranting on Twitter...

    *(Assuming they're on FB, of course)
  • ( got a sorta feeling it won’t work with Hermes! We are all praying for your parcel delivery though.....)
  • Hermes (with parcels in their name) are on Twitter, and that's another way to complain that usually works. You wouldn't be the only person querying deliveries.
  • Just had a conversation with my boss re the company's new enthusiasm for working from home forever (eek!) and how my wifi ailments play into that. I told him I basically commute from the 19th century into the 21st, and am now going to be permanently stuck in the 19th (we live in a historical district which is underserved on everything). He came up with a variety of creative suggestions, all of which won't work in a 19th century house with my floorplan, and offered to throw money at any solution I could find, God bless him. But money isn't the issue. I asked whether I could put beer, pizza, a stick, rope and a large box on our expense report, so I could build a trap and catch myself a technician.
  • @Lamb Chopped if you're not shielding why not ask him to come to your place for a socially distanced meeting and get him to try making the tech work?
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    Delivery made, on the doorstep - courier not visible when I got there, but I called out "Thank you", and he thanked me with an accent from way east of here. It's like dealing with the fairies. (Except one shouldn't thank them.)
    I think I am going to have to make a new sign and put it on the doorstep, with a large arrow pointing to my safe place.
  • @Lamb Chopped if you're not shielding why not ask him to come to your place for a socially distanced meeting and get him to try making the tech work?

    Because my work is being extremely cautious and would never approve such a thing. Plus, given my history as a bad-luck-attractor, I would totally get COVID right now if I gave it a chance, because I'm getting the next shot in two weeks. So I'm being a hermit. :wink:
  • @Penny S , hurrah!
  • Penny S wrote: »
    I think I am going to have to make a new sign and put it on the doorstep, with a large arrow pointing to my safe place.

    Good luck with that. Most of our delivery persons (including the Hermes lady) come to the front door, through the field gate into the courtyard (Chateau S is end-on to the lane) but for some unknown reason Am*z*n drivers invariably come to the back door, through a gate clearly marked 'Please use other gate'. Sometimes - but not always -they bang on the glass as there's no doorbell, prompting either me or Mr S to leap up from our chairs and run round like lunatics trying to find a back-door key.

    Apart from anything else, the gate to the back garden is at the top of six steep and slippery stone steps and I would hate one of them to fall...

    If they don't bang on the glass, sometimes the only way we know there's been a delivery is the email from Am*z*n telling us it's been delivered *sigh*

  • I ordered checks with our new address from the bank by phone. It took several messages, press this and that number on your keypad, wait with music for 12 minutes for a human. All told used up a total of 22 minutes of my day. Went into a bank where we have a second account. Walked in and was out in 5 minutes. Mission accomplished.
  • Having spent well over half an hour waiting for a human at the water board to answer my live chat, and another fifteen or so for her to come back and request my details, I have now been waiting two weeks and counting for the team that deals with lead pipes to call me so I can find out what it will cost.

    (We have the original lead supply pipe from the mains to our house, which runs down part of the drive. The section past the meter sprung a leak before Christmas, so it's starting to get dodgy at c.90 years old. The worst bit is that it actually runs a foot above the electrical cutout fuse for the house!)
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    edited January 27
    It looks like the dining table I ordered from Am*z*n may never arrive: I had a message today suggesting that it might have got lost, and would I like to cancel it?

    I'm more inclined to think it's a victim of Brexshit and if it does ever arrive it'll come with a nasty demand for ££££ to appease the Inland Revenue.

    Talking of whom, they still haven't sorted my tax code. :(
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate
    edited January 27
    Pendragon--

    Yikes re lead. You've probably thought of all this, but just in case not: Any way you can improvise (or buy) a filter in the meantime? Either for the faucets, or for filtering water after you've run it. (E.g., Britta pitchers.)

    Best of luck!
  • Because my work is being extremely cautious and would never approve such a thing. Plus, given my history as a bad-luck-attractor, I would totally get COVID right now if I gave it a chance, because I'm getting the next shot in two weeks. So I'm being a hermit. :wink:

    The vaccine?
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    I've been reading the processing grief thread, because of my friend whose processing was interrupted, but it is not the place to post why and how it was interrupted and replaced by something else, the week after his mother's funeral. Nor is this. I have just deleted a long screed about liars and bullies, and why the stages of grief have got stuck at anger and depression still after a year. (Covid has part of the guilt, preventing face to face discussion, but in an innocence that people cannot share.)
  • Yes, the vaccine. (Mr. Lamb just called to say that they've confirmed it--he did in fact get the Moderna vaccine, the real thing, back in September, so all they needed to give him today was the little paper for his wallet to say he was vaccinated.) My turn is Feb. 10 (second shot).
  • @Lamb Chopped Really pleased to hear that you and Mr Lamb will be up to date with vaccinations on the 10th - that is great news. :smile:
  • I'm happy, but also a tad guilty--none of our people can get them yet, we're ranked 50th in 50 states for vaccine roll out.
  • LC--

    Maybe look at it this way: the vaccine will help you, so that you can continue to help *them*. (Just remember to keep doing the masking and social distancing routine, too!)
  • I second Golden Key ....
  • Trust me, I’m not turning down the shot out of some misplaced sense of guilt—nor will I stop masking, etc. No dummy here!
  • I know it's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but I'm irritated with my unstable internet signal which means the online gig I'm trying to listen to/watch keeps freezing...
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    TICTH Lothian Buses (again). Thinking that because their Travel Hub is closed, there may have been some online method of setting up a Direct Debit for their Ridacards, I went to their web site, but no - just a bald message saying that because the Hub is closed, they can't process new applications.

    So I'll just have to continue paying through the nose to get to work.

    Grrrr! :rage:
  • ECraigRECraigR Castaway
    TICTH my thesis chairperson. He’s quite lovely in a lot of ways and was instrumental in me getting my current dream job, but I sent the first chapter of my thesis to him saying that it’s not good and I’m struggling with it, and he responded a month later with lacerating criticism that amounted to, this is pretty shitty.

    I know it’s shitty, I said as much when I sent it to him, so comments saying as much don’t help. He also gave me some helpful comments, but did a lot of implying I don’t know how to write an essay. Let the reader understand that I took a class with him my first semester of grad school and he loved my work, so to forget that and give me overly harsh criticism on a chapter I told him I was struggling with is quite a downer.
  • LydaLyda Shipmate
    What a pill!
  • ChastMastrChastMastr Shipmate
    edited January 31
    TICTH whomever made the decision about who the new rector at my (and, before he died, Cubby's) church will be. Episcopalians are generally more progressive and less right-wing than many other churches in the US, and the previous rector was awesome, but he retired, we had an interim rector whom we didn't get to know too well as Covid promptly hit, and now they've chosen a new rector.

    I looked the new rector up on Facebook. Looked at his "Likes" list. And oh dear God. His favorite people and groups include Franklin Graham, Ted Nugent, Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Ben Shapiro, Trey Gowdy, Allen West, Mark Levin, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Mike Huckabee, Marco Rubio, Sarah Palin, The Blaze, other weird right-wing "news" sources, Fox News, the "NRA Institute for Legislative Action," etc.

    I spoke with the interim rector on the phone about my concerns, and found that he was a Trump fan himself (oops), so politely moved away from the subject; the interim rector had been kind to me and Cubby, and had put us on the prayer list and such, so I didn't want to get into an argument with him.

    Found a tentative new church (an overtly gay-friendly one), once Covid is over and I consider it safe to physically go to a church at all again. Just... yikes. And I'm a bit sad about this.
  • @ECraigR That just sounds downright mean.

    @ChastMastr Oh dear! I hope the new church turns out to be the right place for you.
  • DooneDoone Shipmate
    Yikes, indeed, @ChastMastr! I pray the new church is great for you and you can attend soon 🕯.
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    Who chose him? The congregation? A bishop? Are there going to be others who leave? I foresee more than you needing support.
    How did he get through the selection process for ordination? Did his mates from the NRA turn up?
    Are you sure it was his Facebook page and it wasn't hacked?
    It seems an unbelievable collection of attachments.
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    edited February 5
    Today I waited in church to speak to a woman about her father-in-law's funeral for 30 minutes. No apology when she eventually turned up. Then an hour of trying to explain that she can't have a choir for the service and that congregations aren't allowed to sing. Went through various organ possibilities and some recorded options: came away with a shortlist of 4 pieces of recorded choral music (extracts from requiems by Mozart and Fauré, some Stainer) and 3 bits of organ music.

    Church was absolutely freezing and I could have done without it but you do the job.

    Got home only to discover an email from her listing the three "songs" (hymns) that she wants... 😡
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    You'll get your reward in Heaven ... :grimace:
  • I just want the feeling back in my toes 😥
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