Every. Damn. Time.
At this point, I'm maintaining this rant thread primarily for my own amusement - what I consider to be a log/blog of "Life in the Nuthouse". *heh*... So with that said, I can only add that much of what is said here is little more than a rant, a vent, a way of blowing off steam so as to avoid blowing off heads. *bwahaha* All questions are rhetorical & do not require attempts at guidance or even an "oh-poor-baby". Just venting... a healthy practice, I think, given a bad name in recent years. Ah well... that's part of the program, too, eh?
So... can anyone really explain why it is that every time I have to deal with Verizon - an allegedly "service-oriented company" - I find myself jumping through hoops, running through a maze, waiting for hours on hold while the canned recording plays "I can't get no satisfaction", interrupted only by the annoyingly sweet voice of the cyberbitch telling me how important my call is to them, and that my projected wait time is now only 45 more minutes. ??? Okay, folks, I'm not talking about once in awhile. I am talking about... every. damn. time.
Less than a year ago, we bought a PC air card for our laptop with a 1 year warranty, so when I called the store where I purchased it to tell them it had given up the ghost and could only be contacted on a Ouija board, I was told by the polite gentleman that I would need to take the device to the nearest "company store" (as opposed to those nasty little kiosks all over the malls bearing the Verizon logo but literally having nothing whatsoever to do with Verizon), where the device would be "replaced, since it is still under warranty."
Well, the nearest company store is an hour's drive from here, but after a long day at the store yesterday (which included getting a $275 bad check from a self-indulgent bitch buying absolutely nothing she needed but only "desired", and passing us a slip of worthless paper to pay for her addictions), I packed up the Verizon air card and headed out in the darkness to The Mall in Rancho Mirage (aka Snowbird Roost Central) where this company store was allegedly located.
Upon finally finding the place and securing only minor threats to body & soul in the process of attempting to find a place to park, we walked in to find an overly polite gentleman with a clipboard who offered to "help" me. Always a sure sign that one is in trouble is when someone is standing at the door offering assistance. That should have been a dead give-away, but for the sake of stalking, I decided to play along. We were quickly informed after stating our problem that "We don't do that here, ma'am, you'll have to call tech support," but if I wanted to wait and talk to a representative, the wait would be a mere 30 minutes. He seemed to think that was good. And never mind that I had already tried to call tech support but gave up after repeated attempts resulted in utter futility.
I stood there for a moment staring at this man as if he were a 3-horned amoeba, and then I politely informed him that for a service-oriented company, their service was somewhat comparable to being sucked dry by leeches. Not only had a Verizon rep sent me to the "company store" after an hour's drive, but now Verizon's company store was telling me that the warranty was only for 30 days, even though I was holding the receipt in my hand which stated in bold Helvetica lettering: "1 Year Warranty".
It was this gentleman's suggestion that if I didn't want to wait, I could drive over to The Other Mall about 2 miles away where the wait time had been "minimal". I could only imagine. But we drove over to That Other Mall, only to find 3 Verizon locations. Two kiosks and what appeared to be a store. The boy-toys at the first kiosk boldly lied and told us they were the ONLY location in the mall - clearly a feeding frenzy of dog-eat-dog in the competitive cell phone market. But even when we eventually found the portal to "the company store", the too-skinny girlette at the counter made it quickly obvious that despite the fact that she was mouthing the words, "May I help you?", her intent was anything but to help.
At this point, it had become sport, so admittedly I began leaning on her buttons. I politely asked if she was aware that that the company she worked for seemed to be in the business of crafting ever-more-creative ways of refusing service rather than doing the simple route of providing service. I asked her point blank (with a smile) if she was trained to see how many customers she could turn away without resolving their problem, and if, in fact, she was paid a commission bonus for every incident of same. She quickly became flabbergasted, as young gum-smacking twits are wont to do, and threatened to call security. *heh* I could only laugh and suggest that perhaps that would be a grand idea, since I had isolated a huge scam taking place right out in the open at every mall in this country and many others, calling itself "Verizon Wireless Services." Certainly, I suggested, security would want to know about that! Call the militia! Call the president! Certainly something can be done!
Whether she called security or not, I do not know or care. We left shortly after, having validated that at the deepest possible levels, (now repeat after me), "The world is a nuthouse and the lunatics are running the asylum."
Okay... so in desperation, we drove back over to the Verizon kiosk inside the Circuit City where we originally purchased the air card, and surprisingly enough the gentleman who had originally sold us the card was on duty. He couldn't help us either, of course, but at least he was able to provide a phone number allegedly for "a different branch of tech support" - though attempts so far to reach the number have resulted in nothing but a ringing phone. Verizon has lots of phones, I presume. Maybe somewhere someone actually answers them, but I have seen no evidence.
So... after all of the escapades, I am still left holding a device that doesn't work, and required to pay $59/month for it lest I be in breach of contract. Never mind that the contract implies that one might actually receive the service for which they are paying, so perhaps I need to secure a lawyer and have him do some digging into Verizon's responsibility for "breach of contract."
So why am I bitching about this? One reason and one only... I am frankly tired of all the pablam wherein we tell each other, "Its just the world we live in," or "It's just the way things are." There is a reason it's this way, and that reason is, simply, apathy with a healthy dose of timidity thrown in. Translated: we have simply gotten used to putting up with this kind of corporate level bullshit, and the attempt is made to intimidate the customer into thinking it's somehow our fault when their service or product is clearly faulty and clearly still under warranty.
What to do? Stop putting up with it. When I finally got terse and intense with the girlette at the counter last night, I actually saw her wake up for a moment and realize that perhaps the rhetoric she was selling in lieu of service was just rhetoric. It was one of those little jolts people do when they are startled - their eyes blink and go wide as if someone just poked them in the arse with a tack, and there's a brief but noticeable "gap" in their attention at those moments when - just maybe - they are forced to see their narrow world in just a bit broader perspective. If everyone just remains calm and in the comforting confines of The Program, nothing will ever change, except to get worse, and I can tell you from experience that this is not the world most of us grew up in, and - to shatter a few illusions - it is not a better world.
We live in a culture that has lost its soul, surrounded by sheeple who uphold that program. No, it's not up to us to change the world, perhaps, but I do believe that when this kind of crap is allowed to continue as if it's okay, it actually becomes okay for the social-normal... and I think we can all see where this has already become a huge problem.
There may not be a solution, but there is clearly a problem. Sorry, but I refuse to buy into the platitude of, "Oh, Della, it's just how the world is." Maybe true - but it isn't how the world must be. It's a choice. So... while there may not be a solution, I just do not intend to be part of the problem through practicing the polite acquiescence of an intimidated sheeple.
As long as everybody just puts up with it, the message being transmitted is that we are okay with it. So maybe it's time to stop being so agreeable, time to stop being so okay when yet one more corporate mega-giant tells us to bend over. Think about it. Anyone over the age of 30 probably remembers a different world. Would you ever have been asked to wait for an hour to speak to customer service? Would a company ever tell the consumer that the warranty is worthless? If you called the phone company, would someone answer the phone?
Think about it. And next time it happens to you, ask yourself if you really are the agreeable person you're pretending to be, or if it's just what's expected of you by "society". How much are you willing to put up with? Really?
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