Here on the East coast, we had a winter storm yesterday. :freezin :rain
My phone line went out. 
I didn’t realize it was out until Janelle sent me an email telling me her call went straight to voicemail. I’d told her to call, that I was home. This isn’t the first time we had problems within one month. :*&#!
I WAS ON HOLD WITH VERIZON FOR ONE HOUR AND A HALF until it dawned on me to try and book an online appointment or report trouble. :biggroan
Turns out I didn’t book an appointment, I merely reported the problem which I don’t think gets reported until tomorrow. At 2:30 PM. :wallbanger I think they have to contact me to set up an appointment. I may never hear back. I may have to call again. I have a stiff neck. 
ARGH.
Then I read that the US Post Office asked the Federal Government to reduce their “must deliver” days from 6 to 5. They don’t have the money to continue delivering 6 days.
What is happening in this world? Beyond the obvious. So let’s focus on the little trivial things we can’t control. Like is it too much to ask to NOT have to sit on hold for an hour and a half? 
Oh! Did I mention Mercury is in Retrograde? :wallbanger
That explains it.
:doh:
Carly Phillips would like to take 100% credit for all her stories but the truth is, Carly’s strength is writing family, emotion, funky elderly people and animals. She couldn’t plot her way out of a paper bag, which is why she smartly found her plotmonkey pals early on in her writing career. Thanks to their support, Carly is now a NYT Bestselling author of 23 plus novels. Because writing doesn’t keep her busy enough, Carly is also a wife, a mother of one preteen and one teenage daughter, the primary care giver of her soft coated Wheaten terrier and an expert carpool mom.
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{{Carly}} Sorry about your day – the weather’s been just awful. I hope it ends soon.
Well I’m playing devil’s advocate here. I say this to myself when I have to stand in line at the post office to remind myself not to get too crazy while I’m waiting. With this economy, there are less people to do the work. Where once there might have been a call center with 30 people, now they might have 20 or 15. At the post office instead of 5 employees working the lines, there are now 2 people. So there isn’t any less work that needs to get done, just less people. Everyday at CNN or other news sources I see daily reports of 10,000 or 13,000 people being laid off in a day. Starbucks is letting go of 6700 employees and closing 300 stores. Meaning those coffee drinkers have to find another, now busier, store.
Today I’m remembering, like I try everyday when it gets stressful, that I am so grateful to have a job. So many of my friends do not and haven’t for months.
Sorry to rain on your rant Carly, because I definitely have days like those! Be safe. :freezin
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I spent yesterday shoveling and deicing. But my power and phone were fine! Speaker phone Carly- No stiff neck!
If the post office wants to cut a day, cut Saturdays. they pay more in overtime to their workers than any business I know of. Why? Becuase they do a rotating day off. Everyone gets Sunday and then they go Monday, then Tuesday, etc each week for their 2nd day off. Then they call in sick or take a vacation day and someone else has to be called in to do their route or the others split it between them (at least here). And they get overtime. Lots of it. Let them all have Sat off then, not the middle of the business week when people need their checks or bills need to go out or buisnesses need their stuff.
And no big bonuses or any bonuses to those financial people who are used to getting them- my own step kids included. Everyone else is barely scrapping by, why should they get our tax money to foot their lifestyles?
Off my
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I was in the middle of the storm to..Good ole Vermont how can you not be. But thankfully the mall where I worked closed at 6 instead of 9 and I got home safe and sound. BUt yes…it was freezing when I did!
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So sorry you had such a bad day, Carly. On the bright side, at least the power didn’t go out so you had heat. :hug2:
As for the rest, I HATE having to make a call because of a service outage. It’s impossible to talk to a living, breathing human being. Going on-line with my request can be a pain as well. First, they have a “support” button and you think, aha, now I can get the help I need. But when you click that little button they throw up a smoke screen of several different options with a list of FAQ’s, multiple choice questions and whatnot before you finally get to the screen so you can ask your question! Then when you submit your question you get a little message saying it will be 24 to 72 hours or possibly next year before you are likely to get a response. They must figure that the average person will eventually give up so they won’t have to be bothered.
It’s like they don’t want anyone asking questions. We’re just supposed to take whatever they dish out. Then they have these “It’s-all-about-the-customer-and-providing-great-service” commercials on television! Which really gets me going. Their commercials should really say “It’s-all-about-making-as-much-money-as-we-possibly-can-and-reaming-the-living-crap-out-of-the-customer-to-do-it.”
As far as the postal service whining about losing money and needing to cut back to 5 day mail delivery, give me a break.
Where is all the money going after those annual postal increases??
Okay, I feel better now. Thanks for opening up the blog to a little ranting today. :giggler
Hope you have a better day,
Cher
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Caryly, I’m sorry you’re having such a frustrating day. I hate days like that. Being put on hold or such along time can be so irritating. And those automated answering services can be such a pain. It used to be that if you impatient for a human being, you could press 0 right from the get go, or just press the wrong number at random a few time until you were transfered. But now a days, some automated services just say, “That is not a valid selection. Good bye.” And disconnect you. I’ve had it happen to me and it’s even more frustrating than what ever situation I was trying to solve. By the time I get to a human, I’m so irritated, and it’s not even his/her fault. Not fair to me or to them.
Debbie
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:hug2: Carly. I really can’t stand dealing with the “customer service” departments for most companies. You sit on hold for what seems like forever, and then they don’t really even help you out. My gym did an extra deduction from my checking account this week. I’ve called, left messages, sat on hold for over an hour, and they still haven’t told me what happened and when I’ll get MY money back. I’m counting the days until I can move my membership to a more customer service friendly gym or just save the money to buy a really great treadmill.
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The most AGGRAVATING part about being on hold? “Your call is important to us.” Yeah, well, if it was, you would have answered an hour ago.
I can’t remember which company it is, but there is one that when you have a service issue, you go to their website, key in the number and then they call you back. It’s almost immediate, but if not, they let you know there will be a delay before the call comes through. At least you’re in the queue, but you’re not sitting on the phone, tying up your line and stressing out.
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Julie…Amazon.com does that, too. Makes life SO much easier.
{{{{{Carly}}}}}I hope it gets warmer soon….we’re going to hit 40 and I am thrilled!
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:hug2: Julie’s so right about that “your call is important” message. When hubby had his surgery all of his insurance was filed wrong. ALL OF IT. They filed everything under his dad’s name so I spent many, many hours on hold. I think I was over 20 hours total by the time I got it cleared up. And they only had 1 song that played over and over and over. Sometimes I’d be so mad I’d be in tears. I think that’s their plan though. If you get frustrated enough, you’ll hang up and they won’t have to deal with you.
Big hugs and I hope the weather lets up sometime soon and gives everyone a break!
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I second the speaker phone. Or blue tooth if you are on cell. Hands-free is the way to go. Standing in lines? I bring a book. Some days, that’s the only reading I get done.
As long as we’re airing pet peeves, I hate out-sourcing. :angryred :scream2: :angryred I don’t speak “Technology”. At all. Trying to explain my issues to a person who is perfectly nice but who’s first language is decidedly not English is an exercise in frustration and futility. :wallbanger I know they are doing the best they can but by the time I either hang up unsatisfied or FINALLY get the problem resolved, I just want to
the CS rep.
BTW, Carly, every time I type your name, I have to double-check it. My DD’s name is Clary. Fingers are trained after twenty-one years.
Stay in and stay warm. The storm has passed here and we may actually get a partial thaw today.
ev, I owe you an email. It’s on my to-do list. Promise. *headdesk*
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Carly I completely understand where you are coming from. I am in New York as well and I absolutely HATE the cold. :freezin
:*&#! I was born in the middle of July, so clearly I have no use for the winter months. I get so cranky when its cold outside so being kept on hold for hours would definitely not be my cup of tea.
I know one of the banks (I think it is Bank of America) found a way to prevent people from being on hold for too long. Now you can go online and chat with a teller immediately. There is no wait and no stupid elevator music in the background. More companies should definitely follow their lead.
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When I posted this, I 100% thought about how many people are suffering and do I sound like a whiny brat, but decided the humor factor outweighed and you all know I sympathize. My frustration also comes from the fact that they can’t hire more people to do needed work because they can’t afford to pay them – and WHY? Something is so seriously fundamentally wrong with the system (ANY system, LOL!).
Yesterday I also tripped on the power cord of my laptop and fell, scraped my knee badly like a little kid with rug burn; last time I did this a few years ago I took the laptop with me. Thank goodness MAC has since created the magnetic cords that detach. I lost everything that last time. So now it’s just the body that’s bruised.
Phones are back on. Waiting for another repairman for something else. !
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A little off topic:
Leslie, I understand you have this writer’s bed desk by Laptop-laidback.com
How do you like it? Is it really worth it?
Cher
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Here’s a local pet peeve. Our power company recently changed their name. Along with the name change came lots of disconnect notices with no advance warning. They are not ansewering their phones just a message saying that they are trying to fix the problem. Wait time at the power company to stand in line is about 2+ hours. I know of one household that has been without power for a week.
Whatever happened to customer service????
Carly this is for you. :hug2:
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Karen, So sorry for those of you dealing with the terrible weather. I have a suggestion that I learned when the L.A. area had the terrible earthquake about 9 years ago: get a dial land phone. As soon as the electricity goes out, you can plug the dial unit into the connector at the baseboard & the phone service continues to work (now, this is with AT&T, formerly SBC, as the service may work differently for other plans). I have a daughter with many medical problems–I need my phone to function–&, honestly, if you had felt what happened during that earthquake, you wouldn’t have believed any phone service could have functioned, but, it did. Don’t know if it’ll work for you, but, just a suggestion. Good luck in getting your service restored, & healing.
Patricia
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Carly, an hour and a half on hold is inexcusable. Like most people in this day & age I’ve had my share of waiting for someone to speak to. There are some companies that really give excellent customer service. My patience has been severely tried more than once!
When someone does finally talk to you it is so hard not to vent all your frustration on that person.
The post office, I can believe they are struggling because stop to think about how many people now pay their bills online, no postage bought, in my family I know for sure there are at least 4 people that pay their bills online multiply that by the millions of people that are doing that. Revenues are down! People complain about the cost of postage but think how cheap it is to send a letter all the way to Hawaii or across the United States for only 42 cents! Pretty cheap to my way of thinking!!
Carly, glad you didn’t harm your laptop or loose any info on your computer. Ouch on the rug burn! Have to giggle though :giggler about the last rug burn I had!!!!!
It was a long time ago!!!
As consumers there must be some way we can let companies know that we are not happy with their service. Maybe they would change some of the ways they do business. When my phone was out of service in December I had to resort to calling the number on billing, once I got to talk to a person she called Repair Service for me, then stayed on the line until I had a live person to talk to. I was so frustrated, had been without phone service for three days but did not realize it until I was having trouble with my computer accessing the Internet, that was what tipped me off!!! Don’t we all just love technology!!
Another tip, trying to call the doctor & realizing I had no dial tone!!!
Thanks for letting me get on my
Enjoy the rest of the day Everyone. Carly I hope you all get a break in the weather soon.
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So sorry that everyone up north is having so many problems with the awful weather.
As far as the US postal department.
I remember when we only had delivery mon-fri. Which I see no problem with doing away with Saturday delivery. With the energy crisis I this to be a good thing. It might help slow the world down a bit.
My problem is the amount of money the post office pays their upper administrative employees and crazy benfits packages that their employees receive.
The past 3 postmasters our little town has have retired very early because the retirement was so good.
I think if all the top dogs in the administration at agency’s like the post office would take a pay cut the regular grunt workers could keep a job.
Same goes for the public school system the top administration employees (principals and assistants and the staff at the school boards) are paid way more than they should be paid for the job they perform. then you could keep the school nurses that they want to do away with.
When you work for a county or government service there needs to be some sort of control as to the amount you can be paid for the job. Not just the good ‘ole boys network.
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Karen, I remember being SO annoyed about being kept on hold for a long time that I got my cell and called from that, too. Figured it was their 800 number, if they were going to keep me waiting for 90 minutes, they could darn well pay for me to do it on two phones.
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I can’t control snow. So that’s what I’m going to whine about – that. My car kept sliding out – and I got stuck on the road about 5 times. ON THE ROAD. I had to do the seasaw maneuver – started smelling like the burning smell, snow flying, tires spinning and squealing…
And of course with a whole row of people sitting there nobody helped me. (I forgot my cell phone, ironically, after teaching – so parents waiting to pick up their kids just watched. Nice.)
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Not only do I not like to be put on hold, I hate having to push one for English.
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One thing I will rant about is the number of jobs leaving the U.S. I understand that it helps the people in other countries, but often times it goes to a location where the employees are speaking off of a script and cannot often answer more complicated questions because there may be language difficulties. So people in the U.S. are losing their jobs that end up being taken over by other countries. I sympathize, but it’s so frustrating to experience this.
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My next door neighbor has been battling breast cancer for a couple of years now. The doctor told her husband today that she has maybe 1 or 2 days left to live. Her liver has failed so I guess her body is shutting down. She is in her late forties I believe.
This is very sad news. Laura and I were not close friends but I liked her very much and I hope for the best for the family she leaves behind.
But in hearing this news it makes me want to celebrate life even more and all that I am grateful for particularly my health and the health of my family. And also my friends.
Put a smile on, ladies. Hug your spouse, kids, parents, relatives, friends, pets…and celebrate life. :-)
Cher
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I’m sorry to hear about your problems with Verizon, Carly. That really sucks. I didn’t know that about USPS. I guess I can understand the request, but if it passes I’ll definitely miss that extra day of mail. *sigh*
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Ah, Amazon. Actually my Amazon Credit card from Chase Bank. Yes, what fun that was.
When we were in CA, 3000 miles from homebase, I tried to use my Visa. It was denied. For a large order at Target. Now, I can understand it happening once, but when the information is verified- that I am ON VACATION PEOPLE WITH A CREDIT CARD- there shouldn’t be a problem.
The first time it happened, it took 2 hours, 2 shifts of managers, re-ringing the items 3 times and 8 phone calls and I finally got my order.
So that should have been the end of it. They asked me every question they could think of to verifiy who I was. Really. They did. Everything except my bra size I think.
Wrong.
On to the next store (half an hour later) and here we go again. And again. And again.
By the time I was done, I had the direct phone numbers to the fraud unit supervisors who would then make sure my purchase went thru. And everytime they would assure me I wouldn’t have a problem with my transaction. Even when I called them as I WAS STANDING IN THE LINE.
I don’t think I have every been that frustrated, angry and down right embarrassed in my life.
Thank god for the wonderful people at the Target I was at. They were not only wonderful, but stuck with me the entire way and understood it wasn’t me. I made sure I sent a note to their main office as soon as I got home.
So if anyone ever needs a really good number for Chase Bank, let me know!! I think I still have them.
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Silver- I have to deal with outsourcing at work when we have a problem. I have gotten to the point where I ask for someone who is easier to understand and preferably a female. I have found the guys to be vey condesending to me. This includes when I deal with anything these days that I have to deal with and they don’t speak English.
I look forward to your email
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Here’s a postive for customer service.
Harlequin is offering 16 ebooks for free! All formats. They will be up for most of the year.
And Leslie’s Slow Hands is one of the books being offered. One of the editors was on the Trashybooks site today, not only listening to our suggestions, but actually implementing ones that she could, or sending it on.
Now that is customer service. I hope everyone enjoys!!
http://www.eharlequin.com/store.html?cid=1316&cmpid=BLSOC200901290002
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We have been without power or heat for the last three days, due to a winter ice storm, just got power back at ten this evening and when I called the power company they keep me on hold forever and then told me to hang up and call back later. It has been a really bad week and we have been cold. We did borrow a heater last night. We can’t even buy a battery in town. It has really been bad here.
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We’re having a warm day today…it hit 9 degrees! In the midst of this LOVELY weather, the air in my boyfriend’s tire contracted and…surprise…flat tire! I called AAA in the afternoon, with the thought that by the time I got off work, the tow truck could be there (cuz, yeah, no spare in the boot!). But, after being on hold for 45 minutes, they said, <> Foolishly, I though this would be perfect…it would take me 30 minutes to drive to the other car anyway! Hahahaha. 60 minutes later, I finally get through again. By this time, the wait for a tow was 10 hours…you heard me right TEN HOURS because it was -50WC and numerous cars wouldn’t start all over the city. (By the way, did I mention that the car needed to be towed ACROSS THE STREET!) We waited the 10 hours, and THEY DIDN’T SHOW UP! (I spent 3 “happy” hours at the bar; the BF waited the rest of the time at work–night shift.) We called AAA the next morning, they never released the hold, they canceled the hold. Awesome. Yay customer service…oh wait.