Tele Check Bastards
I’m sorry if you work for Tele Check. Note, this is not an apology for the following post, it is simply an offering of my condolences to you on the off chance that you are the only decent person working there. The sentence might just as easily read: I’m sorry_for you_, if you work at Tele Check. So, that being said, let me tell you about the Satan-spawned Tele Check Bastards.
I was going to sleep in today. My alarm was set for 9:01 am, and I was startled out of my sleep at 8:51 am, by a bastard named Michael Hayes. Mer. Hayes, if you’re out there, go to hell. He told me that he was from a collection agency, and that I had several outstanding checks; that my bank had closed my account, that I had recently shopped at Wet Seal. First, let me tell you, my bank is still very happy with me, because I have no outstanding checks, and never have had any. As a responsible person, I resent being told that I owe lots of money and have only 48 hours to pay it. In addition, I have never shopped at Wet Seal. I have walked past the store in the Mall in Austin. But I’m not in Austin, and haven’t been for a long time. So.
Mer. Hayes tells me he can accept my payment now—like I’m paying something I don’t owe. Right. Give you my debit card number, when you’ve given me a flaky story of debts I haven’t run up? Sure, let me read the numbers off. I’m not an idiot, and by now, I’m pissed because he seems to think I am.
So I finally get a number out of the bastard, and I call it, to get an f***ing automated response system that hangs up on me every time I go for option 3. So I try option 1 and get a new number to call, a long distance number. What the hell, I think, it’s in Texas, not the Canary Islands, so I call.
Long story short, I talk to a live body who asks me all sorts of questions. City of residence. Number where I had been called. Driver’s License number. She figures out that there’s a problem somewhere, when I’m not in her “these people are evil shmucks who owe us big money” system. So she transfers me to another live body.
Something is actually happening, now, so I’m not seething anymore. This second girl asks for the same information, and tells me she can’t help me either. I begin to seethe again. She says I should leave a message at this next place and have a really high up somebody or other call me back. I say fine, and allow myself to be transferred again. But wait!—
This is a live person. So I get to tell her the whole story again (by now I know it very well), and she says she’ll have someone call me back. She says it’ll be an hour. Great. I can handle that; gives me time to shower and get dressed.
Six hours later, there has been no call. I was seething before. You can only imagine what I was doing at this time, when I called them again to wage war. I call and some girl answers the phone. She sounds nice, so I tell her upfront that I’m livid as all hell and her company is the source of my frustration. I inform her about my day, starting with Mer. Hayes’ call, and ending with the six-hour wait for a return call. I tell her that their communication sucks, and that if I don’t get this straightened out now, there’s going to be a problem.
She’s amazingly calm in the face of this, and I make a mental note to reward her for it when it’s over. She apologizes for my experience and asks me to, for the last time, give her those numbers. I do. She looks it all up, and says there was a mistake and that they called the wrong person. She also tells me what to say if anyone calls me again about it. “Oh, honey,” I think to myself, “I already know what to say to them. You don’t need to worry about *that*. You just need to not be the one calling.”
So I thank her, turn on my sugar voice and inform her that she is only intelligent, thoughtful and kind person working there, and that she has been incredibly helpful.
And that is the story of Mer. Hayes and the Tele Check Bastards. I hope it was as entertaining for you as it was for me. And I almost want them to call me again. It’d be fun.
Let’s see. I’m sure there was a high point to this day. Oh yes. I rediscovered my deep-seated hatred of phones and phone conversations. I got to spend three hours of quality time on the phone with strangers determined to inconvenience me. I was relieved of the burden of having to do any of the things on my list for the day, because I had to wait for a call. I figured out again why I hate SBC for never being able to tell me my code for voice mail. Insert other nastiness here, that can’t be mentioned in polite company.
One truly good thing that happened today, though, was that I got to talk to my mom. Oh, and I have a great story to be written, that before I did not have. What else… well maybe that’s it.
I had a dream last night that the people in my undergraduate English department were squabbling over my class schedule, trying to get me to take other classes next Fall. They sent me all over the place and I finally told them that I was happy with my courses and that they needed to leave me alone. The strange thing is that none of the people in that department are at all like that, and they were, in fact, my allies against the administration in general, which was doing just that. Then the bastards called. Maybe I predicted the phone call. Cool, huh?
Oh well. I’m going to post this now, and try to make good things happen today. End.
I was going to sleep in today. My alarm was set for 9:01 am, and I was startled out of my sleep at 8:51 am, by a bastard named Michael Hayes. Mer. Hayes, if you’re out there, go to hell. He told me that he was from a collection agency, and that I had several outstanding checks; that my bank had closed my account, that I had recently shopped at Wet Seal. First, let me tell you, my bank is still very happy with me, because I have no outstanding checks, and never have had any. As a responsible person, I resent being told that I owe lots of money and have only 48 hours to pay it. In addition, I have never shopped at Wet Seal. I have walked past the store in the Mall in Austin. But I’m not in Austin, and haven’t been for a long time. So.
Mer. Hayes tells me he can accept my payment now—like I’m paying something I don’t owe. Right. Give you my debit card number, when you’ve given me a flaky story of debts I haven’t run up? Sure, let me read the numbers off. I’m not an idiot, and by now, I’m pissed because he seems to think I am.
So I finally get a number out of the bastard, and I call it, to get an f***ing automated response system that hangs up on me every time I go for option 3. So I try option 1 and get a new number to call, a long distance number. What the hell, I think, it’s in Texas, not the Canary Islands, so I call.
Long story short, I talk to a live body who asks me all sorts of questions. City of residence. Number where I had been called. Driver’s License number. She figures out that there’s a problem somewhere, when I’m not in her “these people are evil shmucks who owe us big money” system. So she transfers me to another live body.
Something is actually happening, now, so I’m not seething anymore. This second girl asks for the same information, and tells me she can’t help me either. I begin to seethe again. She says I should leave a message at this next place and have a really high up somebody or other call me back. I say fine, and allow myself to be transferred again. But wait!—
This is a live person. So I get to tell her the whole story again (by now I know it very well), and she says she’ll have someone call me back. She says it’ll be an hour. Great. I can handle that; gives me time to shower and get dressed.
Six hours later, there has been no call. I was seething before. You can only imagine what I was doing at this time, when I called them again to wage war. I call and some girl answers the phone. She sounds nice, so I tell her upfront that I’m livid as all hell and her company is the source of my frustration. I inform her about my day, starting with Mer. Hayes’ call, and ending with the six-hour wait for a return call. I tell her that their communication sucks, and that if I don’t get this straightened out now, there’s going to be a problem.
She’s amazingly calm in the face of this, and I make a mental note to reward her for it when it’s over. She apologizes for my experience and asks me to, for the last time, give her those numbers. I do. She looks it all up, and says there was a mistake and that they called the wrong person. She also tells me what to say if anyone calls me again about it. “Oh, honey,” I think to myself, “I already know what to say to them. You don’t need to worry about *that*. You just need to not be the one calling.”
So I thank her, turn on my sugar voice and inform her that she is only intelligent, thoughtful and kind person working there, and that she has been incredibly helpful.
And that is the story of Mer. Hayes and the Tele Check Bastards. I hope it was as entertaining for you as it was for me. And I almost want them to call me again. It’d be fun.
Let’s see. I’m sure there was a high point to this day. Oh yes. I rediscovered my deep-seated hatred of phones and phone conversations. I got to spend three hours of quality time on the phone with strangers determined to inconvenience me. I was relieved of the burden of having to do any of the things on my list for the day, because I had to wait for a call. I figured out again why I hate SBC for never being able to tell me my code for voice mail. Insert other nastiness here, that can’t be mentioned in polite company.
One truly good thing that happened today, though, was that I got to talk to my mom. Oh, and I have a great story to be written, that before I did not have. What else… well maybe that’s it.
I had a dream last night that the people in my undergraduate English department were squabbling over my class schedule, trying to get me to take other classes next Fall. They sent me all over the place and I finally told them that I was happy with my courses and that they needed to leave me alone. The strange thing is that none of the people in that department are at all like that, and they were, in fact, my allies against the administration in general, which was doing just that. Then the bastards called. Maybe I predicted the phone call. Cool, huh?
Oh well. I’m going to post this now, and try to make good things happen today. End.
posted by Rehkmira @ 19:09
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