Inconvenient Annoyances

Yes. I was in China very recently. No. I was not in Wuhan. Yes, I was in Shenzhen, but all good here.  I'm feeling fine. Pretty sure I don't have coronavirus, thank you.  Every.single.conversation.

Yes. I was in China very recently. No. I was not in Wuhan. Yes, I was in Shenzhen, but all good here.  I'm feeling fine. Pretty sure I don't have coronavirus, thank you.  Every.single.conversation.

Are you sure?? 

Heavens, don't sneeze or have a coughing fit, or you'll end up in isolation with armed guards! 

More venting.

Ok, so it's not just here. It's freaking everywhere!

My former employer contracts with a clearinghouse entity to provide Medicare Advantage plans to retirees who live outside California. They also put a nice sum in a spending account for retirees to use via this clearinghouse to purchase said coverage. So, we're trying to figure out where to live. I need to know, roughly, the cost of the Medicare Advantage plans offered through the clearinghouse - potential medical costs do figure into my budget in a substantial way.

The clearinghouse will not talk to me until 3 months before I need enroll. They won't provide any information about anything. So I emailed our Retirement coordinator at the former employer. I explained that I am familiar with how Medicare works, but would not be ready to enroll in Medicare for a while and need to be able to plan for expenses. I need to have a ballpark feel for how much the various employer-sanctioned Medicare Advantage plans would cost in a few states other than California (where the employer resides). I told them that I'd tried to discuss this with the clearinghouse, but they would not talk to me. At all. And I asked if they could provide the name and contact information for someone who could provide the information I need to know - it will influence what state we move to.

I also explained that I am overseas, so phoning them and being on hold for an hour (which is typical) before I could speak to anyone there was not doable. Could they please respond via their secure message service?  God, I do expect too much from people.    This is the response I got:

"Thank you for your inquiry. While you are not Medicare eligible yet, you can stay in your current plan, the [XXXXXX] plan, until you become Medicare eligible. Please contact the Social Security Office three months before your 65th birthday to apply for Medicare part B. By then you will be able to enroll through [CLEARINGHOUSE ENTITY] who will assist you in finding the appropriate medical coverage. If you need further assistance, please contact us at [phonenumber]. We are taking calls M-F from 8:30am - 4:30pm."

It's like going into a shop and saying "I'd like to order your special of the day, but I need to know what's in it because I have some substantial allergies and eating something I'm allergic to could kill me" and being answered with "Our special is great. It comes from Greenland."

I'm dealing with minimum-wage idiots who cannot read.
Time to escalate, I guess. If I can figure out who to escalate to - it's far from clear.

Yes. I was in China very recently. No. I was not in Wuhan. Yes, I was in Shenzhen, but all good here.  I'm feeling fine. Pretty sure I don't have coronavirus, thank you.  Every.single.conversation.

Someone with the coronavirus would also be in denial


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Every time I see/hear coronavirus......I think cold beer.

I'm dealing with minimum-wage idiots who cannot read.

  I'd bet you are dealing with people who don't have time to read.  The new trend is to fire almost everyone, and make the few remaining try to do all the work and not worry if everything doesn't get taken care of. 

Don't care. If they can't read, they should be fired. If they're swamped, their managers should be fired. Not my problem, other than as a customer. But knowing the particular employer, no, that's not the case. They tend to hire people in at the lowest salary they can possibly pay. Which is why one ends up dealing with idiots. All the brighter ones can get better jobs. 

Most employers hire at the lowest possible wage.  Why wouldn't they?

And there's enough competition for jobs that it's extremely unkind to suggest that a minimum-wage employee is inherently dumb.

  I'd bet you are dealing with people who don't have time to read.  The new trend is to fire almost everyone, and make the few remaining try to do all the work and not worry if everything doesn't get taken care of.

I was thinking more that it's the "automated" response they give for the first email that is more of an acknowledgement and not actually something somebody read.

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I most certainly do not automatically think all minimum wage workers are "dumb".  But there is a definitely a subset of them who are only marginally functional. It may be "unkind" to say so, but it's also the truth.  Lately it certainly appears that the boundaries of the "marginally functional" are expanding. While it can't be said that it necessarily follows that the higher the pay the more functional an employee, it has been my experience that typically the more "with it" employees progress up a career ladder.

The next round of communication from them got me the information that "of course, those costs change from year to year" and "the costs are not something we have access to in our database." Neither of which were questions I'd asked them to answer. Once again, they did not answer the question I did ask.  The NEXT round got me the information I had asked for, in a general way. I was directed to the website of the clearinghouse. So, back to square one. My question was: could they provide the contact information of an individual in that clearinghouse with whom I could speak? (Did the organization have a dedicated liaison within the clearinghouse?)  If they could not provide that information, their answer early on should have been a simple "we're sorry, no." Or I should have been pushed up the chain to speak with a supervisor if they were unsure of where to get that information.

When I have a spare moment, I'll try one more time and ask for a supervisor. Because I seriously doubt the person with whom I've been communicating bothered to check to see if anyone else might have that information.

New job, working through the accessibility niggles. They turned the only disabled toilet on the floor into a fragrance free one by removing the air fresheners pumped in, but men keep using it as their personal restroom every time they need a poo. No consideration for the fact that people with disabilities may actually need it. *sigh*

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This month just must be the month the universe is trying me....

Iceland. Put in an order tonight - or tried to. They said "problem with card". Tried again, same message. Tried using a different email, said declined. Looked at my online banking, it shows it went through OK 3 times.

Ok... spent a half hour on the phone waiting on hold to talk to RBS's mastercard fraud people. Got referred to them by their general customer service people. Finally reached someone who says they tried to send a message to my cell phone about it. Then said "what is the code I just sent to your phone, to verify who you are?"  So I told him I don't HAVE a cell phone and that the number he has is for a currently non-working phone. So he said, "oh."  And verified my ID via a series of questions. And said whenever I was using online shopping I would have to use the cell phone that would text me to authorize the charge. New legislation. I said it was news to me, and that I'd been using my card online just fine without that - this was the first problem I'd had. My OTHER credit cards email me alerts.

So, the phone number on the account was my daughter's cell phone that we put on RBS when we were traveling and never took it off. Because there is literally no way to take it off, online. You CAN change the number, using their little card reader thingy and your debit card. But you cannot DELETE a number.  Of course, her battery is dead tonight because she uses it to listen to music on her headphones with and lets it go dead quite often. So I never got the automated text message. So, logically, that should have stopped any charges, right?

SOOOO, I'm telling the guy what happened. He asked how many charges there should be. I was like "one, maybe, but Iceland said it didn't go through so actually none." So he said, no it's gone through several times! SO I was like, "it shouldn't have, can't you kill those?" and he was like "no, you have to contact Iceland to fix that."

Arrrrgh. So then what the freaking use is their "text you security" good for?  I didn't respond to it, and they let the charges go through several times?

Ok. So Iceland doesn't have 24 hour customer service. I don't have an order number because it never went through according to their system, so that shoots down the "send us a message" option.  So I'll sit around stewing and then phone them when they open at 8:00 in the morning to ask what the hell is going on. According to their online system, I have no order placed, my delivery slot for tomorrow has expired, and all my "stuff" is still in my shopping basket. According to the bank, it's been paid for four times.

I will be glad to get home and not have to deal with this insanity anymore.

I just want my freaking milk and eggs delivered tomorrow! 

New job, working through the accessibility niggles. They turned the only disabled toilet on the floor into a fragrance free one by removing the air fresheners pumped in, but men keep using it as their personal restroom every time they need a poo. No consideration for the fact that people with disabilities may actually need it. *sigh*

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That certainly can't smell much better than air freshener! 

This month just must be the month the universe is trying me....

Iceland. Put in an order tonight - or tried to. They said "problem with card". Tried again, same message. Tried using a different email, said declined. Looked at my online banking, it shows it went through OK 3 times.

Ok... spent a half hour on the phone waiting on hold to talk to RBS's mastercard fraud people. Got referred to them by their general customer service people. Finally reached someone who says they tried to send a message to my cell phone about it. Then said "what is the code I just sent to your phone, to verify who you are?"  So I told him I don't HAVE a cell phone and that the number he has is for a currently non-working phone. So he said, "oh."  And verified my ID via a series of questions. And said whenever I was using online shopping I would have to use the cell phone that would text me to authorize the charge. New legislation. I said it was news to me, and that I'd been using my card online just fine without that - this was the first problem I'd had. My OTHER credit cards email me alerts.

So, the phone number on the account was my daughter's cell phone that we put on RBS when we were traveling and never took it off. Because there is literally no way to take it off, online. You CAN change the number, using their little card reader thingy and your debit card. But you cannot DELETE a number.  Of course, her battery is dead tonight because she uses it to listen to music on her headphones with and lets it go dead quite often. So I never got the automated text message. So, logically, that should have stopped any charges, right?

SOOOO, I'm telling the guy what happened. He asked how many charges there should be. I was like "one, maybe, but Iceland said it didn't go through so actually none." So he said, no it's gone through several times! SO I was like, "it shouldn't have, can't you kill those?" and he was like "no, you have to contact Iceland to fix that."

Arrrrgh. So then what the freaking use is their "text you security" good for?  I didn't respond to it, and they let the charges go through several times?

Ok. So Iceland doesn't have 24 hour customer service. I don't have an order number because it never went through according to their system, so that shoots down the "send us a message" option.  So I'll sit around stewing and then phone them when they open at 8:00 in the morning to ask what the hell is going on. According to their online system, I have no order placed, my delivery slot for tomorrow has expired, and all my "stuff" is still in my shopping basket. According to the bank, it's been paid for four times.

I will be glad to get home and not have to deal with this insanity anymore.

I just want my freaking milk and eggs delivered tomorrow! 

The charges won't go through.  They are temporary holds and will drop off in a few days.  There is literally nothing Iceland can do so no point in calling them. They won't have actually charged you.

Be patient. It works the same in the US as well.

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