I take it all back.<\/p>\n
Too paranoid to have my bills paid automatically, not trusting my bank, the system, uptight about my money, I still pay my bills myself.\u00c2\u00a0 I like to look at the invoice.\u00c2\u00a0 You’d be stunned at the hidden charges you find.<\/p>\n
Like AT&fuckingT.\u00c2\u00a0 They slammed me once.<\/p>\n
Do you know what slamming is?\u00c2\u00a0 Bottom line, I switched to their long distance service, then canceled it the next day.\u00c2\u00a0 But they don’t cancel, they just bill you. Forseeminglyever.\u00c2\u00a0 Until going through the inordinate number of lines on your phone bill you find out you’re paying $8.95 a month for a service that you don’t need, because you’re buying it from someone else.\u00c2\u00a0 Try getting your money back?\u00c2\u00a0 It’s like being in a Freddie Prinze routine.\u00c2\u00a0 Endless hosannas of "It’s not MY job!"\u00c2\u00a0 That’s America.\u00c2\u00a0 You fight for reductions on principle, but then you give up.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s just not worth your time.\u00c2\u00a0 To wait on hold and then speak to someone more ignorant on the subject than you, and they WORK THERE!<\/p>\n
And end up fucking up the change anyway.<\/p>\n
Ever change your cell phone plan?\u00c2\u00a0 Turns out, if you do, your contract is extended. Well, there’s been such a hubbub, they stopped that practice.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, if you leave the country, if you go to an international plan temporarily, so you don’t lose your house paying your BlackBerry bill, they always say they’ll change your plan back, AUTOMATICALLY!\u00c2\u00a0 But they never do.<\/p>\n
So I read the bills.<\/p>\n
And I’m reading a bill from FedEx.\u00c2\u00a0 $13!\u00c2\u00a0 I don’t think I’ve gotten a bill that cheap from the overnight delivery service since the eighties.\u00c2\u00a0 But before I pay it, let me make sure the package was actually delivered.<\/p>\n
I’m not a tracking nut.\u00c2\u00a0 Not with FedEx.\u00c2\u00a0 They never fuck up.\u00c2\u00a0 Not in my experience.\u00c2\u00a0 But I haven’t gotten my copier back, so maybe…<\/p>\n
You can’t track the package from this invoice.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s a bunch of numbers, my account number, an invoice number, but none of them work on FedEx’s site.<\/p>\n
So I call.\u00c2\u00a0 1-800-Go-FedEx, right?<\/p>\n
And when I get the endless voice prompts, I keep saying "Operator", "Operator".\u00c2\u00a0 My voice so low, it’s like I’m the villain in a low budget horror movie.\u00c2\u00a0 As if I were so dumb that my question could be answered by a computer.\u00c2\u00a0 Finally, the canned chick realizes I don’t want her help and transfers me to a real person.<\/p>\n
Who can’t help me either.\u00c2\u00a0 He can’t track my package.\u00c2\u00a0 And this is FedEx?<\/p>\n
This makes no sense to me.\u00c2\u00a0 Just like the invoice itself.\u00c2\u00a0 $13?\u00c2\u00a0 I was quoted a price of over $30.\u00c2\u00a0 But I figured it was my lucky day.<\/p>\n
It wasn’t.<\/p>\n
Turns out the $13 was a "Weekly Service Charge".<\/p>\n
Huh?<\/p>\n
I shipped a package, now I’m gonna pay $50 a month for the privilege?<\/p>\n
No, they’re gonna cut me a break.\u00c2\u00a0 They’ll just charge me an extra $13 every time I send something.<\/p>\n
Well, this sucks.\u00c2\u00a0 Suddenly, what seems like a fair price is exorbitant.\u00c2\u00a0 I might have forgone the whole process and just purchased a new copier, or used the copy feature in my 3-in-1 HP that I got free for buying an Apple computer.<\/p>\n
NOWHERE on the Website was this charge revealed.\u00c2\u00a0 I was on the phone with a "friendly" employee checking the price before I shipped…\u00c2\u00a0 She didn’t tell me either.<\/p>\n
I feel abused.<\/p>\n
When did this start?<\/p>\n
With car rental companies.\u00c2\u00a0 The quoted price is really half the price of a rental.\u00c2\u00a0 Then hotels.\u00c2\u00a0 And Ticketmaster.\u00c2\u00a0 What kind of disease does our country have?\u00c2\u00a0 One of dishonesty?\u00c2\u00a0 I guess if Bill Clinton can lie about getting a blow job and Obama’s appointees can "forget" to pay their taxes, it’s all right for companies to rip us off, bill us extra charges after we’ve used their services.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s the American way, after all.<\/p>\n
Or go to the doctor.\u00c2\u00a0 Lord only knows what the final bill will be.<\/p>\n
Just tell me what I owe.<\/p>\n
If you’re afraid I’m gonna balk, then your price is too high.\u00c2\u00a0 And maybe you deserve to go bankrupt.<\/p>\n
Like this works in personal relationships.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, HONEY!\u00c2\u00a0 I was faithful 364 nights this year, but one evening in Canada I shtupped a waitress.\u00c2\u00a0 It doesn’t count, you shouldn’t be upset, because if you read the prenup, which I was gonna have you sign, but didn’t, you’ll see that I’m entitled to one night of infidelity a year, as long as it happens on foreign soil.<\/p>\n
Tell the wife to shrug and forget that one.<\/p>\n
Or, it’s like the IRS suddenly wanting an extra five grand.\u00c2\u00a0 Because the country needs it. TELL ME FIRST!<\/p>\n
But you can’t raise taxes.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s a dirty word.\u00c2\u00a0 So you just don’t fix the roads and find some other way to get the money from us.<\/p>\n
We go to school and learn honesty.\u00c2\u00a0 We labor over math, getting finite answers.\u00c2\u00a0 Then we enter the real world and none of that applies.\u00c2\u00a0 I guess these companies figure we can’t do math.\u00c2\u00a0 And many Americans can’t.\u00c2\u00a0 Figuring the calculator in their cell phones will help them balance their checkbook after using their ATM card to buy tchotchkes they don’t need.<\/p>\n
But almost nobody balances his checkbook, it’s too hard, it’s too time-consuming.<\/p>\n
I paid the bill, but next time I’m using UPS.<\/p>\n
\n