More Account Cancellation Issues and A Word on Going Paperless

After moving, we found we had to switch to a different mobile phone carrier when getting local numbers, because Verizon had better coverage in the rural areas around our new home than our old carrier AT&T.  Upon getting new phones and local numbers with Verizon for the whole family, I called AT&T to cancel service for all of our phone numbers.  I told them to cancel every number within the family plan.

When I received an email informing me that my new AT&T bill is available for viewing online, I tried to log in to my old account online, but was locked out since the service was canceled.  I just trusted that the bill was the balance of whatever we owed at the time I canceled.  The only way I knew what they charged me was by checking my bank account transactions since I was on their autopay program.  I thought the amount they withdrew was too high, but had too many bigger problems going on at the time and forgot to follow up.

Then I received yet another email from AT&T saying that yet another bill was ready for viewing online.  Once again, I could not view this bill online because I had canceled the account.  I called customer service and the computer system informed me that this second bill was for about $90.  That was definitely wrong.  I got through to a live customer service representative who had a thick accent, and I told him I couldn't understand what he was saying.  He made some adjustment to the volume and asked if I could hear him now.

I didn't want to be insensitive by explaining that the problem isn't the connection, but his foreign accent, so I just struggled to make out each word that he was saying and hoped that I understood him correctly.  I mean, the last thing you need when you are trying to correct a billing screw up is more misunderstandings.  I contemplated hanging up and calling back, hoping to connect with a representative I could understand, but knew that meant being on hold a while longer.

I asked why I'm still receiving bills when I canceled my family plan account back in the first week of April.  He needed to know exactly what date I canceled, and I explained that I would have to dig through a pile of papers two-feet high on my desk to find that information.  I thought for sure, if they had done their job correctly, that information should be in their computer.  I mean, they knew enough to shut down my SIM card and lock me out of their website, so why wouldn't their billing department know what date I canceled?  It seems that should be the most important piece of data to collect.

He dug around and eventually found the date himself.  He asked me a number of questions, and after some discussion he figured out that my daughter's phone number had never been canceled.  So, despite me telling the original customer service rep to cancel all the phones connected with the family plan, she somehow missed canceling one of them.  I even read off all the phone numbers to her, and she still screwed it up.

So, once again I wasted a portion of my morning correcting yet another customer service representative's mistake.  I've learned to dread the process of canceling accounts, because I just find that most companies don't use care or have a foolproof process for that.  They'd just assume keep collecting your money.  But, what they don't realize is that next time I need to switch phone carriers, I will remember this and probably avoid using AT&T again.

The good news is that the second customer service rep I talked to seemed to understand and fix the problem.  I'm not going to say it's resolved just yet, because he said he would put in an order to prevent them from withdrawing any further money from my bank account, and he would credit the last bill back into my bank account.  My experience is that customer service reps say they will do that, and for some reason I end up getting a check in the mail instead, which means I have to take more time out of my day to drive to the bank and stand in line to deposit the check.  So, since I've been burned by that several times, I made sure they had my correct mailing address and my new phone number to make sure I get my refund.

Then there's the matter of the math involved in the refund.  Most companies I've dealt with under these same circumstances manage to screw that up too, so I usually have to make a couple more phone calls to correct those mistakes.  I just hate getting sucked into these wormholes.  Of course the stupidest thing in all of this is that because they won't allow me to view my old account online, I can't even view the bills to know if they are correct or not.  That's the downfall of going paperless, so I advise you to switch your accounts back to paper billing before you attempt to cancel them.

A Word for Computer Programmers

A family member recently informed me that I have a small, unclaimed rebate out on one of those "missing money" websites.  I went out and took a look and sure enough, it was my money.  My name was correct and spelled right, which is a miracle, because way more people misspell my last name than get it right, even when I write it down for them and/or say it out loud.  My house address and street were correct, but the city, state and zip code were totally wrong.

I could see that someone had switched the first two numbers in my zip code by mistake.  It was an easy typo to make, especially since those two numbers appear right next to each other on a keyboard, however it is not easy to get my city and state confused with another city and state.  That led me to the conclusion that the computer program being used to send out my rebate check was designed to automatically fill in the city and state based upon the zip code that was input.

While that may be fast and convenient for the companies that process such claims, such a design lends itself to human error.  Unfortunately, most people do not proofread their own work.  This is a mistake that could have been easily avoided if the person who input the data took the time to compare it with what I filled in on my form before submitting it.

Having been a software tester for 12 years, I not only checked the functionality of computer programs, but also participated in the evaluation of the design.  I was an advocate for designs that anticipate human error.  I know it's mean, but I always assume that everyone is uneducated, uninterested in their own quality of work, lazy, rushed, and distracted.  It's up to computer programs to guard against those human traits, and programming software to make assumptions based upon the input of human beings is asking for trouble.

So, here I am, years later, a customer having to fill out forms again in order to correct someone else's mistake so that I can collect a little bit of money that belongs to me.  There's something wrong with this picture.

Fortunately, the computer programmers of the government site where I had to input my claim did a better job.  I was worried that they wouldn't give me space to explain the mistake, because their program presented me with the question of whether I have been associated with that address.  Ummmm, yes and no.  I was associated with the first part, but not the second part, because the second part was wrong due to a typo.  I took my chances and said yes.  They were thoughtful enough to include a comments section where I could explain the correction.  If they were so rigid as to require documentation that I resided at that exact address, I would have had trouble.

It's just too bad that the money owed me wound up in a state I've never had any association with all because of one typist's slippery fingers.  So, programmers, think ahead, expect the worst and guard against it.

Idiocracy Continues

Today, November 28th, I received a letter in the mail dated November 8th from the radiology lab that has been doing my breast cancer screening.  Why did it take 20 days to send it an address in the same zip code?  Because some idiot folded the letter in such a way that my name and address did not show up in the envelope window.  It was blank.

Someone at the post office had to shake the letter enough to see my name and then match it up with an address.  This letter was kind of important.  It informed me that the radiology lab still didn't have my past records and images for comparison.  They wrote, "As you know, early detection of breast cancer is very important."

Well, I'm not the one who has been holding this up.  First it was my old radiologist's office not sending out my past records and images.  Then it was a series of clerical mistakes made by my new radiologist's office, and now this.  Ironically, though I called for the results of my latest tests eight days ago and they said that the results had been transcribed and just needed to be approved by the radiologist, I still have not received those results.  They are probably stuck in the mail in a letter that was folded by an idiot who didn't check to see if my address showed through the envelope window.

As you know, early detection of breast cancer is very important.

Welcome to The Loser List: AZ-MVD

When everyone in my family except me began receiving mailings related to the upcoming election, I got suspicious.  Something was wrong.  I registered to vote in my new state when I applied for a new driver's license.  I figured something could have been screwed up.  Something is almost always screwed up when people input data into computers.

So, I went out to a website to check to see if I was indeed registered to vote.  I knew that I had registered, but I didn't know if the state of Arizona knew that I was registered.  Sure enough, I was listed as "inactive" in the computer.  Why?  Because they had a fictional address attached to my name.

Why did they have a fictional address attached to my name?  Flashback to the day I applied for a new driver's license.  After waiting in line for an hour and being batted around to various windows, I was issued my driver's license.  It had the correct name, address, other information, and picture.  That was good, considering that my husband's driver's license had to be reprinted multiple times because they kept putting someone else's picture on it.

I was about ready to leave when the clerk said, "Wait.  I have two records under your name."

Instead of just asking to see the driver's license she just handed me, she called the manager over.  The two of them looked back and forth between these two records making comparisons with baffled expressions.  I tried leaning over the counter to see if I could help, but the computer screen was turned away from me.  Suddenly, the manager said, "Eh, just delete one.  It doesn't matter."

My eyes got wide and my heart skipped a beat.  I've worked with computer programs for the past 30 years of my life.  Deleting anything is dangerous.  However, the deed was done before I could react.  I figured that the data in both records was identical, and that was why she said it didn't matter.

Flash forward to several weeks later.  My husband had to go to the Motor Vehicle Department to register a vehicle, and returned to inform me that they have my address wrong in their system, so the address on the vehicle registration is wrong.  They had me living in an apartment somewhere.  He said he tried to get them to change my address, but the clerk said that it didn't matter what address was on the registration.  He instructed my husband to tell me to go to their website and change my address there.

Once again, I found myself having to put in the time and effort to correct someone else's mistake.  Well, you can bet that I blew a gasket when I discovered that the MVD wanted me to pay a fee to have my address changed.  There was no way in hell I was going to pay them money to correct their own mistake.  There has to be some justice in this world.  I wish they had something smaller than small claims court for shit like this, because incompetent people really need to be taught a lesson in a big way.

So, I printed out the change of address form and mailed it in along with a letter explaining the story I just wrote here -- that it was the manager of the MVD who deleted the record that contained my correct address, and therefore I am not going to pay the fee.  I didn't hear anything more about it, so I figured that the problem was corrected.

However, since I'm not registered to vote and the wrong address is still attached to my name, they either threw my change of address form in the trash or they changed it in the MVD database, but not the voter registration database.  So, here I am, unable to exercise my right to vote, all because of some stupid woman at the AZ-DOT Motor Vehicle Division.  When I tried to change my address online for the voter registration, I was just routed to the MVD change of address page where they charge me a fee.

So, guess what I get to do come Monday?  Yes, I get to spend yet another chunk of my life on the phone being transferred from person to person to person until this fuck up gets corrected.  I was really, really, really hoping that I could have just one week without hassles like this, but I guess I'm destined to just rot away with a phone attached to my ear correcting other people's mistakes.  Will I ever get my life back?

Two Posts in One Day?

Yes, it's been that kind of a day.  This is about more medical hassles.  I received this letter in the mail from my doctor's office informing me that I am responsible for contacting my insurance for pre-approval of the anesthesia portion of my procedure.  So, I called my insurance pre-certification department and read that part of the letter to the lady who answered.  She said, "Why are you calling me?  Have you tried calling the benefits division?"

"Huh?  I don't know who I'm supposed to call, because nobody is helping me.  I'm just being batted around like a ping-pong ball."

She gave me the number of the benefits division, but just to clarify, I asked, "Is the anesthesia portion automatically approved for this procedure?"

She said yes.  So, I don't know what that letter was about.

Onto the next question.  I explained that I was asked to come in multiple times for additional testing after some problems were found in a mammogram, and I wanted to know if I needed to get pre-approved for the additional testing.

"Well, do you know the names of the tests or have the test codes for me?"

"No," I said.  "They won't tell me anything.  They just told me that I need additional testing."

"Usually, the radiology department should call me for pre-approval.  Can you call them and ask them to call me?"

Ugh.  So, basically she was asking me to insert a middle man between us, allowing more room for misunderstandings.  I said, "I've already asked them to call, and they said I had to contact my insurance to see if it needs to be pre-approved."

"Why can't people just learn to do their jobs?" she said, following it up with, "I'm sorry.  I shouldn't have said that out loud."

I said, "Don't worry.  I say the same thing every day."

She wanted the name of the person who told me to call the insurance directly, so that she could read her the riot act.  Unfortunately, I didn't take down any names, so she offered to call over there and find out what tests they are planning on running.  I thanked her profusely.

She called back and said that the two tests they need to run don't require pre-approval, but if they take it to the third step, then we will have to contact the insurance for pre-approval again.

Sigh.

Here's to not needing to get to that third step.  Oh yeah, and I called the number she gave me for the benefits division, and no one beyond an automated system picked up.  The phone just rang for five minutes after the automated system directed me to an operator.  Isn't that awesome?