Fred and Valerie

I really don’t intend for this blog to become a ranting board about all the companies that can’t seem to do business well, but I have to mention my latest encounter with Sprint. In fact, it’s still in progress as I type. (And now that it’s over, the result is quite hilarious).

This all started a few weeks ago when Sprint notified me that I would be receiving a new account number and a new address to send my bills to. Thinking I would remember this, I didn’t immediately update the information in my bank’s online bill pay system.

Fast forward to a hurried night at the computer during which I paid bills online, including the Sprint bill. I didn’t think about it at the time, but just realized this morning that the payment was headed to the old account number and address. No problem, I’ll just call Sprint and see if a payment to the old account/address will post to the new account/address.

Upon calling, I was asked to type in my phone number. I did that and then the first customer service agent I got asked me for my phone number… even though I had already entered it once. I gave her the number and she told me she had to connect me to the office that’s handling the new accounts. No problem.

The second customer service agent asked for my phone number. Again. I gave it to her and she repeated it to me. She then asked for my name and I gave it to her. She then asked me if I was the person whose name was on the account. A bit confused, I said, “Yes.” She then said that my name was not associated with the account. She repeated back the number, only this time she gave me a 3 instead of the 8 that’s supposed to be in the number. I corrected her and she was finally able to pull up my account. I asked if the payment would post correctly and she said she would have to pull up my old account.

“What’s your old account number,” she asked.

“I don’t know, but I do know my phone number.”

“Can you give me your social security number?”

“No. I’m a bit confused how you, Sprint, don’t have my old account number available. That would seem to be something you would have on record.”

[awkward pause]

“Hang on,” I said, “I’ll look it up through my bank account since you don’t seem to have it.”

I gave her the old number and she asked me to wait while she pulled up the account. And I waited… and waited… and waited… and waited. After about five minutes, it was clear the account wasn’t going to come up, so I asked to speak to a supervisor. The woman transferred me… to another customer service rep!

I decided to give the new customer service rep a chance and gave her my phone number. It should be noted at this point that the quality of my call continued to degrade with each transfer. I’m not sure why, but it was a bit disconcerting that call quality was becoming an issue with my phone company.

After setting up security questions with the new rep (and explaining the difference between “shore” and “sure”), she was able to pull up both my new and old accounts and said that everything “should” be okay. That wasn’t exactly the level of confidence I was looking for, so I asked to speak to a supervisor.

This time, I was actually put through to a supervisor who pulled up my account and asked a few questions. After understanding the situation, the supervisor asked, “When did your bank post the payment?”

“According to the bank, it was done this morning,” I replied.

“I’m showing a payment to the account for $XX.XX that posted yesterday.”

“That’s the exact amount I paid. So my account is currently showing a zero balance and that my January payment has been made?”

“Yes.”

“We’re done here.”

I don’t know why it’s surprising to me that it took three customer service reps AND a supervisor for someone to simply look at my account and tell me that I had a zero balance and that last month’s bill had been paid, but it is.

I can only assume that someone high up in the US Post Office reads this blog. There really is no other explanation I can come up with for my most recent experience with their inept package delivery “system.” My history with the USPS has been fairly well documented on this site, but this latest case of ridiculousness still makes me shake my head in amazement.

We’re heading to Italy for our upcoming honeymoon. In preparation for our trip, we ordered some books from Amazon.com on January 9 that will help us enjoy the cities we’ll be visiting. Unfortunately, the order was shipped in two packages and both were shipped via USPS. It should be noted that after my last experience with the USPS, I actually called Amazon.com and asked if I could specify that my packages never be shipped via USPS. They don’t allow that sort of specification, so it’s basically a roll of the dice. I rolled craps.

I was quite surprised when I logged in the next day to see both packages marked as “Shipped.” I was not, however, surprised to see the delivery estimates as January 17 (for 4 books and the language CD) and January 22 (for 1 book). A full week to ship 4 books and a CD and 12 days to ship a single book. Seems reasonable by USPS standards.

But, I received another surprise when the book that was supposed to take 12 days for delivery actually showed up on January 16. I’m certainly not complaining about getting the book in 6 days, but a 6 day difference in delivery estimate seems to offer some insight into the extent of the issues with the USPS package delivery “system.”

One package down and another that’s supposed to be delivered the next day. No problem, right? Wrong. Of course. It’s now January 22 and I still don’t have the other package. Even better, and the part that had me shaking my head in amazement, is that the package seems to have been sent on a massive detour. Seriously, check out this tracking report:

• January 10: US; Carrier notified to pick up package
• January 14: Capitol Heights, MD, US; Arrival Scan
• January 16: Cincinnati, OH, US; Arrival Scan
• January 22: Capitol Heights, MD, US; Departure Scan

For informational purposes, I’ll provide the following:

• Capitol Heights, MD to Charlottesville, VA: 133 miles, 2:45
• Cincinnati, OH to Charlottesville, VA: 448 miles, 7:41
• Capitol Heights, MD to Cincinnati, OH: 530 miles, 8:32

Clearly, something went wrong. VERY wrong. But, what doesn’t make sense to me is that they (clearly?) mistakingly sent the package to Cincinnati and rather than just ship it the 448 miles to Charlottesville from Cincinnati, someone made the brilliant decision to send the package back to Capitol Heights so that it would take a total of 663 miles to get to Charlottesville. Brilliant.

Also, for comparison purposes, I’ll note that the average human being walks at rate of approximately 3 mph.

• Capitol Heights, MD to Charlottesville, VA at 3 mph:  44.3 hours (1.8 days)
• Cincinnati, OH to Charlottesville, VA at 3 mph: 149.3 hours (6.2 days)
• Capitol Heights, MD to Cincinnati, OH to Capitol Heights, MD to Charlottesville, VA at 3 mph: 397.7 hours (16.6 days)

As of tomorrow, the package will have been in transit for 14 days. Not only could I have walked to AND from Capitol Heights, MD faster, I also could have walked to AND from Cincinnati, OH faster. And, if it takes another two days to get the package, I will officially have been able to WALK the entire traveled route faster than the USPS can DRIVE it!

I honestly don’t know which is greater: the pitifulness or the hilarity.

When we flew Air France two years ago for our trip to Paris and London, we absolutely loved our experience. Not only did we get a full, and delicious, dinner upon leaving Dulles at 7 pm, but we also got a full, and delicious, breakfast just an hour before landing in Paris. Further, we got a full, and delicious, lunch on both our 1-hour trip to London and our 1-hour trip from London. That kind of meal service and flavor has quickly become a thing of the past in the States, so it was a nice surprise.

With such delicious meals offered up for every flight we boarded with Air France, you can imagine our surprise when we booked our airfare for our honeymoon trip to Italy last week and saw “Bland” listed as one of the special meal options. The image to the left is the actual drop-down menu of options available.

We decided to just stick with the “No Special Meal” option.

We had the first real snowfall of the season yesterday and the storm dumped a good 4-6 inches of snow on the ground. Everything in sight is pretty much white and while the temperatures are going to get into the upper 40s today, they’ll plummet tomorrow, which should keep things looking like a Winter Wonderland through the weekend.

Though it’s not quite as glamorous as it is for the English, we’re back from Holiday and are glad to be back home. All told, we drove a bit over 1,800 miles over 11 days as we went from home to Raleigh, NC to Gatlinburg, TN to Atlanta, GA and back to be with family and friends.

Now, it’s time to do the laundry!