(no subject)
Feb. 3rd, 2006 04:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sevsome time in the last several months, somebody on my f-list (I was sure it was ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jaylake but I can't find proof) posted a story about the aggravation of an undeserved parking ticket, and how it became clear that the cost of the ticket was way less than the cost of fighting it.
Despite my awareness of this phenomenon, I still, on some irrational level, expect the universe to be fair. I'm tired of paying $50 here, $50 there (and it always seems to be right around $50) for things that I shouldn't have to. For years I assumed that this was a laziness, naivete, or stupidity tax I was paying -- that Other People were able to pick up the phone or write a letter and, in a reasonable quantity of time (which I personally define as "less than an hour" for righting $50 worth of wrong), get the problem Fixed. It's slowly begun to dawn on me that the only naivete involved is me thinking that there's some magic other people have that I lack. If you can call half a lifetime of people telling me that I wouldn't have these problems if I'd just be more careful, or be firm, or stand up for myself, or whatever, "naivete." And if you don't have these problems, fuck you and I don't want to hear about it, okay?
Once upon a time, somewhere more than three but less than seven years ago, I was hit by a car. The emergency room wouldn't accept my insurance details on their forms, because it was an injury caused by a car. They wouldn't accept the driver's insurance details, either. They gave me bills which I was then supposed to submit to the driver's insurance. Which I did. The driver's insurance company spent months "researching" the claim, which involved many phone calls from me with the answer of "we're still researching it", one phone call from them in which I was asked questions about the accident in an incredulous tone of voice ("You were on the north side of the intersection...the one with the crosswalk? And the streetlight? And you claim that you were hit by a car while you were in the crosswalk?" Yes, idiot, and apparently the driver of the car thinks the same thing, since *I* did not give you those details, as you never asked me for them...). At some point, they paid two of the three bills I got from the hospital, but the third -- for around $50, surprise! -- remained unpaid. And then more phone calls from me, including my rising agitation that these bills had been sent to a bill-collection agency and therefore were on my credit report ("They shouldn't do that. Tell them that your claim is still at the insurance company, and they'll stop." What kind of hospitals and collection agencies do they have on your planet? Because on my planet, those organizations do not accept anything but "here's a check" as the answer to any conversation, and the collection agencies will in fact talk right over me if I try to say anything else. And what excuse the insurance company had for continuing to "research" the third bill when they'd paid the other two, I have no idea.) And finally, the unpaid bill on my credit report was interfering with my ability to get a loan to buy my house, so I said, screw it, and ponied up the $50 and got on with my life.
A few months ago, the state of washington went through their unclaimed-property files and sent out notifications to a bunch of people. Much to my surprise, I got one, for this $50, which the insurance company wanted to reimburse me, but for some reason -- despite them having my current address and current phone number -- they couldn't find me to give it to me. And, despite them having my current address and phone number, the state wants me to prove that I'm me before they give me my unclaimed property. However, due to my own unwillingness to spend more time on problems like these -- because in my experience, why bother? they're just going to screw me anyway -- I haven't gone through the trouble to scrounge up the second piece of identification they want (they want proof of my social security number. My SS card was destroyed nearly two decades ago and I haven't gotten a replacement yet, my birth certificate predates my SSN, my SSN is not on my health insurance card). I'm hoping that a 1099 or some other tax document I've recently been mailed will include my SSN, or else this will have to wait 'till I get a new social security card, which should be feasible now that I've got all the proof that *they* want that I'm me. (sheesh) (incidentally, have you ever tried to put together enough paperwork for a twelve-year-old to prove that she is legally herself, with no help from her parents? Yikes. They kept asking me for my driver's license. And my school ID didn't count. Sheesh again.) The insurance company rigmarole is probably not an unfamiliar kind of situation for many people, I think, and the "have to prove I'm me" stuff probably isn't, either.
The reason this came up *today* was that I've got a friend chasing down the next $50 that this corrupt capitalist system is attempting to bilk me out of. While we've both agreed that most likely, I'll end up paying for it anyway, she's willing to give it a try and I'm willing to let her, if for no other reason than to prove to myself that it's not some failing in *me* that makes this hard. She's a lawyer, ferchrissake.
Once upon a time, in the early days of "check cards", I signed up for a magazine subscription using my debit-card-that-worked-like-a-credit-card. After one year, I got a notice that they'd automagically renew my subscription unless I sent back the thing-that-looked-like-a-bill with a cancellation notice. Which I did. They did not renew my subscription...until a year after *that*, when they suddenly charged me & started sending me magazines again. By then, I had closed the bank account, because they did bank-like things like fuck with my deposits and put arbitrary limits on my debit card that they changed randomly and didn't inform me about. The bank accepted the transaction, re-opened the bank account, and charged me hefty fees for overdraft.
I called the publisher. Their phone tree had no options to talk to a human (no matter which buttons I pushed). I don't recall exactly how I got my message across -- I think I may have found a place to leave a message. They did promptly stop sending me magazines, but did not refund my money.
I called my bank. I explained that this transaction hadn't been authorized, that this account was *closed* and I wanted it to stay that way, and that if they wanted to charge somebody overdraft fees they should charge the magazine publisher, and there was no place on their dispute form to communicate that but that I wanted it anyway. In addition to the dispute form, I went through several phone calls with the bank (each spaced a month apart, as I received new statements with new charges on it because I hadn't paid the previous charges) until eventually, one of their customer service agents told me that, yes, they didn't understand why the account was still open, since there was a note in my account explaining that things were being refunded and the account was being closed but that those things had not actually *happened* even though the notes clearly stated that they were supposed to happen, so he was going to sit there and make those things happen while I was on the phone with him, and he said he credited my account, and closed it, and that that should be the end of it.
Shortly after the final phone call, I got a statement with the credits on it. There was one credit for the amount that the magazine publisher had charged me for, and three more covering the overdraft fees (and the late fees on the overdraft fees which had piled up), and while the fee-refund-amounts didn't make a whole lot of sense (none of them matched the actual individual fees), there was a nice tidy $0 balance and a notation that the account was closed. I sighed in relief, patted myself on the back for a first-time-since-college successfully sticking up to a large institution (the college financial aid office, it turns out, was peanuts compared to the real world when it came to amount-of-hassle vs amount-of-money...the real world gives me a lot more hassle over a lot less money), filed away all the paperwork (important habit I've developed!) and stopped worrying.
Two *years* later -- two months ago -- I got a collection notice, for some-but-not-all of what the bank refunded me. I spent over four hours over the course of two days on the phone with the bank. A lot of that time was on hold, but a nontrivial amount of it involved talking to people, too. Each department I talked to wanted to transfer me to some other department. The customer service department explained that they'd gotten a new accounting system and that as a result, some previously-ignored problems had been sent to collections agency. They sent me to department #2, who sent me to department #3, who sent me to department #4, who sent me to department #5. I will note that my habit of insisting on getting direct-dial numbers before I was transferred came in handy: Somewhere in there, I was on hold (with department #2, I think) and the hold-music changed to a recording that the office was closed and I should call back tomorrow. Somewhere else in there (department #3, I think), I noted that the place they were transferring me to had the same phone number as the previous department I'd called, which had transferred me to them, so that wasn't going to be helpful to me. However, none of this helped the discussion with department #5, where I was told -- by the same person! -- both that the collection was for the amount of the fees, which I "should have known" would still be my responsibility, and that it was for the amount of the magazine subscription, because my "claim was denied. However, he could not provide me with any documentation about the claim-denial, because the claim was too old and after two years, the documentation was long gone (what?). And that I should have followed up on it sooner, because even though they'd told me it was dealt with, and didn't notify me that anything had changed, it was my responsibility anyway. (what?)
A lawyer-friend wrote me up a nice lawyerly letter which she sent to the collections agency, along with a copy of that last bank statement.
After we heard nothing for a month, she called them, and they said that they had put a note in my file indicating that I was disputing the collection and that they were waiting for paperwork from me. Even though 1. the paperwork they were waiting for was included along with the letter indicating that I was disputing the collection and 2. they had not contacted either my lawyer or me asking for the paperwork. And no information that I was working with a lawyer or her contact information was in my file, despite the part in that nice lawyerly letter that said any further communication should go to her, not me (which is important, as after that last conversation in which the bank told me that this was all my fault, my reaction when this whole thing comes up personifies "impotent rage").
After we heard more nothing for another month, today she called them back. The collections agency said that I can dispute the collection all I want and give them paperwork showing the $0 balance on my closed account, but that they would continue with the collections process until the bank told them to stop. Which, my lawyer-friend believes, is not legal, but she's going to wait until she actually has legislation to cite before arguing with them, so she ended that conversation in order to do some research.
She also called the bank. Since she's a lawyer, they sent her straight to their legal department. I dunno if that means she's going to get better results than I, or not.
Anyway, while she was giving me that status report, she remembered the unclaimed-property thing from the insurance stuff, and asked if I'd followed-up on that. She didn't buy my "why the fuck bother, when none of this effort ever actually helps anyway?" answer, and she took my ID from me to photocopy, in order to remove one more obstacle from me actually sending the thing out. I'll need to visit a photocopier once I get the second piece of proof-that-I'm-me anyway, but I appreciate the gesture.
Anyway, that's why I'm not likely going to get diddly-squat done today. (see "personification of impotent rage," above.)
jaylake but I can't find proof) posted a story about the aggravation of an undeserved parking ticket, and how it became clear that the cost of the ticket was way less than the cost of fighting it.Despite my awareness of this phenomenon, I still, on some irrational level, expect the universe to be fair. I'm tired of paying $50 here, $50 there (and it always seems to be right around $50) for things that I shouldn't have to. For years I assumed that this was a laziness, naivete, or stupidity tax I was paying -- that Other People were able to pick up the phone or write a letter and, in a reasonable quantity of time (which I personally define as "less than an hour" for righting $50 worth of wrong), get the problem Fixed. It's slowly begun to dawn on me that the only naivete involved is me thinking that there's some magic other people have that I lack. If you can call half a lifetime of people telling me that I wouldn't have these problems if I'd just be more careful, or be firm, or stand up for myself, or whatever, "naivete." And if you don't have these problems, fuck you and I don't want to hear about it, okay?
Once upon a time, somewhere more than three but less than seven years ago, I was hit by a car. The emergency room wouldn't accept my insurance details on their forms, because it was an injury caused by a car. They wouldn't accept the driver's insurance details, either. They gave me bills which I was then supposed to submit to the driver's insurance. Which I did. The driver's insurance company spent months "researching" the claim, which involved many phone calls from me with the answer of "we're still researching it", one phone call from them in which I was asked questions about the accident in an incredulous tone of voice ("You were on the north side of the intersection...the one with the crosswalk? And the streetlight? And you claim that you were hit by a car while you were in the crosswalk?" Yes, idiot, and apparently the driver of the car thinks the same thing, since *I* did not give you those details, as you never asked me for them...). At some point, they paid two of the three bills I got from the hospital, but the third -- for around $50, surprise! -- remained unpaid. And then more phone calls from me, including my rising agitation that these bills had been sent to a bill-collection agency and therefore were on my credit report ("They shouldn't do that. Tell them that your claim is still at the insurance company, and they'll stop." What kind of hospitals and collection agencies do they have on your planet? Because on my planet, those organizations do not accept anything but "here's a check" as the answer to any conversation, and the collection agencies will in fact talk right over me if I try to say anything else. And what excuse the insurance company had for continuing to "research" the third bill when they'd paid the other two, I have no idea.) And finally, the unpaid bill on my credit report was interfering with my ability to get a loan to buy my house, so I said, screw it, and ponied up the $50 and got on with my life.
A few months ago, the state of washington went through their unclaimed-property files and sent out notifications to a bunch of people. Much to my surprise, I got one, for this $50, which the insurance company wanted to reimburse me, but for some reason -- despite them having my current address and current phone number -- they couldn't find me to give it to me. And, despite them having my current address and phone number, the state wants me to prove that I'm me before they give me my unclaimed property. However, due to my own unwillingness to spend more time on problems like these -- because in my experience, why bother? they're just going to screw me anyway -- I haven't gone through the trouble to scrounge up the second piece of identification they want (they want proof of my social security number. My SS card was destroyed nearly two decades ago and I haven't gotten a replacement yet, my birth certificate predates my SSN, my SSN is not on my health insurance card). I'm hoping that a 1099 or some other tax document I've recently been mailed will include my SSN, or else this will have to wait 'till I get a new social security card, which should be feasible now that I've got all the proof that *they* want that I'm me. (sheesh) (incidentally, have you ever tried to put together enough paperwork for a twelve-year-old to prove that she is legally herself, with no help from her parents? Yikes. They kept asking me for my driver's license. And my school ID didn't count. Sheesh again.) The insurance company rigmarole is probably not an unfamiliar kind of situation for many people, I think, and the "have to prove I'm me" stuff probably isn't, either.
The reason this came up *today* was that I've got a friend chasing down the next $50 that this corrupt capitalist system is attempting to bilk me out of. While we've both agreed that most likely, I'll end up paying for it anyway, she's willing to give it a try and I'm willing to let her, if for no other reason than to prove to myself that it's not some failing in *me* that makes this hard. She's a lawyer, ferchrissake.
Once upon a time, in the early days of "check cards", I signed up for a magazine subscription using my debit-card-that-worked-like-a-credit-card. After one year, I got a notice that they'd automagically renew my subscription unless I sent back the thing-that-looked-like-a-bill with a cancellation notice. Which I did. They did not renew my subscription...until a year after *that*, when they suddenly charged me & started sending me magazines again. By then, I had closed the bank account, because they did bank-like things like fuck with my deposits and put arbitrary limits on my debit card that they changed randomly and didn't inform me about. The bank accepted the transaction, re-opened the bank account, and charged me hefty fees for overdraft.
I called the publisher. Their phone tree had no options to talk to a human (no matter which buttons I pushed). I don't recall exactly how I got my message across -- I think I may have found a place to leave a message. They did promptly stop sending me magazines, but did not refund my money.
I called my bank. I explained that this transaction hadn't been authorized, that this account was *closed* and I wanted it to stay that way, and that if they wanted to charge somebody overdraft fees they should charge the magazine publisher, and there was no place on their dispute form to communicate that but that I wanted it anyway. In addition to the dispute form, I went through several phone calls with the bank (each spaced a month apart, as I received new statements with new charges on it because I hadn't paid the previous charges) until eventually, one of their customer service agents told me that, yes, they didn't understand why the account was still open, since there was a note in my account explaining that things were being refunded and the account was being closed but that those things had not actually *happened* even though the notes clearly stated that they were supposed to happen, so he was going to sit there and make those things happen while I was on the phone with him, and he said he credited my account, and closed it, and that that should be the end of it.
Shortly after the final phone call, I got a statement with the credits on it. There was one credit for the amount that the magazine publisher had charged me for, and three more covering the overdraft fees (and the late fees on the overdraft fees which had piled up), and while the fee-refund-amounts didn't make a whole lot of sense (none of them matched the actual individual fees), there was a nice tidy $0 balance and a notation that the account was closed. I sighed in relief, patted myself on the back for a first-time-since-college successfully sticking up to a large institution (the college financial aid office, it turns out, was peanuts compared to the real world when it came to amount-of-hassle vs amount-of-money...the real world gives me a lot more hassle over a lot less money), filed away all the paperwork (important habit I've developed!) and stopped worrying.
Two *years* later -- two months ago -- I got a collection notice, for some-but-not-all of what the bank refunded me. I spent over four hours over the course of two days on the phone with the bank. A lot of that time was on hold, but a nontrivial amount of it involved talking to people, too. Each department I talked to wanted to transfer me to some other department. The customer service department explained that they'd gotten a new accounting system and that as a result, some previously-ignored problems had been sent to collections agency. They sent me to department #2, who sent me to department #3, who sent me to department #4, who sent me to department #5. I will note that my habit of insisting on getting direct-dial numbers before I was transferred came in handy: Somewhere in there, I was on hold (with department #2, I think) and the hold-music changed to a recording that the office was closed and I should call back tomorrow. Somewhere else in there (department #3, I think), I noted that the place they were transferring me to had the same phone number as the previous department I'd called, which had transferred me to them, so that wasn't going to be helpful to me. However, none of this helped the discussion with department #5, where I was told -- by the same person! -- both that the collection was for the amount of the fees, which I "should have known" would still be my responsibility, and that it was for the amount of the magazine subscription, because my "claim was denied. However, he could not provide me with any documentation about the claim-denial, because the claim was too old and after two years, the documentation was long gone (what?). And that I should have followed up on it sooner, because even though they'd told me it was dealt with, and didn't notify me that anything had changed, it was my responsibility anyway. (what?)
A lawyer-friend wrote me up a nice lawyerly letter which she sent to the collections agency, along with a copy of that last bank statement.
After we heard nothing for a month, she called them, and they said that they had put a note in my file indicating that I was disputing the collection and that they were waiting for paperwork from me. Even though 1. the paperwork they were waiting for was included along with the letter indicating that I was disputing the collection and 2. they had not contacted either my lawyer or me asking for the paperwork. And no information that I was working with a lawyer or her contact information was in my file, despite the part in that nice lawyerly letter that said any further communication should go to her, not me (which is important, as after that last conversation in which the bank told me that this was all my fault, my reaction when this whole thing comes up personifies "impotent rage").
After we heard more nothing for another month, today she called them back. The collections agency said that I can dispute the collection all I want and give them paperwork showing the $0 balance on my closed account, but that they would continue with the collections process until the bank told them to stop. Which, my lawyer-friend believes, is not legal, but she's going to wait until she actually has legislation to cite before arguing with them, so she ended that conversation in order to do some research.
She also called the bank. Since she's a lawyer, they sent her straight to their legal department. I dunno if that means she's going to get better results than I, or not.
Anyway, while she was giving me that status report, she remembered the unclaimed-property thing from the insurance stuff, and asked if I'd followed-up on that. She didn't buy my "why the fuck bother, when none of this effort ever actually helps anyway?" answer, and she took my ID from me to photocopy, in order to remove one more obstacle from me actually sending the thing out. I'll need to visit a photocopier once I get the second piece of proof-that-I'm-me anyway, but I appreciate the gesture.
Anyway, that's why I'm not likely going to get diddly-squat done today. (see "personification of impotent rage," above.)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2006-02-03 04:29 pm (UTC)Anyway, I hope your situation works out better than ours did. It's so frustrating when good, honest people get screwed by following the systems we are told to follow. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you!
no subject
on 2006-02-03 04:39 pm (UTC)I hear the DMV could perhaps give me an "it's not my car" form for half the price of the ticket, plus the time off work to go down. But as the ticketing agency has already *denied* my appeal (they don't apparently *care* if it was my car at the time), I'm not sure there is much point.
I'm debating - black mark on my stellar credit, or pay the now-increased ticket. *sigh* I may wait for it to go to collections and then try to invoke the fair credit laws.
It's everyone, not just you.
no subject
on 2006-02-04 04:57 am (UTC)And yes, it was me with the parking ticket post. If you're curious, see:
http://jaylake.livejournal.com/339219.html
and
http://www.jlake.com/old/agony.html