I’m normally pretty fucking chill, but today is the trifecta of no internet (I think my router tanked), no humans to be reached on that issue and it was apparently bill day everywhere, and I had a sim chip to swap out, with not one, but two T-Mobile’s to call.
I really am grateful, because without the internet disruption, I’d probably be paying late fees too. ADHD be expensive that way.
But until the weed hit, I was about ready to hit a motherfucker with another motherfucker. Possibly with a spare motherfucker just in case.
Amazingly, I wasn’t rude to anyone, the seething struck conveniently when the robot runaround started for some bullshit that took 5 minutes with tech support by phone or chat to resolve a decade ago.
I’ll write about that ordeal when I see what happens. It will only get more absurdly stupid, I’m sure.
Things I have control over, but also passionately dislike, like dealing with customer service and technical fuckery, I tend to knock out in a single day of misery when a qualifying condition, like having a bill imminently or belatedly due, due to, ahem, procrastination.
and existential dread
Karen hissy fit cunting aside, this is fine time to discuss words meaning different things to different people, so let’s do that with service.
Eyes up here. Settle down.
The service industry used to mean actual service. People got dressed up to fly, had real silverware, glasses, salt & pepper shakers, and food that didn’t look like dogfood and taste like a tv dinner (my era) or a fancy lunchable (now). They weren’t charged for pillows and blankets or drinks. Maybe booze.
In coach, where they could also smoke. A recent addition to lost Seattle was last a sort of weekly squatter karaoke bar, adjacent to a restaurant in International District. It was one of the first karaoke bars…somewhere, US? West Coast? It was called Busch Gardens and they’ve torn it down now. The crowd was nice, but my ex took them in the divorce and hosts karaoke places now. In bars. Cash apping girls named Vixen.
Sounds like a GREAT fucking distraction to me!
I swear I didn’t make that shit up. Financial disclosure, baby!
I read up on its history once and the article reminded me eating out used to be less of a daily occurrence. People chose Chinese restaurants, they said, not just for the food, but for the experience. A grasp at appreciating another culture. Exotic immersion.
Shit, I used to nerd out at the most modest strip mall Thai Restaurant.
A very important part of the experience of dining out is the service, which I remember grandma and maybe great-grandma madame also saying, just isn’t what it used to be. That’s how I learned what flying was like before coach became steerage, and they will probably start charging for air (I’m in if it’s an oxygen mask) any day now.
Especially with planes running into each other.
Many still take pride in their work and continue to provide excellent service. It is especially admirable, because they are worked hard, paid little, and have to deal with the public, who are often complete asshats.
Everyone should have to work in the service industry, hospitality specifically, and not to traffic children, which should go without saying, however…here we are.
As I was editing this, it occurred to me that our servitude is what it comes down to. Then I wondered if serf shared any origins, and probably other stuff too. Then I wondered if language was just a big game of telephone. I warned you there was weed involved.
Lo and fucking behold, the google ai (bastards) quoth:
Yes, "serf" and "servitude" are related linguistically, tracing their origins back to the same Latin root.
Both words stem from the Latin term "servus", which means "slave" or "servant".
This shared origin highlights the common concept of being bound to another's service or control that underlies both terms.
Therefore, while the specific conditions and legal aspects of serfdom and other forms of servitude might differ in historical contexts, the words themselves share a linguistic connection rooted in the idea of being subject to the will of another.
So, some dickbags treat those in the service industry poorly because they feel entitled to.
I imagine it’s the same sort who always seem to feel entitled to be serviced.
But what about the service of services? We’re paying for movies and music we’ve already bought at least twice, streaming channels we cut the cord not to pay, and channels that were once free, AND buying the internet to do so from the same fucking cable company.
Did we choose or were we herded?
We’re paying for mobile service we abandoned our landlines for, so telemarketers and scammers can reach us more places, mostly. But also constant tracking.
We’re paying for cloud service, paying for subscriptions, paying for delivery, paying for prescriptions, paying for the privilege of existing.
If I ever have to come back to this shit-show planet, I hope I’m some wild animal. Free. I think we can all agree I’ve paid.
Perhaps that’s why we, the humble, incessantly paying customer, are not worth the barest effort to provide expedient, knowledgeable, care in support of a product or service we pay for, from a human in our own country, with a fun different answer, who is allowed to think, and authorized to act on policy and common fucking sense?!
No customer care for you!
Just script reading automaton sweatshops, and the robot runaround!
“Carl’s Junior, fuck you, I’m eating.” - Idiocracy
I’ve said….some things about how I feel about ai in notes recently, if you partake.
Story Time 1:
Paypal has been running their shit like this since at least 2019. It took me 9 months to regain access to an account that had a year of my bookkeeping gig income, enough to matter. During Covid and dissolution, the timing mattered.
No corporate office contact information, only people trained to make you jump through hoops. I was given fax numbers that never answered, the fax lady was an ebay seller and tried her back line too, no response, upload urls I couldn’t access, algorithms determining the means, methods, and frequency of validation.
It was the shittiest labyrinth ever!
Everyone swore I would never see that money again.
Instead, I recited their scripts along with them.
The more the merrier!
I have the time, here, hold my beer! (I don’t actually drink, but anyway)
A decade earlier, a human from Paypal called me at a festival, on a weekend, to confirm a charge wasn’t fraudulent before approving it, like a bank human used to.
We are coming to realize those who have been providing us with “service” are not the sort to be of service to others unless it is serves them somehow.
They are addicted not just to profits, but to record profits.
I wonder if they will go the way of the airlines and make you pay every time you call.
T-mobile already charges $10 for making payment arrangements with an agent instead of online.
T-mobile and XFinity only give their autopay discounts for access to a bank account. Now imagine XFinity fucks up your bill, and takes a giant payment.
If you can navigate through whatever bullshit customer gatekeepers they’ve devised…
Story Time 2:
When I moved in here in early 2021, Xfinity locked down my address because someone made a typo on my social security number when I opened the account. I was told by someone working in the store, the reason they were so careful about identity was because parents would skip out on paying and get accounts in their children’s names.
My tin foil tiara notices it’s an easy way for them to tie people to addresses, bank accounts, along with their viewing and browsing habits.
To correct their error, they made me bring in my social security card and my license, and I think swap out my gear. The kid in the store didn’t know what to do with the information. For days. Nobody even kept me informed.
At least dumb looks were free, my service has quadrupled in cost, since they ended lifeline, and all I have is basic internet. Plus $10 if I don’t autopay with a bank account. If for whatever reason, I don’t have enough money in the account, and don’t catch it in time, my credit union charges me $10 to cover it, which I’m sure saves me a horrendous return fee.
The pov tightrope. Wheee!
I had been their customer for at least 15 years, in the past. I had only moved, with some delay due to homelessness, 8 whole months. And all this nonsense was months before my name change. A small mercy.
But like, I’m trying to give someone money for a vital, privatized, monopolized service that is essentially a utility at this point, on this timeline.
AND IT WAS THEIR FUCKING MISTAKE to begin with. They were in such a rush to get their money, they didn’t validate me ahead of time. They just locked down my address until I fixed their problem.
On the phone, a quick thinking rep thought to have me reapply via lifeline, because even if I didn’t qualify, verification was immediate and would clear that hurdle. She’d had this come up before but I had to make it through tiers of idiots and was lucky to get her.
Okay, so back to the fucking up what I hope wasn’t your rent money, a payment to refund it that we know is instantaneous is held for days or weeks until it is returned. Checks should clear the bank just as fast.
How interesting all the delays are, and always in their favor.
And with consumer protections dismantled, for (as in to enable) waste, fraud, and abuse? Best of fucking luck to you.
I use a separate credit union account for autopay stuff.
I can’t think of a single corporation I would trust with a straw to my milkshake.
Have you seen the price of milk?
Come to think of it, we are also being served on a silver platter to oligarchs, a nickel and dime at a time.
Double dipping.
For shame.