Double Whammy, wish me luck!
October 14, 2009
Firstly, the county of San Diego can go fly a kite.
During the funeral weekend, we had to use the toll road a few times but each time, the toll booth read a bit fat $0.00. I thought it was a little suspect, but could never get a good photo of the booth when we were passing by.
Sure enough, this week’s mailbag brought proof that I was right, that was a timebomb waiting to go off: three Notices of Toll Evasions! Um, what evasion, people??
There was never an attendent or any other cars on that road so we couldn’t see if the booth was active, if it was out of service, or what the situation was. There wasn’t even a phone number posted on the booth for roadside assistance/questions/etc. Call me crazy, but if you tell me that the price is zero dollars, zero cents, that’s exactly what I’m going to pay ya! Not any of this extra $50 per incident nonsense….
A request… no, wait, three requests for administrative review will be in tomorrow’s mail. Wish me luck, guys, I’m not going to fork over nearly $200 for what amounts to a county-enriching fee-trap without at least a strong argument.
Secondly, the state of California can go fly another kite.
I was honest on my last claim form stating that I had started classes during the time period in question, noting that the classes were online only, and what do they do?
A) Send me a notice of a telephone interview scheduled for 3 weeks from now,
B) paperwork to “verify” my “eligibility for training benefits,” a list of questions that I could easily answer on paper stating that no, my classwork does not interfere with my job search,
and C) No Check.
Oh and there’s icing on this cake: they refuse to answer the phone. Really. The recording says “We’re currently receiving too many calls to answer,” sends you through a Mephistophelian maze of phone options, and then hangs up on you! Way to not even TRY.
Dude. Also, way to punish the populace: hound them for pursuing other options in case sitting around on UI doing nothing but fruitlessly job-hunting seemed kind of useless. We should sit tight, surf the ‘net, and hope that Big Brother provides, hm? Obey precisely or else BB will yank the funding?
I didn’t ask for you to pay for my schooling and I’ll adhere to the “regular unemployment provisions,” so couldn’t you make this another form letter that I can fill out so that I have some income for the next four weeks? I’ll survive, though my cash cushion will be more than a little devastated by this sudden drawdown, but can you imagine someone relying on each check for that month’s bills? I would be thoroughly freaked out.
*sigh* I guess I wouldn’t normally be so put out but … oh heck, of course I would be! It doesn’t matter how much I’m bringing in (or not, at this point) – money has just been flying out the door these past few months. The only thing to do after sending off my objections to the first problem, and preparing to deal with the second problem, is wait and see. In the meantime, it’s absolutely infuriating.
Yesterday was my day to tackle the unsavory phone-call tasks. I guess today is your day.
Mr. 444 had something similar (but not as bad) as your toll experience. He buys an E-Z Pass every month, but something happened like there were new tags on his car, and their camera system flagged him as going through without paying. He’s sent in documentation to prove that he’s paid and demonstrate the misunderstanding many times over (I won’t bore you with the details but believe me, he didn’t do anything wrong and it should have been straightened out by now even according to the very few humans he was able to talk to) but the bills for the unpaid fine keep coming. After a while it begins to be a question of how much your time is worth, and how strong your principles.
(reach for the Advil now.)
That sounds frustrating as all get out. GL dealing with it all.
Uh-oh, this will take awhile to straighten out. Even worse, sometimes you won’t get the back pay even after it’s straightened out! That happened to Mr M. I can find out the magic sequence to hop through the EDD phone tree, but if they’ve already scheduled your interview they’ll probably tell you there is nothing you can do until then. Honesty gets you nowhere with those folks, I was telling Well Heeled the same thing last night!
My parents live off of the 125 toll road in south San Diego and the few times I’ve been home since it opened, I see nary a human being there. I know practically everything is automated nowadays, but it would be comforting to see a human being now and then manning a toll booth as not everyone has a FastLane pass.
444: I can’t even get through to a human, I’ve been calling every day, several times a day. Blergh.
Much more of this crap and I’ll be heading for the prescription drugs, not just the OTC pain meds.
The Lost Goat: Thank you!
Miss M: UNbelievable. I’m glad you told me but still. These people are unbelievable.
Kathleen: Right? And if they insist on not having humans, how about at least having a sign with a price on it?? Or information!? *sigh*
I know what it’s like. So irritating! Work and Income here have stopped answering the phone too – too inundated with calls, I guess, and they have an automated thing which asks you to tell it what you’re calling about. Yeah, one of those ones.
eemusings: Between EDD, the airlines and various other customer service calls, I need to not hear one of those menus for at least a month. I turn auto-growly when voice prompts come on.
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