The state of everything seems broken...

[PWMDMD]

1. Brought my 2020 Tundra into the dealer for warranty work on the front differential and they drop the truck causing $4500 in damage.

2. Have another Toyota shop fix it and I've been waiting to months for a the stupid Tundra Platinum placard for the passenger door.

3. Brought the 2019 RX 350 to a very well regarded indy shop a few months ago for some maintenance issues and mentioned there's a vibration coming from the right front tire when turning left - sounded and felt like a wheel bearing. They could not reproduce the issue, they inspected everything, and everything was good. I knew it was the wheel bearing but sure let's give it some more time. Yesterday, brought it back and sure enough it's the wheel bearing. There is no difference from how it presented yesterday and how it presented a few months ago.

They did an alignment yesterday at my request, the wheel bearings have remedied the noise issue completely, but the steering wheel is off-center quite a bit. Called today and they will take care of it but how does the tech not notice this?

4. Lost phones at work a few months ago. It took Charter days to "fix" the issue. We subsequently lost internet and phones for no obvious reason 4x since the initial incident. Every tech blames something else and everything works by the time they leave, just to go down again a few weeks later.

5. I received a pre-collections letter from my son's physician office for a $0 balance. The statement shows the zero balance in several places. We paid it when we received the first statement months ago.

6. Ordered lunch yesterday through Uber Eats from Panera because I get $25 worth of credits per month. I've been doing this for years. Yesterday, Uber Eats confirmed my order and 2 mins before I was supposed to pick up, I got a message from Uber Eats saying Panera cancelled the order. Spoke to the manager and she was adamant that Uber Eats cancelled my order.

Does anything work anymore?

 

[SC Maintenance]

Seems like its been this way forever but getting forever worse.

On #5 I paid a hospital bill at time of service - in full. They mailed me a bill anyway and I took it back into the hospital personally, they said they would take care of it. A few months later i get a letter from a collection agency.

I sent a registered letter to the billing department at the hospital with proof of payment at time of service and dates / times of who I talked to later. And I stated that if any of this shows up on my credit report my lawyer will own there hospital. Finally got fixed.

 

[SShooterZ]

The collection bill for $0.00 is amazing. They can't get you in when you're sick, takes months to book out a doctor, but darn, if they don't think they're getting paid, it gets the most prompt attention. I'd like to see what the collection agency does with a $0.00 balance collection.

Sorry to hear and see about your vehicles. For those of us that take care of our machines, it really frustrates you when others don't show any concern.

 

[supton]

I agree, people have been complaining about things going downhill since the dawn of time. I suspect it seems to get worse as we have more stuff / pursue more things / have more irons in the fire. Life was easier when the only thing important to us was that crush in our classroom, and maybe what was on TV that night.

Maybe it's a bit like scar tissue. Each time we run into an annoyance, a bit of it is retained, and over time it just starts to accumulate. Then any annoyance can trigger an inflammation reaction and it seems worse than what it is. [If any of that doesn't make sense then I'll remind you that you're the doctor not me. ]

Sometimes you just have to blow your top and then move on. Else everything turns into problematic.

 

[Capt W]

It's nothing more than proof of Mike Judge's prescience from 2006 -- we are living in Idiocracy. It seems most people are now so dumb that basic societal functions are suffering under the weight of their stupidity. And trying to explain this to a world of dummies is met with complete befuddlement on their part.

 

[pbm]

I recently posted about FedEx dropping my package at a different house and despite many calls from both myself and the man who received the package nothing was done by them. I had an appointment with a new Urologist practice this week who doesn't draw blood so I needed a script for Quest Labs to take blood. After numerous calls (to call centers and sadly not to the doctors office) in which we (my wife who was on the phone for long waits) were assured the script would be faxed. After a 45 minute wait at Quest (who had no human at check in ...only a kiosk) we had to leave without a PSA test because the script never arrived. Nobody seems to care anymore or take pride in accomplishing a task and there seems to be no repercussions for these failures. Maybe 'social promotion' isn't such a good thing.

PS: I just 'googled' Mike Judge and 'Idiocracy' and while it says he meant it as a joke....his premise seems to be coming to fruition.

 

[Allaned]

 

[Vil_Riker]

Let them waste their time on the $0.00 collection efforts. I wonder if the collector calling to demand payment will still do it for $0.00 since it's in their queue, will they ignore and move on or will they initiate a ticket to remove the collection efforts. I would say option two is the likely one.

 

[Capt W]

Maybe 'social promotion' isn't such a good thing.

Bingo! A lot of this started when merit-based promotion ended. Your FedEx story reminds me of my local post office. Despite living here for over 3-1/2 years, we still get loads of mail for the previous owner...to include packages! She's no rocket scientist and basically neglected to change the address on all her accounts.

I labeled my mailbox and told the carrier not to leave anything without my last name. He agreed. What he didn't tell me is we're on a rotating route and have up to a dozen different carriers. So the mail still comes.

The worst of it was last Christmas when I received a bunch of gift packages for the last owner. I ended up hauling them to the local post office and talking to the station manager. That lady had the nerve to ask if it was a big deal for me to simply deliver them since I knew the correct address. She was kind of surprised when I refused. It's now my job to sort and deliver packages? A very likely DEI promotion.

I finally had to contact the postmaster's office for remedy. The packages have stopped, but some mail continues to seep through.

The sad part is many of them simply cannot see how they're screwing up and therefore fail to accept responsibility. It's like those popular police bodycam videos on YouTube, where an offender is being arrested while shrieking "...but I didn't do anything wrong!"

 

[johnmyster]

If a business is so busy that they have to develop a "system" to handle me, and that "system" is broken, I'm always happy to alleviate a small part of the business volume that they find so problematic. I can find a new provider.

It's always bad policy as a business to blame your systems in front of your customer. Your customer didn't design your process. You did. Never confuse a you problem with a customer problem. Unless you can take ownership, apologize, and tell me what you've done about it I'll go elsewhere.

This is why I replace wheel bearings and do alignments myself.

 

[Owen Lucas]

That lady had the nerve to ask if it was a big deal for me to simply deliver them since I knew the correct address.

That's insane.

Sometimes you have to be very involved in the process of whatever service you are involved in to get it done right. Unfortunate, because we pay specifically not to do that.

For example, I have a family member that needed legal work done. 2 separate attorneys screwed it up. I had to AI a solution and spoon feed them what to do. One was a big law firm the other a small private outfit.

I think it's partially due to dopamine addiction from cell phones which is depleting most people's reserves for attention to detail, productivity, and overall care.

 

[Passport1]

The state of everything seems broken...​

Sounds like you are stuck in a karmic loop. Look for a way break the loop. Maybe buy a lotto ticket.

 

[gfh77665]

Cant fix stupid. Send them a check for $0.00. Seriously, that would work.

 

[gfh77665]

It's nothing more than proof of Mike Judge's prescience from 2006 -- we are living in Idiocracy. It seems most people are now so dumb that basic societal functions are suffering under the weight of their stupidity. And trying to explain this to a world of dummies is met with complete befuddlement on their part.

Went through a fast food drive through. Bill was $8.76. Gave the employee $10.01. Bewilderment ensued.

 

[JeffKeryk]

@PWMDMD I wonder if the zero $ invoice has to do with a rounding error of some kind? Or maybe some clerk fat-fingered the keyboard?

 

[4strokes]

I have to say Amazon is spot on for me 99% of the time.

 

[PWMDMD]

@PWMDMD I wonder if the zero $ invoice has to do with a rounding error of some kind? Or maybe some clerk fat-fingered the keyboard?

My wife called yesterday and was told, "It's $0.00. Don't worry about it." Who knows...

 

[PWMDMD]

I have to say Amazon is spot on for me 99% of the time.

I didn't think about Amazon for this post but now that you said it, we've had a few issues lately with our stuff being delivered to neighbors and vice versa.

 

[Pew]

4. Lost phones at work a few months ago. It took Charter days to "fix" the issue. We subsequently lost internet and phones for no obvious reason 4x since the initial incident. Every tech blames something else and everything works by the time they leave, just to go down again a few weeks later.

If you're interested, I can probably help you troubleshoot the source of the issue - so you'd know it's at least nothing on your end. Printers are the bane of my existence, desk phones are a close second.

 

[PWMDMD]

I get Chick-Fill-A very rarely, and when I do it's usually only the chicken nuggets. Today, I thought I'd splurge and get some fries, which are of course completely raw. Sigh....