Listen Dumbass

Readers who know what make Merle Sneed tick, know that he doesn't suffer fools easily, nor does he get pushed around by corporate giants. You will remember my vicious struggle with Circuit City as an example of what I am talking about. They trod on Merle and wished that they hadn't. Don't you love it when I talk about myself in the third person? Anyway the corporate bigwigs have regrouped and are making another run at me, to see if they can crash my defenses. These people are like cockroaches. You can't let them get a foothold. I did learn today that when talking to a customer service agent about a problem, beginning a sentence with "Listen dumbass", is not a persuasive tactic, but on to the issue at hand. I have to take you back to January 2005, when the lovely Mrs. Sneed finally succumbed to my pestering and agreed to give up her VCR in favor of TIVO. I had been a TIVO user for some time and had been regaling her with its virtures. I called our long-time satellite provider, DirecTV, and inquired about changing the lovely Mrs. Sneed's regular receiver to a TIVO unit. The rep for DirecTV told me that I would have to purchase the unit from them and offered me the super-swell price of $99 plus installation, providing I agreed to extend our contract for an additional year. I agreed. The rep suggested that I try to sell my old receiver on eBay. He also said that since I was buying the new receiver, it was my problem if it broke outside of the warranty period. All this is important later in this story. A few weeks ago, the lovely Mrs. Sneed's TIVO unit crapped out, totally dead. I called my good friends at the DirecTV technical support team and after a few futile suggestions about how the unit might be resurrected, they pronounced it dead too. When I asked about buying a replacement, the guy said they don't sell them anymore, but instead they lease them to the subscribers. He said that they would send me a new unit and that they would own it. Should I ever disconnect my service, it would need to be returned to them. I was also obligated to once again extend my contract. Fair enough. Two days later the unti arrived, I hooked it up and all was right with the world, that is, until the bill arrived. This past Monday I got my bill and it included a $200 charge for "equipment". This puzzled me, so I gave them a jingle, to see what was what. The nice woman on the phone told me it was a charge for failing to return the dead receiver. Assuming a misunderstanding had occurred, I told her that I owned the dead unit, so it didn't have to be returned to them. Besides I threw it in the trash. Silly me. The next person I was passed on to was a TIER 2 REPRESENTIVE, and judging from his dismissive attitude, a very important one at that. He patiently listened to my tale of woe and said, in not so many words, that any brainless ninny would know that the old unit needed to be sent back. But, I protested, it was my receiver, not theirs and as such, mine to dispose of as I pleased. This fell on deaf ears. I told him I wasn't paying and he told me that he would refer it to his boss and that I should call back in 48 hours to see if they would make an exception in my case. At this point I had had enough of Mr. Nice Guy Merle Sneed, so I snatched the phone from that panty-waist and unleashed Nasty Guy Merle Sneed on the hapless schmuck at DirecTV. I told him that as long as he was writing notes to his boss, write down that I would pay the $200 when hell freezes over. Furthermore, if they persisted at stupidly insisting that I return a receiver that they sold to me and that I owned, then I would send them one of the remaining two receivers that I own, I would gladly pay the $275 early-cancellation fee and then they should shove my DirecTV satellite dish, with dual LNBs up their collective arses. I am not beyond cutting off my nose to spite my face. So, this morning I called to see if they had arrived at a decision. Not yet, but another guy took up the task of explaining to me why I had the oligation to return the receiver that I owned. My rebuttal was (a) its mine!!!! and (b) if returning it was part of the deal, then they should have told me that before I pitched it. Well, Mr. Smartypants allows as how they probably did tell me, but I didn't understand. Quaking with rage and near an aneurysm, I invited him to get the tape of the original conversation that had been recorded for customer service and training purposes and play it. If the guy told me to return the unit, then I will pay the $200, if not, it comes off the bill. Well surprise, they don't have no stinking tape. The he begins to explain to me that I got a swell deal for $99 on the original receiver so it had to be returned. I counter with the arugment that it is insane that a brand new $99 receiver is worth $200 dead. Hell, send me a million of them and I'll break them for you and we can split the profit. DirecTV logic. Well, eventually it got to the part where I may have called him a dumbass and he may hung up on me. The lovely Mrs. Sneed offered me $200 to just shut up, but I can't be bought off. I rethought my plan to cancel our service altogether, because that would leave the lovely Mrs. Sneed high and dry TV-wise and me in sh*t city. So instead, if these jugheads insist on insisting, I will send back my TIVO unit, cancel my HBO which no one watches except me and the lovely Mrs. Sneed can continue to enjoy DirecTV on her set because I will be done with these fools. Plus she can pay those idiots. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor