May 16, 2011

 Mrs. Sneed was telling me about one of those articles about easy ways to save money.  One tip was to cancel home water delivery and get a water conditioner.  Who has water delivered anymore?  And who wrote the article, June Cleaver?

I went to the bank this morning to cash my giant hardware store check.  The teller asked me for about the millionth time if I was interested in switching some of the fabulous Sneed fortune to CDs?  Okay, fortune may be a stretch.

She said that I can get .7% on my savings, with a 24-month CD.  How can I resist tying up our emergency funds for the promise of .7%?  We are currently earning a whooping .2%, or $20 a year from the bank.

Conversely, we are getting 3% cash back by spending money on our Costco American Express card.  Last year we got about $200 in cash rebates on our AMEX card and didn't pay a penny of interest.  What kind of a crazy world is this?

One more thing.

I got into a fight today with the Shade USA company of Gilbert, AZ. 

I bought a market umbrella last July for the front patio from these folks.  This morning the mechanism that cranks it up and down broke, so I fired off an email to them asking if they would warranty the umbrella.

Their response was to blame me for the failure and offer a possible solution, which didn't work.

My second email reported the failed attempt at home remedy and asked about a replacement umbrella.

Their second response was that my umbrella was "well beyond the warranty period", but that I could buy another from their website.  Evidently, their warranty period is out of sight, out of warranty.

I paid over a hundred bucks for the sucker, about $10 per month of its useful life.  I could have rented an umbrella cheaper, if I had been forewarned that Shade USA, of Gilbert, AZ, sells temporary merchandise.

Longtime readers can imagine my third email to them.

So, in the unlikely event that you ever contemplate doing business with Shade USA of Gilbert, AZ.,  you might want to consider my experience, which basically sucked.



Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

11 comments:

Perpetual Chocoholic said...

Greed pure and simple in both instances.

The Bug said...

How VERY annoying! I read a hilarious comic yesterday about a mythical fight with tech support from about 150 years ago. I'm putting the link here in case you're interested:

http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2247#comic

Merle Sneed said...

Very funny, Bug! Nothing ever changes.

Kurt said...

I have added Shade USA to my long list of companies that I will never do business with again, which includes such luminaries as:

Virgin Mobile
Continental Airlines
AAA
many others

Megan said...

My brother "gifted" me one of his extra umbrellas that he had lying around his back yard. It lasted through one blast of wind. You think I should bill him for the labor of taking it down and the travel time for getting it down four flights of stairs and into the dumpster? I'm thinking about it...

:)

Merle Sneed said...

Kurt, thanks for the show of solidarity.

Megan, even I know not to leave an umbrella up in the wind.

mouse (aka kimy) said...

if you moved to cleveland you wouldn't need a worthless, defective umbrella from shade of gilbert az....

and lots of good water around here no need for delivery or conditioning!

you keep those emails going to those sucker!

Barbara said...

Breaking just after the warranty is up is planned in most products these days I'm convinced. Nothing lasts the way it used to.

Steve Reed said...

I will avoid Shade USA at all costs! :)

alphabet soup said...

Ah, the Merle Sneed of old returns to fight the good fight and keep all those rogues in line....
And hey look, there's Steve Reed who has returned to the blogfold, Hurrah!!

Ms Soup

Bella Rum said...

Um. Now, what was the name of that company??

I complained about Comcast on my blog a few months ago and ComcastMark showed up in the comments, telling me, "for further assistance, feel free to contact me." It kinda gave me the creeps.