As I was leaving my house in the morning, it occurred to me the rebate from buying the high speed modem never came.
AT&T customer service transferred me to the rebate center. So after I gave all my information again, the rebate rep told me to call the main line back and have them three-way call him to verify the details. This would mean I would need to go through the voice recognition software, you know, the one where I end up screaming “NONE OF THESE!” and hear “I’m sorry, I’m having trouble understanding you. Please say ‘pay my bill,’ ‘check account balance,’ or ‘none of these.’”
Since I was at work and had nothing but unstructured time and an advanced phone system, I told the rebate rep I would conference us into the customer service center and he could handle it from there. He was confused, but agreed.
There is something very satisfying about hearing an AT&T employee trying to navigate the customer service lines. They have no special way to get through the system and after five minutes, he was yelling into the phone, just like a customer. If his only complication was navigating the phone system, I’d have been more than satisfied.
When we were finally connected a few minutes later to a rep who had the usual call center issues; slow computers, lack of knowledge, mandatory lobotomy, ten mg of valium to clock in.
The information the rebate rep had to check was simple: Is Brandon Thomas a customer?
Thirty five minutes later, I was eating peanut m&m’s playing scrabulous with a girl down the hall and listening to the rebate rep almost in tears through my headset.
He never got the exact information he was looking for from the other rep, so he ended up asking me how much I was supposed to get back. Had this conversation happened only a day before, I might have asked for more, maybe even feeling justified due to the inconvenience. But it happened on a day when someone asked me to step up in some other room of my life, and the unfortunate side effects of trying to be being a better person are viral in nature, infecting other areas of my life. A positive pandemic when left unchecked.
I can still take comfort in the misery of others, so that’s good. If that goes though, I’ll have to re-evaluate my relationships with people who demand personal progression and universal forgiveness.
The rebate wasn’t about the money; it was checking something off the running list of my shortcomings. One more discredited piece of evidence that was once carefully and painstakingly cataloged in the case against me. A case I simultaneously prosecuted and defended myself to sway a jury unaware they are even in a courtroom.
B
AT&T customer service transferred me to the rebate center. So after I gave all my information again, the rebate rep told me to call the main line back and have them three-way call him to verify the details. This would mean I would need to go through the voice recognition software, you know, the one where I end up screaming “NONE OF THESE!” and hear “I’m sorry, I’m having trouble understanding you. Please say ‘pay my bill,’ ‘check account balance,’ or ‘none of these.’”
Since I was at work and had nothing but unstructured time and an advanced phone system, I told the rebate rep I would conference us into the customer service center and he could handle it from there. He was confused, but agreed.
There is something very satisfying about hearing an AT&T employee trying to navigate the customer service lines. They have no special way to get through the system and after five minutes, he was yelling into the phone, just like a customer. If his only complication was navigating the phone system, I’d have been more than satisfied.
When we were finally connected a few minutes later to a rep who had the usual call center issues; slow computers, lack of knowledge, mandatory lobotomy, ten mg of valium to clock in.
The information the rebate rep had to check was simple: Is Brandon Thomas a customer?
Thirty five minutes later, I was eating peanut m&m’s playing scrabulous with a girl down the hall and listening to the rebate rep almost in tears through my headset.
He never got the exact information he was looking for from the other rep, so he ended up asking me how much I was supposed to get back. Had this conversation happened only a day before, I might have asked for more, maybe even feeling justified due to the inconvenience. But it happened on a day when someone asked me to step up in some other room of my life, and the unfortunate side effects of trying to be being a better person are viral in nature, infecting other areas of my life. A positive pandemic when left unchecked.
I can still take comfort in the misery of others, so that’s good. If that goes though, I’ll have to re-evaluate my relationships with people who demand personal progression and universal forgiveness.
The rebate wasn’t about the money; it was checking something off the running list of my shortcomings. One more discredited piece of evidence that was once carefully and painstakingly cataloged in the case against me. A case I simultaneously prosecuted and defended myself to sway a jury unaware they are even in a courtroom.
B
Posted by Peanut Butter And Jealous 
