Crazy!!!

A few weeks ago, I rang my local Superstore. I wanted to ask a question. The robotic, voice gave me lots of choices to choose, each one that I chose, did not get me to a human. I would ring back, and choose another number, hoping that I would be successful. I didn’t want to go to the town, I just wanted an answer to my question. It was Very frustrating. After 20 minutes on the phone, I had no joy, I sadly had to give up.

I wasn’t going to town, just to ask the superstore a question.

Three weeks ago, I rang another superstore, I had just shopped there, and a man was begging, from myself and everyone else for money. He came right up to me as I sat in my car, I watched as he went to other cars too.

I decided to ring the very large store, from the car park.

Just like the other store, that I had rung before, I had tried options 1, 3, 5, but it made no difference, I was unable to speak to a human being. Again, it was Very frustrating! So, I used my loaf, and decided to press option 7, that was for traders! Immediately, I got through to a person!! I said, to her, “There is a man in the car park going up to people in their cars, and asking for money.” She said, “Thank you for letting me know, I will send the Security down now.” I then said to her, “I was unable to get through to a human, so I had to pretend to be a Tradesman, and then I got you straight away.” She laughed and said, “That was a great idea!”

Recently my washing machine broke down. Was gutted, because the washing machine was the only individual thing that I had insured on its own. But due to the electric going up I had to cancel the insurance to try and save money. Now months later, my machine broke down, it was strange not having insurance. I had always insured it, but that’s life, something had to give.

Meghan said, “Ask them for a quote, and depends what it is, I will pay it.” She is such a little gem, I replied, “OK, I will phone them tomorrow and ask them.”

The following day, I rang the washing machine, insurance section, I asked, “Can I have a quote?” I explained how I had stopped the insurance and why. I said, “My Daughter will pay.” She said, “I will tell you what options we do.”

When I wasn’t insured with them anymore, they bombarded me with letters to, “Come back, for a reduced special offer price of £11 a month.” That was a very good price compared to what I had been paying them a month while I was their customer, but I had a very expensive electric bill to pay, which was climbing up every month. The direct debit, that they had put up, was still not covering the bill that they were charging me. It was scary stuff. I don’t earn that kind of money. At first when they hiked up the electric, I was tempted to close the account and not pay it at all, but someone advised me not to do that, but to pay the direct debit each month so I did.

One of the options, was a bit complicated, she tried to explain it to me, but Meghan was at work and Paul was asleep, so although I wrote down what she said, I didn’t fully get it. Basically, she said, “For £200 a one-off call-out will include the engineer coming into the house, the parts and labour.” But, “If he can’t fix it, we will get £70 back.” Before this, I had said to Meghan, when she said, she would pay, “They will probably charge us, “One hundred pounds just to walk into the house, £150 for parts and £100 for labour!” I added, “That’s what happens when you don’t have insurance, they make you pay through the nose.” I was advised by my Husband and Brother to, “Buy a new machine,” That was far too much hassle, and I didn’t have time. Yes, the new machine would have been paid over 6 months interest free.

The other option, was to, “Pay over one year.” The price had now gone up a lot! I asked, “Why?” She said, “Because your machine is now broken, that £11 a month was when you machine was working.” They truly have us over a barrel!  

I told her, “I can’t afford to pay that amount for a year,” She said, “Another option, would be, £143 paying over 6 months,” She went on, “That would include everything you had before, unlimited call-out, and if it can’t be fixed, a new machine would be given to you.” That sounded like a better deal, for now. It was still a lot of money, that direct debit would not put us in the red today.

I said, to her, “OK, I will go with that.” She went through her spiel. I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders. When she had finished, I asked, “When will the engineer be here?” Was a bit down when she said, “Thursday,” I replied, “That’s 3 days from now, can’t it be sooner?” I added, “We are a family of 4,” She replied, “No.”

The engineer came, he was unable to fix the machine, he told my husband what parts we needed. Later that day, I had a text, “We have the parts in stock, please phone or email us for the engineer to come and fix your machine.”

I had a lot to do before I went to work, I rang the company, to arrange a date, but all I got was various robots, telling me to pick 1, 3, 4 etc. I would re dial again and it made no difference, when the machine gave me the email address or the live chat, information, I was unable to speak to a human being!!! The robot would then end the call! I even tried to pick the wrong number like I did for the Tradesman, but there was no Tradesman to pick. I was trapped in a robotic world and there wasn’t anyone at all to speak to, it was Crazy! One of the robot’s messages was, “We will not tolerate anyone been rude or angry with our Staff.” I thought that was ‘funny’ because by now I was feeling angry! Time was going, 40 minutes later, of that time I will not get back, I finally got to speak to a person. I told him what happened, he said, “There are more people who have our appliances than we have staff.” He had a point. It is booked for this Friday, 2 weeks after it broke down.

Thankfully I was able to use another washing machine.

It seems like robots and AI’s have slowly taken over the World! It is only when I wanted to speak to a human, that I realized, how bad it has gotten.