I am thankful for...

having an hour to waste on Tuesday morning. And for lousy customer service agents. They give me a target for all of my ire and hate. And I got a lot to go around...

It all started last weekend when I killed my cell phone by dropping it off of a fishing pier. Not surprisingly, after I fished it off of the bottom with a net, it would not work. I have been wanting a new phone anyways, so I wasn't too upset.

We keep the cell phone for emergencies and so that I have a way to contact The Boss Lady while the kids and I are out running around. In more than a year and a half we have only talked on the thing like 500 minutes. It lives in the diaper bag most of the time. And frequently goes missing for days at a time. We are not tied too tightly to this phone. So we use a prepaid service.

We have always been pleased with Tracfone. When we got it, the phone came with a year's service and about 40 minutes of talk time. We put a couple of hundred minutes on it back then and the time lasted us the entire year. In March we bought another year of service and about 300 minutes. In all of that time, we had no missed calls and no dropped calls, so what more do we need?

But when I killed the phone we still had about 75 minutes on the phone. According to Paul in customer service, they could not verify the time, so they would only give me 10 minutes for activating my new phone. But I could keep the last 4 months of my year of service. He was not rude, just not allowed to solve my problem. When I asked to speak to a supervisor, he offered me 30 minutes and the remaining service time. No deal.

Then Paul asked if I would settle for 75 minutes and the months. Yes, we have a deal, Paul. But after I agreed, he transferred me to a supervisor anyways. I waited on hold for 20 more minutes but Florence, the supervisor, would not agree to credit the 75 minutes, only the 30, and I would need to buy another year of service immediately.

And she called me a liar. Said that her employee never agreed to anything of the sort. And if said he did, then he was lying, too. This was her only offer, take it or leave it.

Hey Florence, you stupid bitch, no deal.

So I demanded my case number and asked to speak to her supervisor. I was pretty sure she would hang up on me, so if I had a decent case number, maybe I would not have to wait so long on a follow up call.

20 minutes later, the manager, Maria and I had another deal. And after I spent another 10 minutes explaining that I did not like being called a liar by her employee, she gave us a little bit of extra time. We now have the remainder of our year of service and 90 minutes of talk time.

So I spent 55 minutes on the phone. I got my time and service back and 15 extra minutes. I figure the time cards cost about $40 for 80 minutes, so even though it was a hassle, it was worth it. And I bet we won't use all of this time beore we have to buy more time in March.

So now, if I ever go to New Delhi I'll have cell service to call and get bail money. Because if I go to New Delhi and I run into Florence, I'm kicking her ass. And maybe Paul will help me.