Patience can be a pain in the ass

Here is a nice picture of the kiosk that sits in front of the office. For the past month and a half, the printer has been on the fritz.  It started one day when a customer made a payment and the receipt kept printing.  I had to go out and turn the printer off we had already rolled about 20’ of paper out of the machine.  From this point on the printer stopped working.

I called the kiosk company and quickly found out they have field techs that can be on site instantaneously.   The reality is I am their field tech because they do not send one out… So the origanal phone call goes something like this.

Me: the printer does not work.

Them: what is it doing?

Me: not working.

Them:……………

Me: Uh, there is no power.

Them: What was it doing before the power stopped?

Me: Continuous printing, over 20 feet of paper without printing anything you can read.

Them: It is a communication cable problem.

Me: But there is no power.

Them: We are sending you a new cable call us when arrives next week.

Me: But the printer is not working now.

A week goes by and the communication cable shows up, so I call the company and they politely (they are very nice people) tell me to install the cable and to call them back. 30 minutes latter I finally get the cable in.  This cable is held in by 20 + zip ties. I call the company back and they say…

Them: Now turn on the power.

Me: The power switch is on.

Them: Can you see the test page?

Me: ….No… there still is no power.

Them: We will send you a new printer.

Me: And that will fix the power issue.

Them: And we will send you a new power supply.

Me: Thank you

Them: It will arrive in about a week.

It did arrive in a week but I was on vacation that week so two weeks later I call the company and say I have the printer now what? 

At this point I am going to stop typing the dialog because the installation of the new printer and new power supply took a couple of hours and several calls.  It was not very fun and there was a whole bunch of zip ties that had to be cut.  This is the point I realized they did not send any zip ties to replace they ones that had to be cut.  Duct Tape to the rescue.

This time when they asked for the power to be turned on it did come on. And the printer started spitting out 20 to 30 ft. of paper.  Almost four weeks have gone by and we are back to the original problem.  I stand out at the kiosk for another hour while they run test to no avail.  The answer is “We need to do some research on this”.  The following Monday I call back to follow up. “Hey guys it has been a couple of days have we figured out anything on this printer situation”.  The answer is that I need a specialist to call me and to work this problem.  The truth is I have needed as specialist to come over to the property and fix this printer four and a half weeks ago…..  Wednesday of last week I got a call and was talking to the specialist and he loaded drivers and reloaded drivers, he tested the printer and he retested the printers. He even would hang up the phone because what he was trying was going to take a while then he would call back and test the printer and retest the printer. Finally in the end 5 and ½ weeks later I have a working printer.

 

This is a look at the final days testing of the printer aftermath.  I have seen the inside of that machine just a little too much.

Let the games begin

The letters about the inventory for auction went out yesterday and I got my first head ach today.   Today went by kind of hectic but not out of the ordinary.   Till 5:45 this afternoon when one of my auction tenants stops by.  Now I haven’t received a payment from her (that didn’t bounce) since she moved in.  Yet today she shows up and wants to pay now.  Hey I like that kind of enthusiasm, just tell me where it has been for the past three months. 

Now let me tell you that the computer happens to be turned off at the moment she comes in ( another long story for another rime).  So we must wait for the complete boot up to happen. Then she has some disputes on the total amount.

Side bar here - the reason we got the new program is because the old program would like to add charges at random. 

Yes I know there is a problem and yes I know how to fix it.  The problem is the info I need is in her file and the calculations are going to need to be done by hand.  Then once the proper price has been set I will need to figure out how to make the new computer to accept the discounted price.  Did I mention it is 5:45 heading to my 6 o’clock closing and this will make me work past 6 which I do not get paid for.

By the way did I mention that this process is taking to long for her and I am putting her out?  You see she has places to be.  This is the kind of attitude that really bothers me.  She has put off taking care of this bill till the last moment making me wait three months to get paid, yet waiting fifteen minutes so I can charge her the proper amount is cramping her style.

Simple answer… I cut her a hand receipt … refilled my coffee and fixed the problem.  She was out of my office at 6 and I took the next 10 minutes and patched the paperwork.  She will never understand how rude not paying your bills can be, but that’s ok I had hot coffee and a quite office.  Unfortunately this is what will great me in the morning.

I need to do some filling to find my desk.  

The first is down, five more to go

The next Big step to Auction.

I mailed out letters to my tenants who are on the road to auction.  I hate these letters for many reasons but the top reason is the attitude I get from many of the customers.  Now please understand I have 90% of my tenants are great people fun to visit with and never give me any problem, what I get from the bottom 10% is this look of disgust as they walk into the office as if I was the problem.   I have even had customers tell me “why are you threatening me with these ugly, mean letters.  You know I always come in and pay my bill”.  What are they thinking the account is over 120 days late and they have not responded to my letters, or phone calls, yet I am supposed to psychically know what day they are going to pay!  Most likely they will also want me to waive the fees.  Man I wish I was golfing.

Here is what is actually coming my way.  Out of the six letters I sent two will pay up quickly one will make a fight out of it and I will get 90% of what they owe, but only after I cut their lock. The other two will end up in the auction and one of those two spaces will look like this.

I stared with just over 20 units going to auction three weeks ago and this is what I am down to.  When I get the rest of the units filled I will probably get a better sized auction going, but with just over 200 units rented I should be happy with 2 to 3 units every 6 months.  

 I should start hearing back from my letter as early as tomorrow.  

To my friends at AT&T

To my friends at AT&T:

The fact that you have job absolutely astounds me. What has happened to customer service. It is amazing that one of these “customer service experts” can say the words that sound like they are being helpful, but you know that four hours latter you will have to call again and start from scratch. By the end of my 36 hour journey into the world of AT&T service, the last rep. that I talked to says “Please hold while I call up your account….. Wow… you have made a few calls haven’t you”? My answer “Yes, but this call has nothing to do with the last 2 days of my life”. His response “ Thank God”.

My biggest complaint has nothing to do with the fact that they were unable to fix my problem in any timely manor. I am a reasonable man (at times). The fact that I was lied to time after time, caught them in their lies, and still they continued to lie. At one point I had a representative hang up the phone while I was in mid sentence. I called back to ask the supervisor to find out who that was, and after she told me that they do not keep records of which person talks to whom so she could not find out who hung up on me, she told me who was the last three techs who did do real work on my problem.

Oh well, I ramble, much like the supervisor at AT&T.

I think I will name my next aneurism after her.