They are doing my head in!!!!!
A couple of days ago I wrote about my current paper warfare! Chasing up a medical appointment and it seems somewhere something went awry.
Having heard nothing, despite the promise to call me back, today I followed up the situation.
The conversation went like this.
First I explained the WHOLE situation yet again!
Then the young lady said, “Oh it is all sorted, you have an appointment on May 17.”
I mentally rolled my eyes and replied, “Today is May 17.”
“Oh”, followed by a moment’s silence, “I’ll reschedule that for you.”
The first date offered was not good as I have a speaking engagement that day for the book.
So we eventually agreed on a date in June. *Sigh*
To be confirmed in writing. I’ll keep my eye out for the letter!
If human rights is not something you think about, I invite to read Dr George Venturini
Dr Venturni has an impressive legal bio. He has started a new series of articles on Independent Australia looking at “the history and reasons for Australia’s current unfair and illegal refugee policy”. I invite you to click on the picture below and read Dr Venturini’s excellent article.
Dr Venturini on Independent Australia
User pays or profiteering? Partner Visa fees
In principle, I have no problem with the concept of user pays. I have a major problem if someone takes money and I get nothing for it.
There are costs involved in applying for visas. Here I am looking at Partner Visas for Australia. The current fees are set out below (current as at January 1, 2013).
Partner Visa Fees
The fees booklet is found at http://www.immi.gov.au/allforms/pdf/990i.pdf
Day 3 of the default drama
We still do not actually have a copy of the bill, but it is coming. Despite the fact we are in no way liable for this $208, we paid it. Sorting it out with the Red Cross and DIAC could take months, which really doesn’t help anything.
Believe it or not, it goes like this. The bank pre-approve the car loan, subject to us paying the $208. I can understand this – it is not the bank’s decision to make about whether we are liable or not. I try to pay the bill. I CAN’T!!! The bill is too old, there was no way on the electricity company’s systems that I could pay it!
At that point I I cried. It was like being back 20 months ago. The tears just ran down my face. I couldn’t stop them. All the pain and fear just seemed to come rushing back. This should not be happened kept ringing in my ears. Again I felt I was drowning.
The young man who manages the electricity company’s Twitter account was wonderful. I have no idea about the rest of the company, but he was lovely. He organised for the company to open a new account so we could actually pay, then sent me a confirming email I could forward to the bank. Of course, all this took so long we still do not have a final approval stamp from the bank! He also confirmed the advice I received last night that these things drop off after five years. I knew nothing, of course: I’ve never had such a situation.
Will it NEVER end?
Yes, you can put the “f” word in the heading. I just try very hard not to use bad words on here.
I am furious, frustrated and feeling completely “done over” by the “system”. Why, you ask? I hoped you’d ask. LET ME TELL YOU!
As you will recall, Mr O’s car is dead and needs to be buried. We had hoped to get one more year out of it – no such luck. But he needs to be able to get to work, so whether we can afford it or not, we have to buy a new car. Mr O finds a car, we bite the financial bullet and submit a car loan application with the bank. We look on the positive side that this will build Mr O a credit history in Australia. Bank is reasonably positive so we pay a deposit on the car.
Today the bank contacts me. The standard credit check came back showing Mr O has a default with TruEnergy, now Energy Australia, for $208 dated January 2011. Really? Mr O was, you may recall, involuntarily removed from Australia in April 2010. He was hardly likely to be accumulating electricity or gas costs in January 2011!!!
I call Energy Australia and try to find out the situation. “What is the account number?” Of course I don’t know that. We don’t know that. We don’t even know if it is actually for Mr O! I ask what address is the bill for? She can’t tell me, but suggests that maybe Mr O called from overseas to organise the account for someone else. WTF??? Did she hear anything I had told her already?
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Just click on the cover image below to buy
Love versus Goliath!
Love versus Goliath
Other retailers will follow shortly.
I invite those followers who have read the book already to leave a comment and of course invite them to give a review on Amazon! Many thanks to our wonderful beta readers!
The Telstra calls resolved
On December 18 last year I lodged a complaint with the Telecommunications Ombudsman.
Yesterday I had a call from the Complaints Department of Telstra. Thankfully this time I did not get the “nothing will change” member of staff! I was called by a very nice man!
I won’t go through the whole lengthy conversation, but I will mention a couple of interesting points.
First time around the story, looking at my records, he ALSO said no, they are bogus calls, not Telstra calls, etc etc.
Then he mentioned Telstra having called me on December 24th and another date. Ummmm no. Oh! Further investigation revealed those dates were “record created” dates and it is taking about 10 days for the records to show up. The “created” date of the call record was December 24th, the actual call date (interaction date) was many days earlier.
He also agreed the system shouldn’t have been chasing me anyway! He understood my concerns about the nature of the calls and the fact I got three different answers from three different phone calls to Telstra trying to resolve the issue.
He has undertaken to raise my concerns through the internal review system and also follow up why the interaction records take so long to update in the system. Clearly that is why the young lady I spoke to on the Saturday knew nothing about the calls and also advised me they were bogus.
A good result, which highlighted some awful systems problems within Telstra! This experience does illustrate if the answers don’t sound right – keep trying!
Related articles
- Purportedly Telstra calls: scam or not? (teamoyeniyi.com)
