So it's Friday already, a very busy week almost behind me.

Between working 12 hour days and having to call my car insurance company - a dozen times at least - and calling Century Link to fix the freaking internet - which it is still messing up - I'll be glad when today's work day is over.  Oh and let's not forget whatever creature came and ate half of one of my fish out of one of my ponds.............

The insurance situation was simply the desire to have my windshield replaced on my car using my windshield insurance with no deductible.  It started with a lady on the phone who was asking endless questions, which I guess they all do, but after 15 minutes of this, she THEN stated that "okay, let's get started, this is going to take a while".  ???  What do you mean?  Well it's about a 30 minute "investigation".  But I just answered questions for 15 minutes.  Yes, that was the preliminary investigation.

Unbelievable.  I have had windshields replaced with insurance companies where you simply call them, tell them you want it replaced, 5 minutes later you're done, off the phone and scheduling a company to come out and replace it.  Not here.  We got "started" on this next "phase" and went on for another 10 minutes before she asked about previous accidents.  Yes, I was in one about 3-1/2 years ago with this car, minor bumper damage.

NOW, this woman wants to go into a lengthy discussion about an accident that occurred years ago and most assuredly had absolutely NOTHING to do with THIS claim. I asked to speak to her manager as I was sick of this s***.  She said no, company policy you can't speak to a manager.  That's when I knew things were going to turn ugly.  Company POLICY that I can't speak to a manager?  This went on for a while, I wasn't budging, she switched me over to a claims adjuster.  This guy was a real piece of work.  I asked this dude about the ethics of an employee that would tell me it's a "policy" not to be able to speak to a manager?  He didn't want to talk about that, told me he wasn't in customer service and eventually hung up on me.

I called back and talked to another lady who was very sweet, looked over my policy and informed me that everything was done, all I needed to do was to get a glass company and have them fax over their information.  This after the guy that hung up on me told me that I was "refusing to cooperate" and that this investigation would have to be completed  to get my windshield - and then hanging up.

Well, the glass company called them the next day and someone informed this guy that I had been "uncooperative" and that I had not completed the investigation.  He calls me to inform me of their statement.

I called back several times, getting the runaround.  I was attempting to find a way to call their corporate headquarters, but even Hoovers only had their 800 number listed.  Yesterday morning, I hunkered down, steeled myself and got on the phone.  One refusal after another.  The final adjuster I was talking to absolutely refused to connect me with a manager.  He repeatedly asked my why I needed to speak to one and I repeatedly told him why.  Apparently not good enough for him.  I finally just stated that if he did not connect me to a manager, I was going to call corporate (though I had no idea how, I guess do an extensive search on the internet) and have this phone call reviewed.  He still refused and I just started repeating "management please" after every time he repeated himself.

This finally got me connected to some other department, who connected me with another department and I finally got a lady on the phone who said, well, okay, let me get you a manager.  FINALLY!  Another woman got on the phone and yes, this was, after an hour of trying to get to that point, a manager.

I told her the entire story from front to end.  She was aghast at some of the statements some of the people had told me, including Ryan, the adjuster who had absolutely refused to get me a manager or the first lady that also refused, or the second person, or anyone after that excepting the final person.  She checked into it and said well, you are already good for the windshield.  No, ma'am, I am not.  The glass company called and someone told him that I had to call back.  This story unraveled and finally?  Yes, she was telling me how she was going to be contacting the managers over all of these people that had told me all of this BS and that they would deal with these individuals accordingly.

A certain feeling of satisfaction started creeping in.  These people all thought they were immune to any form of disciplinary action.  I asked that she ask those managers to review every single phone call.  ALL of those calls are recorded, they each explicitly state that before you even start talking to any of them.

So, relief hitting, I have a new windshield to be installed today while I am at work.

As for the internet, it comes on and off, I have no idea and neither did Century Link.

As for the pond, I don't know if this a daily, recurring theme or what, but I am going to have to figure something out.  Whatever (Heron?) ate that fish, that fish was about a $40 fish.  I got it when it was small and it had grown very large. It's a fancy type of goldfish and I saw them listed for almost $40 at Pet Smart the other day and those fish were smaller than mine.  Goldfish are cheap to replace - just buy another small one and eventually it will be a big one - but the large Koi?

Well, almost time to leave for work.  I have been neglectful of my journal but what can I say.  I have been too tired to do much of anything but come home from work, sit down, browse the internet for a while and then - go to sleep.

Church prayer meeting tonight, I am hopeful I can muster the energy to go to it, it should be good, very good.

G'day.

ben