oyuki

Monday, October 03, 2005

How stupid can people be?

Excuse me, but am a bit bouncing off the walls in a peeved state.

Dear Countrywide, please instruct your stupid minions in the difference between the phrase 'placed a hold on the ACH service' and 'your ACH service has been cancelled.' Yes you moronic business institution, I know I was in the declared disaster area of Katrina; nine days sans power somewhat qualifies for that definition. However when I receive a letter in the mail saying you will place a hold on automatic deductions for my mortgage, I take your word for it. That for merely two months, the payments will not be deducted and after those two months it will start again. I tried to call this weekend, but the phone number so helpfully provided on that letter did not work until after 10am Central time which contradicted your recording that claimed your office opened at 7am Central time on Saturday. Then when I did get ahold of a human being I was told this phone number was not the one I needed, so they gave me the Customer service number. Well this morning I did call that number. And I did get ahold of another real human being, but I might as well have been talking to a machine for all the good it did. Why? Because I learned that my account was not placed on hold as the letter stated it would, but in fact the automatic draft was cancelled! Now I am working on the paperwork to restart the automatic draft. Excuses of 'well some people could not reach us by phone' does not wash since you Countrywide took a proactive stance and arbitrarily cancelled services while sending out a letter telling us that if we did not want the automatic draft put on hold to call to let you know. Yes Countrywide I am sorry I was late in responding to you letter, but I was busy helping in the relief efforts to even wade through my mail until this weekend. And now I find that you have cancelled my ACH. To explore the depths of my contempt for you Countrywide would take far more time and space than I care to spend since I still am helping with the relief efforts.

Excuse me while I call Countrywide again and this time try to climb up their ladder until I find someone I can really stick it to to get this corrected.

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Update: Countrywide continues to be stupid. This time did not select the Katrina option and waited almost forever to get ahold of someone. That person told me he was not in the department that could lift the hold and transferred me. Waited and then got transferred again. Next thing I know I am waiting for someone from debt collection. What the heck!?!? Explain what is going on to person at debt collection and she transfers me again. Finally talk to someone else. Yes the ACH was cancelled and can you give me your bank routing number and account number again I am asked. With gnashing of teeth I give them this information again and I ask the lady what is going on and I explain what I have already been through; and it seems she does not understand what I am saying, that to me there is a difference between 'hold' and 'cancelled.' I also learned because I did not respond promptly to this mail from them, that was why they cancelled the ACH. My brain hurts over this stupidity. So now I have to mail in a check to Countrywide to cover October's payment and on November 1, the ACH is supposed to start again. I hope Countrywide is competent enough to actually reinstate that.

5 comments:

RightWingRocker said...

Sounds like a good time to refinance with another lender, Anna ...

I am sorry I was late in responding to you letter, but I was busy helping in the relief efforts to even wade through my mail until this weekend.

I couldn't help but laugh at that one.

Seriously. Once you get ashore, you should really consider changing mortgage companies. There are plenty out there to choose from, and you may even wind up saving money while allowing someone other than Countrywide earn the interest on your loan.

Along those same lines, I will take this incident as a warning that Countrywide is not a good company to do business with, and will avoid its services at all costs.

RWR

Anna said...

Well the good news is, have gone from 12 on/12 off with 3 hours of commute to 12 on/24 off with 3 hours of commute. So catching up on things.

Countrywide had been sending me letters about getting a HELOC so this letter sat unopened while I tackled real bills like one that was four days overdue. Ooops.

Already contracted out repair work on storage building, now need to call quotes to redo front porch. Got radiator flushed in Firebird along with oil change. Still to do on Firebird is redo tint for it to pass inspection along with replacing windshield - gotta love rock hits, not.

RightWingRocker said...

Anna!

A Firebird?

My God! How can you do that to the environment? Don't you know that a Firebird is a gas-guzzling polluting machine?

Did you know that the company that makes the Firebird, General Motors, doesn't even have a halfway decent hybrid on the market?

How can you do this to our Earth?

RWR

RightWingRocker said...

/SARCASM OFF/

Anna said...

Well this 'evil' ol Firebrid gets 25 to 28 mpg on the highway so I am not complaining. ^_^

As for hybrids, those plug-in hybrids are all hype. Yes the Japanese market Prius has a button that disables the gasoline engine from even starting unless you toggle it. So your top speed is a blazing 38mph on purely electric power.