FlishFun.com

So, Jess and I paid off our car on the 14th of this month. Happy time, right? Wrong.

When we paid off our car, we thought we just had to pay it off, and then call the company (C.A.F.) and ask them to cancel our automatic payments. Ha! Well, we did that, and all was well… until the 22nd. Suddenly they took our usual payment (which is about $315, not a small amount) from our checking account.

So I’m pissed… I call up C.A.F. and they tell me that is wasn’t them who took the funds, no, it was my bank. They say that the way their automatic payments work is that the bank (G.W.B.) takes the money and sends it to them. I didn’t believe them, but what could I do?

I call G.W.B. and ask them to stop sending payments to C.A.F. right away and to refund our money. We’re told that they don’t send the money unless it’s requested, but they can put a stop on it for the low, low price of $25. We yell, but we have to pay, so I shell out the $25 and they give us the remaining money back. All is well, right?

Wrong. I get an e-mail today from a new company (M.V.C.) saying that they paid the $315 for us, since there was a stop put on the check. So we now owe them $315. WTF? I call them and have a nice chat… this is what I find out. I was apparently supposed to cancel my automatic payments FIRST, and pay off the car second. Good to know. Also, it seems that the company that requested the money isn’t the same as C.A.F., they’re the C.B.M. company. They’re under the same umbrella as C.A.F., but they seem to be completely blind to each other. So while C.A.F. says I don’t owe them any more, no one told C.B.M. to stop taking my money.

You following so far? Just incase you’re not… quick recap:

Okay… so C.B.M. thought I needed to send another payment to C.A.F. and got my bank to send it. I put a stop on it, so C.B.M. got another company (M.V.C) to pay and just get the money from me later.

Got it? Let’s continue. Now then, this is what I was told I need to do to fix it:

1. Call C.B.M. and convince them to close my account with them.

2. Call C.A.F. and ask them for a refund of the $315 (when they ask for proof that it’s paid, I need to get them to talk to C.B.M.).

3. When I get the refund we need to remove the stop from my bank and make sure the money is there.

4. Finally I have to call C.B.M. and have them re-take the money from us.

Nice. So that’s a lot of effort and I’m down $25 and possibly a tick on my credit score, as M.V.C. is technically a collection agency. Yay! :angry:

And here I thought things would be easier now that I paid it off. Sure showed me.

So, to start… I’m sure those of you who read my Blog noticed there wasn’t a “Part 2″ to my nice day. Well, that’s because we got in late after going shopping and to the movies. Overall, it was a great weekend, in fact, a fish I had long thought was dead, turned up alive and well in my tank (he has been missing for over a month)! Yes, my Bulldog Pleco is alive and well living in a pot in my aquarium! Now I just hope that Levi (you’ll remember him from a previous entry) doesn’t try to kill him. Okay, okay… enough about the weekend, I need to complain.

So, Monday started out nice, we went to work, and decided to come home for lunch. Upon opening the door I noticed something was wrong… the apartment was filled with smoke, and I had been pretty sure I hadn’t left a smoke machine running while we were away. Now it wasn’t a normal smoke, it had a “burnt electronic” smell to it. As Jess (my fiancée) gathered up the cats and dialed 911, I checked the house out. The air conditioning was off, smoke was in every room, the kitchen lights weren’t working… but I couldn’t figure out where the smell/smoke was coming from.

Long story short, we had 7 firefighters (in full gear) in our apartment looking for the cause of the smoke. Seems something in the furnace room (beside our apartment) shorted out and caused the problem. Well, after taking a long lunch, the maintenance man finally came back and fixed the problem (he said). Now everything is working, but the smell is everywhere… and now there’s a horrible noise coming from the furnace room. *sigh* Did I mention that I had to stay in the apartment and wait for him to come back? I breathed those fume (and missed half a day of work) just so he could take his time. Grrrr!

We spent all the rest of yesterday, this morning, and during lunch trying to fan out the smell (we had the windows open and bought more fans to help). While the smell isn’t as bad, it hasn’t gone away. Today we’re probably going to have to buy stuff to clean the carpets, walls, clothes, etc. That smoke was everywhere! Who knows how much this is gonna cost us, I swear, I’m ready to beat someone.

I seriously hope the apartment complex does something to compensate us, I mean, had we not come home for lunch, our cats and our fish could have died (from the smoke, fumes, and heat). This also wasn’t the only issue we’ve had in this place. In the last 12 months we’ve had the following issues:

Leaky pipes under the sink
Dishwasher backing up
Heat not working (Winter)
Air not working (Summer)
Roof (possibly) leaking
Constant power outages
And now the smoke, etc

It seems we’re the only people having problems, the management act like we’re just trying to bug them! The sad thing is, they’re not bad apartments! Just apparently ours is out to get us. Jess is thinking about getting them to move us across the hall, it’s a bigger apartment, and it doesn’t have a direct attachment to the furnace room. I honestly think they owe us either free rent, or that apartment at the rent we’re paying now.

So tonight Jess and I get to buy cleaning supplies, take some things to her parents for safe keeping (so they don’t get too messed up), then start cleaning. Tomorrow after work we get to continue our cleaning binge! Whooo! Just what I wanted to do this week. I’m very glad that we get a three day weekend after Friday, we both need it.

Okay, that’s it for now… if anyone knows how to get the smell of smoke out of a house, please drop a comment.

I was sent this picture today, and I just had to share it… here’s the quote I got along with it:

“Ever wondered why all the hard work the AutoPatcher team puts in is worth the effort? It only took 4 days to patch and install 75mb of drivers on a 100+ new laptops with 0% bandwidth usage!!!!!!!!Last rollout took 14 days for same task. The possibilities are staggering!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Well I tell ya, I love the way that looks! If anyone else has any pics like this to share, please send them my way!

(Ed. Note - This is from my old AutoPatcher news blog)