Curse you, Student Accounts!

No swearing, yet, but I just had to share these conversations. Here’s the background. I tried to make a $1500 payment to my account (for tuition) on Friday night. The online system gave me a message that said “Your card may have been charged and the balance not applied to your account. Contact Student Accounts!” Which I couldn’t do til Monday. So, on Monday I talk to Student Accounts and they assure me no charge has been made. And on Monday I check the bank account, and the $1500 has gone missing. So today I call. After breaking through the phone jam…

“Student Accounts”
“Yea, hi, I was trying to make a payment online on Friday, and I clicked Authorize and it thought for a second and then told me ‘Your card may have been charged but it wasn’t credited to your account. Contact Student Accounts.’ But it’s showed up on the bank statement”
“What’s your name and social?”
“<nameandsocial>”
“I’m not showing any payments made.”
“But the bank’s showing a charge.”
“That’s weird. It shouldn’t do that. So your card has been charged, but it hasn’t shown up on your account?”
“Right.”
“That’s strange. It shouldn’t do that.”
“I know.”
“Normally it credits it to your account when you make a payment.”
“Yep.”
“So it hasn’t?”
“Nope. It’s showing up on the bank statement, but not on my GSU account.”
“Hmmm. That’s weird.”
“Isn’t it?”

I’m waiting for them to call me back. I’ve rocked their world. But I felt the need to inform the world that it’s both weird and strange when things don’t work right.

God, tell me. My mom has been trying to tell MY college that we have paid the total balance, and that the remaining seemingly unpaid amount is from a scholarship. But do they listen? …No. Morons. Bureacracies…let’s just do away with them all, shall we?

Ah, yes. I’m getting a $50.00 “Deferred Payment Plan” fee; only I’m not on the Deferred Payment Plan. Gotta write them a goddamn letter today 'cause I know that if I just call, they can always say later on that they never heard of me. I mean, it’s not like it’s huge money, but why should I have to pay for a mistake?

Grrrr.

I have the misfortune of going to a state school. I like my school, but hand-to-hand combat with a large school Bureaucracy and a state Bureaucracy drives me nuts. Regardless, I think we’ve got the tuition payment issues worked out. All it’s taken is 4 days, 4 seperate phone calls, and one missed class (so I could sit at home and wait for them to get back to me) And I’m trying to give them money!

Now, while we’re talking about fees, I’m being charged an International Learning Fee. But I’m a slack-jawed yokel Southern boy that’s never even been out of the U.S., so I’m not an international student…and I’m not going to study abroad…so what the hell is it?

And yes, Student Accounts person, it is odd that you charge my card and don’t credit it to my account. That’s why I’m calling you. She reminded me of those tech support accounts…“It should work.” “But it doesn’t” “Well…it SHOULD!”

I’ve had a few interesting run-ins with the university fees department recently.

I’d deferred my place, and then I decided to come back second semester. Late in the first semester I took a 10 hour train/coach trip up to Canberra to specifically sort out all the annoying administrivia that needed to be done. I thought I’d managed to get it all done. Boy was I wrong.

When I came back and tried to enrol, my account was “frozen”, meaning I had to beg the student administrator in writing and pay AU$100 if I wanted to enrol. However, I couldn’t have possibly enrolled before the date they asked me to, as I needed to get lecturer’s signatures to waive prerequisites so I could enrol. I eventually managed to get the $100 fine waived after much hassle.

Then on the 28th of July I got a letter DATED 24th of July, that said I had to pay my general services fee by the 18th of July. When I went over to the student administration building, they told me that because I hadn’t paid before the 18th of July I would have to pay a $100 fine. I showed him the back-dated invoice I had been sent, and he told me that if I wouldn’t pay the fine I would have to write to the student administrator. I eventually got out of this fine too, but not before having gone through 3 officials who said that I should have to pay the fine on the backdated invoice! Argh!!!

And while I’m bitching about Uni accounts and fees, I should mention that I’m paying AU$0.15 per mb for internet access. Oh, and the university so kindly gives me 5mb a day down in the computer labs.