Look to the south for that answer, you 51st-stater.
My rant - why does the DOT send out renewals 90 days in advance. Listen, money grabbing a-holes, there is no reason to send annual (vehicle registration) or every four years (license) so far in advance. They are not major expenses (<$40 for DL) that most people need to plan & budget for a long time to pay. Of course, I, like everyone else I know gets it & doesn't pay a bill due so far out, & then promptly forgets about it. I drove past the DMV this morning & thought I better look at my license...it is expired so I renewed it online in about two mins. They had *six* questions - do you want to donate to this charity or that fund,; $3 or $5 each but saying yes adds $26 to a $39 bill.
-* We have annual vehicle renewals; there is an option to renew for two years at double the cost of the one year price. There is absolutely no discount. Although it’s not a lot, the time value of money states that I shouldn’t prepay the extra year, instead investing it in something safe & earning a whopping penny or two. Further, if you part with that car for any reason in the first year (stolen, totaled, sold) you don’t get any refund. Given there’s an easy to use online portal, I’m not even saving the cost of postage if I wanted to was dumb enough to take the two year registration option.
We have a similar 1 or 2 year registration option with no volume discount.
What you save is the “convenience fee” for paying online by CC. And you save having to fuss with it next year. And you save a second postage stamp if you pay by mail. All of those savings are worth more than a year’s interest on e.g. $40.
Shhh, don’t give 'em any ideas because, as of now, there is no fee for paying online.
Also, registration & inspection are supposed to expire at the same time; somehow mine are months apart. There is a windshield sticker that shows when inspection expires so there is some visual reminder to that one.
Was crossing the road on my bicycle on Saturday in full view of 800+ friends and neighbors and tried to do the cool leg-over rolling dismount, forgetting about the flags zip tied to my rack. Ate spectacular shit and now have to move out of state and start over under an assumed name…
Did the entire Amazon service really go tits up the day I put in my regular coffee order? Expected overnight, turned to, “should be there by 11:00”, and now the site is just completely borked.
On Saturday i received a Facebook message from a descased friend. once my heart stated up agi i sent of a profanity filled message to the scammer. they responded back “what do you mean? this is her son!” I messaged back agin that she was dead, she had no sons and that i hoped he would rot in hell for his attempt to scam people. that was bad enough but I guess I shouldnt have answered back becasue Sunday i started getting fraudulant charges on my debit card. My banks Fraud dpartment casught if froze my card, we disputed the fraudulent charges, they canceled my card. a bunch of purchases I had made over the weekend bounced. Ihad to locate those vendors and rovide an alternative method of payment and then go to my bank to get a new card and then update everything. I still hope they rot in hell. I miss my friend.
Not to brag excessively, but I live in a country that not only has free health care, but in a province that (as of a couple of years ago) no longer has registration fees for private vehicles. For a year or two they required a no-cost online renewal, but then some bureaucrat realized that this was pointless, so that was cancelled, too. So now you have your license plates, and that’s the end of it forever!
The only ongoing plague here in Ontario is that the government hasn’t taken over auto insurance, hence my rants above about the bloodsucking motherfuckers who still prevail here.
Ya gotta love the caution I got from a previous insurance rep (same company, different agent) after a home insurance claim for roof repair due to an extraordinarily rare hail storm. “Your insurance rates will go up if this happens again”. Yes, thank you, insurance moron. I will make sure that I don’t cause a hail storm again!
Three different times I’ve had someone deceased try to reach out to me (but not through their actual account, but through a new account that copied the original person’s name, pictures, and so on, trying to ask me to add them to my friend list). What I did each time was report the account as a fraudulent account trying to imitate someone, and in their form when they asked how I know it’s fake, I point out that the person they are imitating is dead. It seems that it works because each time that fake account vanished.
Simply replying to someone in Facebook Messenger is not going to compromise your account. You had to have given them information or at least clicked on a link they sent you. It’s very possible that it is a coincidence that your card was compromised shortly after this person contacted you, unless you did do something in that interaction to compromise yourself.
Just replying in text to a person to yell at them in a chat doesn’t do anything magical.
The mechanic who did the original safety certification on the Camry had the good grace to also fill out the stupid insurance form today, so now I can get comprehensive coverage on it (I’m still declining collision coverage).
Why, when you order something online & you get an (shipping) email update they can’t just give you the tracking # in that email? Why the heck to I need to log on to their site to get such secure & valuable information like a tracking # showing there a package coming from {somewhere} to my home address? I got an email from Etsy that my shipping date & estimated delivery date are both today. Hmmm??? Instead of giving me a tracking # so I can just go to the website of the chosen shipper & enter said tracking # I need to log on to their site to get that info first.
That’s weird, but the few times I bought things from Etsy, it was from a seller outside of the country, and delivery was days or even weeks away. I did get a link for tracking once it shipped.
But I get what you mean about having to go into their site and sign in. Even that tracking link from Etsy takes you to their web site where you have to log in. They’re not the only place that does that, I’ve certainly bought things from other web sites where you have to actually go into their web site to get the tracking info. It’s clunky. I like how Amazon does it, where they will give you the real tracking number in the shipping notification email if it’s from a major carrier like FedEx, UPS, or USPS. (Obviously, if Amazon is delivering it themselves you have to go to their web site because they are the delivery service.)
It also sucks that the last time I bought stuff from Etsy, the first couple of things I wanted to buy I couldn’t, because they won’t ship to the US anymore thanks to Trump’s insane tariffs making it unprofitable to ship here.
I guess I’m coming down with something because I feel like the walking dead. Worst possible timing as I have a federal grant due Friday.
And I can’t find the fucking hours to work on it. I had to sleep a little more after I dropped off my son because I was useless. Got the computer booted up and the network is down. Now I have to eat lunch. Then I have to leave at 3:20pm to pick my son up at school.
Then tomorrow another fucking leadership meeting. These meetings are a waste of my goddamn time especially when I’m on a deadline. That one I’m going to see if I can be excused from.
And I yelled at my kid this morning because he kept messing with a half empty soda cup in my car after I told him not to, resulting in him spilling soda all over my change repository (as in, coins.) Now I have to wash the fucking coins. And somehow in the middle of all that, something set off my car alarm, in the middle of the school parking lot. And I didn’t know how to turn it off at first it was so embarrassing and I still have no idea how it happened.
People armed with tracking numbers and destination addresses can redirect the package to somewhere else. Email snooping is real. Somebody who managed to skim through a day’s output of Etsy or Target shipping updates could have quite a shopping spree diverting packages already in flight right to their own drop off point, not the customers’.
Is that a real threat? Or just paranoia on the part of e-commerce houses? Doesn’t much matter; businesses are often paranoid about stuff that’s unrealistic, while cavalier about real security problems in their systems and procedures.
Different idea:
If I (e.g. Etsy or Target) send you all the info in an email, you can go right to FedEx or UPS to check on your package. Nice for you, but you can’t make an impulse purchase from me there.
OTOH, if I send you a tracking update and you have to hit my e-commerce site to retrieve the real tracking info to use at UPS or FedEx, I’ll get a chance to show you my daily specials, various teasers that folks who bought this also bought that, etc. Ka-ching.
Remember, you’re not a customer who’s always right. Instead you’re a sheep to be herded, corralled, then fleeced. The guys with shears are very good.
I still hope they rot in hell. I miss my friend.