Somewhat lame rant, but, dammit, I’ve had a crappy morning, so I’m going to vent:
Yesterday my husband called the heating/cooling people to make an appointment to have them look at our heater. No emergency, but we had a problem, and we want it fixed. So he calls, sets up the appointment for 8 a.m. The lady calls to confirm yesterday, says “Hey, I’m calling to confirm your appointment tomorrow at 9 a.m.” I said, “Hmmm, I understood you were coming at 8 a.m.” She said, “Right, I’m calling to confirm your appointment.” I said, “Okay, I’ll see your people here at 8 a.m.,” wanting to make sure that she really meant 8 and not 9. She said okay and hung up. The fucking heating/cooling people show up this morning at 9:15! Goddamn it! My husband had already left for work, asking that I not let them in, which I totally agreed with. After all, if these jackasses want our business, they should at least have the good grace to show up approximately on time - I’m happy if they’re up to 20 minutes late, but fuck - and hour and 15 minutes?
Anyway, I ignored the door when they buzzed, then 15 minutes later their receptionist called to “let you know we’re on our way.” Then 20 minutes later, she called again to say they were on their way. At the third call, she was sounding more and more annoyed. So I picked up the phone, and it was the same woman I had talked to yesterday. I said, “I appreciate you calling; however, the gentleman who was to do the work didn’t show up on time - he was here an hour and 15 minutes late. My husband and I will be taking our business elsewhere. But thank you for calling back.” She got really ticked off, and started arguing with me that she had told me they would be late. I said, trying hard to remain calm, “I seem to recall you calling to tell me you were confirming for 9 a.m., then when I said the appointment was at 8 a.m., you agreed to the time.” She responded with, “Well, I told you they weren’t coming until 9,” and continued to state that, because she had originally called to say 9 a.m., I should have somehow known that the appointment was for 9 a.m., not 8, even though she agreed to that time. What??? So I simply said that I didn’t have to time to argue about the situation, and said goodbye, then hung up.
Then she called my husband at work and told him she had called yesterday and told me they would be late, indicating that I must have failed to give him the message. My husband politely disagreed, then the woman got mad at him, so he said, “Thanks for calling, but I’m taking my business elsewhere,” then dumped the phone.
Fuck. Why the hell would you make an appointment if you have no intention of showing up on time? I don’t expect this lady to bow and scrape before me, but she should have said something after I said I’d see them at 8, such as, oh, I don’t know, “Actually, we can’t make it at 8, it’ll have to be 9, unless you’d like to reschedule.” And then to call my husband when I disagreed with her to “tattle” on me? What’d she expect he’d say, “Yeah, my wife’s kind of an idiot. She probably knew you really meant 9 a.m., but agreed to the 8 a.m. appointment twice on accident. I’ll have to beat her when I get home.” What the fuck? For some reason the whole situation’s driving me batshit - not only did she not tell me they were showing up on time, which wasted at least a half hour of both my and my husband’s time while we waited, she bothered my husband after she got nowhere arguing with me, and she kept interrupting my work when I was on deadline (partly my fault, I know, for not answering the phone)! I fucking hate these people - waiting for them is worse than waiting in the doctor’s office, and arguing with them is even more frustrating.
