All Narfed Up photography and words by Bryan Villarin

I’m expecting a package that was supposed to be delivered by FedEx yesterday, March 12th. They “tried”, but nobody was here. “Customer not available or business closed.” Lies! My mom was home at 4:47pm and she didn’t hear anything.

Today, March 13th at 3:52pm, I’m home. I check the FedEx tracking number a little after 4pm, and I get the same message.

Erroneous!

I called customer support and told them what happened. The address was verified correctly, so that wasn’t the problem. She notated the complaint, which doesn’t help the situation at all. I want justice.

Since they can’t deliver in a timely manner, I offered to drive to Hacienda Heights to pick it up. Nope, they closed at 4pm. Plus, if I wanted to pick it up, they’d have to notate it to the terminal, which would take 24-48 hours. Wait a minute - are they using pigeons to send messages back and forth?

Ridiculous. FedEx, stop giving me problems and do your job.

Someone on Flickr added me as a contact — and promptly removed me — knowing very well that I’d get notified about the new contact.

Not cool and very sleazy.

I had one of his photos faved, but not anymore. You’re on my bad list. Good day. I said good day!

I tried three Redbox codes tonight that should have worked: NEWYEAR, OOPS, and HDU942. They all expire at midnight. But, none of them worked.

I already complained to Redbox after NEWYEAR didn’t work. Then, they sent all Redbox users an apology email and a new code: OOPS.

Redbox, fix the system. I don’t care that it’s a buck a night, but don’t give away free codes that don’t even work.

This could be a stretch, but the following sentence (or any variance of it) bugs me:

“Would you be kind enough to…yadda yadda yadda?”

This applies to anyone. I’d like to think I’m a nice guy, and that I love helping people whenever I can. Don’t decorate the question — be upfront and ask me! Elaborating the question is wasting the valuable seconds I could’ve already been helping you. If they ask why, then you can butter ‘em up!

Last October, I bought some Power Strip Liberators from Cyberguys. Cool. Not cool? Mid-December, I emailed Cyberguys to opt out of the magazine catalog subscription because I’m don’t read paper catalogs. I’ve gotten two since my initial request. C’mon, figure it out!

Other than that, they reply to email very promptly and seem pretty nice. No sarcasm intended.

Update 11:48am: Apparently, I had duplicate entries in their database. It’s been fixed. I shouldn’t get anymore catalogs. Yay!

I think I got banned from a lot of Counter-Strike servers earlier today. Why?

I was itching for some fy_iceworld2 (a map with no real purpose except to kill each other). I found one with a small number of players, but ended up going 1-on-1 with some other guy. I killed him 4 times in a row. Not sure what the rules were, but that was it. I didn’t get any error message, Counter-Strike just “ended” on me. No warning, and he didn’t chat with me.

To be honest, I’m not even that good. I guess I picked the wrong guy to kill 4 times in a row. He probably was an admin. (They should do background checks on those guys.)

I’m in good standing on the VAC server. I asked for help at Steam-powered Support.

Ridiculous. It’s amazing that so many people continue to play Counter-Strike, compared to all the other Steam games available.

Thoughts? Do you agree? Am I a geeky dork for wanting to play this game again? Lemme hear ya!

Update: I got a reply 16 hours later and was directed to an FAQ article titled “Admin Slowhacking.” That did the trick. Thanks JeffH!

On Saturday night, I moved all my clocks at home an hour forward for Daylight Saving Time. I thought my cell phone would update itself. (Oh yeah, it’s also my alarm clock.) I was almost late for church the following morning.

Lesson: Power your cell phone off and on to adjust the clock.

When I ordered my external hard drive, I opted with FedEx this time. I wasn’t home when they tried, but rather than trying a neighbor, they took it back to the sorting facility to try again. I wasn’t going to be home the following day, so I called and asked if they could just hold for pickup. I’d just go a bit out of my way on the way to work, really because I wanted my new gadget!

So what happened? The phone call that was made the night before, assuring me that they’d hold it for me, was all lies. I got there about 9am, and they said the driver left with it at 6:45am. What about the phone call less than 12 hours ago? Apparently it didn’t get onto the system until 8:30am. What!?! I didn’t even get an apology from the clerk at the front desk. (No, I don’t know what they’re called, and I don’t care.)

FedEx Customer Rep: The driver left with it, so you’ll have to come back tomorrow. *silence*

Me: Um, okay. *walks out*

No apologies. I was furious. Back on the road, I called the 800-number, and told the CS of the situation. He basically summarized what I already knew. (Duh, I just told them I was there.) I asked if he could get the driver to deliver to my neighbor, and that worked out okay. But even from him, no apologies.

In the end, my neighbor got my package, and I’ve been messing with the external hard drive since then. I just don’t understand how FedEx could mess things up for me, make me go more out of my way than I should have, without offering any sort of apology. If they said “sorry,” I would’ve been okay with it. It wasn’t that one person’s fault…hopefully. That isn’t too much to ask for, and it’s bad how big corporations like that lose the personal touches that everyone craves. Touches? I don’t know how to put it.

I talked about Newegg over here, but I think it’s worth mentioning again. (Back? Good!)

Today, UPS attempted to deliver my package again. My complaint is that their InfoNotice slip stated that they would try again after 5:00pm today. When I got home, I checked online to find that they came at 3:46pm.

Having called UPS, I have to ask Newegg to call UPS to give me permission to pickup my package that I’ve already paid for. Shouldn’t I be able to change the delivery address to have them hold it for pickup? C’mon, what do I need to do to be heard? Hello?

Oh yeah, did I mention that I’m not going to go through UPS anymore? I find that terrible service. Tell me one thing, do another. Good grief.

Update 12/6/2005 11:30pm: I missed the final attempt to deliver. Called the 1-800 number, verified that I’d pick it up in the morning from the distribution center, and went on my way for the evening. I got home a couple hours ago only to find out that it’s been returned to sender. What? I’m ticked. I finally got through to a human, and he left a message (or something) at that distribution center about my package, and they should be calling in the morning before 10am. My package better not be going back to Newegg. It’s not like I’m refusing the package. I’ve called after every attempt.

Update 12/7/2005 8:36am: I called the 1-800, despite the promise last night that someone should call me before 10am. (They still have an hour and a half before I get enraged.) The website says the package is in transit, but it’s in Cerritos now - that’s why I called. But, the customer rep says it’s being returned to the shipper. So ridiculous! I found this ranting thread about UPS at Broadband forums, and I think I’ll be going with FedEx from now on. Good job, UPS. Terrible service. No, I’m not exaggerating - I’d say this is thoroughly documented, wouldn’t you? Anyways, I sent an email to Newegg last night…whoa, wait a minute - that was two days ago! I haven’t even got a reply yet! They definitely need a phone call now.

Update 12/7/2005 8:58am: I called Newegg and spoke to Mark. Basically, he suggested not to do it through UPS because of what happened, and to just use FedEx because they could leave it at my doorstep. I’d get credited for that order in 3-5 business days (argh), so I need to reorder again. Great. I’m upset at Newegg now because they didn’t reply to my email. For businesses in general, you need to get back to your customers in 24 hours, at least that you received the email and will be getting in touch soon.

So for now, I’m over this. Lesson: Don’t use UPS unless you’re a business, or if someone’s going to be home at all times.

Do you have any insight? Please leave a comment!

How do I clean and run maintenence on over 75 computers running Windows XP, that are also housing multiple accounts on each system? One by one? (You know, making sure they don’t have extraneous programs, cleaning temporary internet files and cookies, stuff like that.)