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I have been trying to get another deferment from OSAP ... Ontario's student loans monster. Anybody who's ever dealt with OSAP knows how much fun this can be ...
I sent them my paystubs from The Mothership ... and waited.
I kept getting auto-generated emails saying "Your application is incomplete." I read the fine print. Oh damn, I'd been collecting unemployment for a while. So I got those records and sent them along.
And waited.
And got more of the auto-generated emails saying "Your application is incomplete."
I got fed up and re-sent the unemployment documents. Over and over and over ...
Which is when I discovered that they have a limit on what you can send them.
And that limit is 50 documents.
And I hit that limit.
And I was STILL getting those auto-generated "incomplete" messages.
Eventually I called them (that is a fun thing in itself ... press 1, press 2, press 3 ... you know the endless drill ...)
"Oh, we don't have your September 1 pay stub from [The Mothership]."
Me:
Me: "But I can't upload anything anymore!"
OSAP drone: "Oh, you can fax it to us. Here's the fax number: blah blah blah."
So I go and fax the thing.
You guessed it: still getting those auto-generated messages.
Another phone call.
OSAP drone: "Oh, well, it can take 4 to 5 days before we get the fax ..."
WTF ... what kind of fax machines have you got?! Do the gerbils need time off or something??
I wait a week and call again.
OSAP drone: "No, there's no record anything has come in ... I'm sorry [and she really did sound sympathetic] but you'll have to fax it again. Write your loan number on the pages and your SIN [Social Insurance Number -- Canada's version of the Social Security Number] as well."
By this time I am pretty much incoherent with rage. When I had the deferment, my credit rating was respectable, if not great. I need at least a respectable credit rating (as far as I know) to get a damned apartment, which I am hearing more and more about from my brother and sister ("We think it'd be really good to put the house on the market in January ...")
And part of the delay was my fault. I get that. But it's the endless mazes that you have to negotiate when dealing with a bloody bureaucracy that were driving me to drink.
Tonight I went back to Staples to fax the pay stub yet again. But before I did, I asked the guy behind the counter if he had a black Sharpie. He did.
I wrote my SIN number and loan number in BIG BLACK LETTERS on the cover page -- twice on the front and once on the back, and of course the back lettering showed through -- and also on the pay stub itself (it was an 8x11 sheet of paper downloaded from The Mothership site so there was a fair amount of room), front and back.
I just barely managed to refrain from also writing "OK YOU BASTARDS HAVE YOU GOT IT NOW?!?!"
A few hours later, at about midnight, I checked my main email address -- just because I always do -- and lo and behold, there was another message from OSAP.
My request for a deferment has been approved.
That's gotta be some kind of speed record.
I can't help wondering what that last OSAP drone wrote on my file after the phone call was over.
I sent them my paystubs from The Mothership ... and waited.
I kept getting auto-generated emails saying "Your application is incomplete." I read the fine print. Oh damn, I'd been collecting unemployment for a while. So I got those records and sent them along.
And waited.
And got more of the auto-generated emails saying "Your application is incomplete."
I got fed up and re-sent the unemployment documents. Over and over and over ...
Which is when I discovered that they have a limit on what you can send them.
And that limit is 50 documents.
And I hit that limit.
And I was STILL getting those auto-generated "incomplete" messages.
Eventually I called them (that is a fun thing in itself ... press 1, press 2, press 3 ... you know the endless drill ...)
"Oh, we don't have your September 1 pay stub from [The Mothership]."
Me:
Me: "But I can't upload anything anymore!"
OSAP drone: "Oh, you can fax it to us. Here's the fax number: blah blah blah."
So I go and fax the thing.
You guessed it: still getting those auto-generated messages.
Another phone call.
OSAP drone: "Oh, well, it can take 4 to 5 days before we get the fax ..."
WTF ... what kind of fax machines have you got?! Do the gerbils need time off or something??
I wait a week and call again.
OSAP drone: "No, there's no record anything has come in ... I'm sorry [and she really did sound sympathetic] but you'll have to fax it again. Write your loan number on the pages and your SIN [Social Insurance Number -- Canada's version of the Social Security Number] as well."
By this time I am pretty much incoherent with rage. When I had the deferment, my credit rating was respectable, if not great. I need at least a respectable credit rating (as far as I know) to get a damned apartment, which I am hearing more and more about from my brother and sister ("We think it'd be really good to put the house on the market in January ...")
And part of the delay was my fault. I get that. But it's the endless mazes that you have to negotiate when dealing with a bloody bureaucracy that were driving me to drink.
Tonight I went back to Staples to fax the pay stub yet again. But before I did, I asked the guy behind the counter if he had a black Sharpie. He did.
I wrote my SIN number and loan number in BIG BLACK LETTERS on the cover page -- twice on the front and once on the back, and of course the back lettering showed through -- and also on the pay stub itself (it was an 8x11 sheet of paper downloaded from The Mothership site so there was a fair amount of room), front and back.
I just barely managed to refrain from also writing "OK YOU BASTARDS HAVE YOU GOT IT NOW?!?!"
A few hours later, at about midnight, I checked my main email address -- just because I always do -- and lo and behold, there was another message from OSAP.
My request for a deferment has been approved.
That's gotta be some kind of speed record.
I can't help wondering what that last OSAP drone wrote on my file after the phone call was over.
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