Am I being an SC I've got to know - long post

[the lawsmeister]

Guys, I'm really losing it today. But I have to know am I being unreasonable?

The back of our house was soaked as the result of major storms and a damaged roof on Saturday.
I've lost 3 book cases and a large printed picture, my CD tower is damaged as is a chest of drawer, bedside and a cabinet. The rest of our stuff is piled in the middle of the room so it doesnt get any wetter.
Landlord's agency said nothing could be done to the roof until it stopped raining but sent carpet cleaners to suck the water out of the carpets. I've had to pull the fuses for this half of the house as the water was coming down the insides of walls that have power points and light switches on them. I was told as soon as the rain stopped a roofer and electrician would come out.
Sunday morning the rain has stopped, so I call the agency again, get their answering machine. They're closed on sunday. I manage to get hold of one of the sales agents on their mobile who will call the rental manager. about 5 hours later I get a call back saying that nothing can be done in the rain (by now its started again) and the soonest anyone can come is tuesday (monday was a public holiday)
So I've had extension leads running from the front half of the house (where my housemates live) since saturday with fans, heaters and a dehumidifyer running pretty much 24 hours a day.
Its now tuesday. Nobody called me by 11am so I called again, told roofer is on the way. He turns up 30 min later & fixes a few tiles. Says there's still a little water but it will dry and he's gone by midday. So I call the agents again, tell them the roof guy has been and ask them to call the electrician and then let me know when he's coming. They say they'll call me back. I call again at 3:30 and ask when the electrician is coming. They say that they'll call me back. 4:45 I call again and ask whats going on. They say they'll call me back. about 5:10 they call and tell me the electrician will phone shortly. He calls at 5:20 and he tells me that nothing can be done now that its dark. The tests that he needs to run are better when there's light to see what's going on.
I asked when the agency informed him of my problems and he said that they only called him 10-15 minutes ago!!
So potentially if they'd phoned him earlier in the day he may have been able to check the wiring today
I called the agency back and got their voicemail so I called the rental manager's mobile and she's pretty much says sorry, nothing we can do, they'll come out tomorrow. So everthing stays piled up in the middle of the room so he will be able to access all the switches in the morning.

The storms really bad around this area and I know that there's people who are a lot worse off than me. I keep trying to tell myself that I've been quite lucky to have lost so little when people have lost so much more. I've tried had not to be an SC, I've tried to be polite and not get angry and I succeeded for most of the day until I found out that no-one had called the electrician. If they had called him at midday and he said that he couldn't come today at least I would have known. I could have gone to work or somthing. But whenever I called to see when he was coming I was just told they'd call me back. Am I right to be upset.

sorry for the ramble guys, just feeling a bit miserable and sorry for myself at the moment.

[cinema guy]

You have my sympathies. There's nothing like a water ruining you property to piss you off. Nobody else quite understands how desperately you want to get things fixed, so everything seems just too slow. And you can't yell at the electrician because its not his fault. It so

On the brightside, at least you are renting you won't have to pay for the repairs. If it was your house, it would all be coming out of your pocket.

[the lawsmeister]

thanks Cinema Guy.

I'm not cross with the electrician, just the agency for not calling him until it was too late to do anything.

At least my insurance should cover the cost of replacing my book cases and other furniture. Just have to keep reminding myself that it could have been worse.

[Alfie]

I'm sorry that you have been badly affected by the storms, and I think in that respect it is fair enough that you are feeling frustrated by how the agents are handling your property.

Am I right to assume that you are in Australia, in the Hunter Valley region? (Or somewhere near there?)- For anyone who doesn't know, there are parts of Australia which have had severe storms, and have flooded the area. In some areas, only the roofs of houses are visible from planes, the rest is under water.

Because in that case, I think it is more understandable that the agents may be having so many issues with many of their properties, not just yours. Their office may be absolute mayhem at the moment, and so it may be difficult for them to keep on track with everything they need to be doing for each of their renters.

I think that you just need to stay patient, and hopefully everything will get sorted. It is a difficult time for you, so you definately aren't over reacting, but perhaps think about what the agents may be going through too. I really hope that things get sorted soon though.

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

thanks Cinema Guy.

I'm not cross with the electrician, just the agency for not calling him until it was too late to do anything.

At least my insurance should cover the cost of replacing my book cases and other furniture. Just have to keep reminding myself that it could have been worse.

So far you haven't been a SC yet.

Just remember that the difference between righteous anger and being a SC is that a SC goes right to righteous anger first without exhausting all other avenues of resolution first.

If they're still jerking you around after a couple of days, feel free to do the verbal equivalent of reaching into their body, yanking out the greasy, oily rag of a soul and feeding it headfirst into a cross-cut paper shredder.

M

[cinema guy]

If you were a SC you'd be letting all your frustrations cause you to yell at everyone.

The agency were shut on Sunday and Monday, but it's a holiday and the people who work there are entitled to have a day off. Frustarting for you, sure, but understandable.

The one missed phone call to the electrician, may have been because they have dozens of tenants with problems after the storm, or maybe they themselves had similar problems. Of course when they miss another phone call like that, then you can get angry.

Even then an rightfully angry customer is not a sucky customer.

[Reyneth]

You aren't being an SC.
An SC would have gone off on the electrician as to why he hadn't called before then and all of that. You wondered what happened and found out exactly why he hadn't called.

There's nothing wrong with being persistent and logical about things - which is what you are.
Good luck on getting everything dealt with!