My conglomeration of stories...as promised

[Andara Bledin]

It's not that hard . . I pay the electric bill for Mom all the time. She tells me or gives me the bill, I make out the check and take it into the payment center if I don't do it online.

When I took over the bill payments at the last place I was living, I just logged into my mom's account and took care of everything online. No muss, no fuss, no needing any of her info beyond her login, which was the same as every other login she has.

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[RecoveringKinkoid]

Wait, I'm confused. How can you take a payment but can't tell her the amount? How can she make a payment then?

[SCSlave]

It never ceases to amaze me how people react to service being turned off due to nonpayment. WHY act all shitty about it? THEY did it...not the big bad electric company/cable company!

And yes...people are damned serious about their cable. I had the misfortune of working in a cable call center a few years ago...and it was the most miserable time of my life. Death threats were the norm..."If you don't turn on my cable I will come down there and stab you!' OK...great...Mr. Smith at 123 Main street...whos Social Security Number is 123-45-6789....you have my first name..good luck finding me. Dumbass. (Of course...right after the threat we notified the police in their area....) Funny how people think they can call in and threaten people's lives without consequence. I had one ELDERLY lady call in upset her cable was out and the Superbowl was the next day. I said I'd send a tech out asap...and svcs would be restored in time for her to see the Superbowl. That wasn't good enough...she said "If it's not on in an hour I will blow your head off" O....k... Then shortly after that...her husband called in and threatened to blow the entire building up then he would kill himself if the cable wasn't on soon. That's when the police were notified.

The kicker....the techs were on their way to their house after my phone call. When the second call came in, our tech supervisor called the tech and told him to turn around...do not go to that house. So instead of the tech knocking on their door....it was the police. Stupid F'ing People.

[myswtghst]

It never ceases to amaze me how people react to service being turned off due to nonpayment. WHY act all shitty about it? THEY did it...not the big bad electric company/cable company!

That would be exactly what I can't get over. You did it to yourself. You didn't pay your bill, and you knew full well that electricity/cable/internet/etc was not free, so why did you think they would "have" to keep it on? What part of nonpayment do you not understand?

By the by, if you think it's ok to not pay your bill for several months simply because you don't have the funds, why is it so upsetting and wrong that they can't have it back on immediately since they simply don't have the techs?

[Becks]

SL: BUT WHAT IF MY HOUSE IS ON FIRE!?!?!
CW: ... ... IS your house on fire?
SL: NO, but it COULD BE. What would I do!??!
CW: ... Well, ma'am, if your house is on fire I would hope you would call the fire department.

Good answer!!!!!

My ex and I lived without cable for months.

I've been without cable (for the most part) for nearly 4 years now. Yes, there are times when I miss it a lot, but I've lived. OK, I've existed.

[protege]

I don't have cable where I'm living now--haven't had it in a year! However, the local reception sucks, and DSL isn't much better...so I've been looking at getting it

[Andara Bledin]

Wait, I'm confused. How can you take a payment but can't tell her the amount? How can she make a payment then?

Privacy issues.

If a person has the account number, they can make a payment on that account. The person taking the payment can do nothing but accept the funds and apply them to that account, which may or may not be enough to cover the current amount due.

Only the account holder and any person they designate specifically should ever be able to get any information from customer service.

And this really should go for any type of account, anywhere. I don't care if it's a bank account, utility account, gaming account, what have you.
stupid XBox Live call center people...

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