1st December 2007

Change of address

posted in Frustration, OmegaMom, The Move |

When you move 4,000 miles away from your old abode, your address changes in lots of far-flung places.

So, in this age of the wonder that is the intertubes, you sit down at your computer once you have sorted out all the details (like, say, where you’re going to live, and what your phone number is going to be), crack your fingers in a semi-macho display, poise the hands over the keyboard like Leonard Bernstein, lift a hand…

…and type http://www.bofa.com…

…and Hey Presto! you’re there, you answer a few security questions that no-one else is ever going to know (your father-in-law’s middle name is not exactly common, nor is it exactly common knowledge outside your spouse’s circle), and voila, you have happily changed your primary address and phone number and your bank statements are now delivered to your bank-o-mailboxes at your new address by the postal person and you’re happy.  Well, kinda.

You do the same with a variety of services.

All on the web.

All nice and easy.

All using Sekrit Kwestshuns with Sekrit Ansers that only you know.

And you go along with your life, merrily having a grand ol’ time trying to adjust to life in your new abode.

Then one day you discover Etsy.  Some wicked woman lists some artists in her “gifts for less than $50″ blog post, and you foolishly click on the links, and you are in love and you MUST.  HAVE.  THESE.  THINGS.  NOW.  (Especially since you are trying to decorate a new house, and counteract the continually shrinking amount of sunlight by scattering Bright Things around the house.)

Now, Etsy allows you to use PayPal.

You have a nice small amount in your PayPal account, due to your previous go-round with blog ads (and you wistfully hope that your new go-round with blog ads will prove as pleasantly pseudo-lucrative).  So you decide to purchase your new treasures using PayPal.

There’s a little note at Etsy when you select PayPal to pay; it says to be sure your shipping address in PayPal is the correct one.  So you schlep over to PayPal’s website, knowing you haven’t changed your address, so maybe it’s time to change it.

And you think you’ve done it, and order your Glittering Things, and the shipping address that shows up is not your new address.

So you scratch your head.  “Say what?!  Dayum.  I know I changed that address.  Hunh.  Maybe I need to change the address that’s marked as the main address.” 

You are in a maze of twisty, turny passages that all look alike.

You are in a maze of turning, twisty passages, all looking alike.

You are in a maze of twisting, turning passages that all look alike.

First you add an address.  That works.  Then you add a phone number and an email address.  That works.

Then you try to make the new address your primary address and delete the old one.  You get a page that says they will contact you with a Sekrit Code so you can confirm the changes.

They will contact you at your primary phone number, which is not the new phone number you just added.

OR…

They will contact you at your mailing address.  Which just happens to be the old mailing address.

OR…

You can select “Other”, which brings you to a page where they say to contact Customer Service at this particular phone number.

So after trying a few go-rounds (surely there’s a way to get your new address and/or new phone number to appear in the drop-down??), you grit your teeth in frustration and call the phone number (which is not toll-free).

You get a nice pleasant-sounding computerized voice.  You follow its instructions.  You select the “change customer address and/or phone number” option.  You get a voice message that says…

“Did you know you can change your address and phone number on our website?  We’ll be sending you instructions on how to do this to your email.”

See OmegaMom.

See OmegaMom’s eyes bug out.

See OmegaMom turning red.

See OmegaMom start howling.

See OmegaMom jump up and down in frustration, just like her five-year-old daughter does.

See OmegaMom go wash dishes to get away from her frustration.

See OmegaMom sit down at the computer once again to try to figure out how to contact a real, live human being who might be able to help her do something that LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS OF PAYPAL CUSTOMERS MUST WANT TO DO, JUST LIKE HER!!!

Now, really.  Banks do it.  Utilities do it.  Lots of places that are just as needful of security measures as PayPal do it OVER THE INTERNET.  Without all this rigamarole.  Why the fuck can’t PayPal?!?!

I just want to be able to use my “OmegaMom fund” to be able to buy myself some kewl artwork.  Is this too much to ask?

Grrrr.

So I’ve sent an email to their help desk.  Now I have to wait until Monday to be contacted.  The Kozmik All is no doubt arranging, right now, for the person at PayPal to ignore my offered new phone number and new email addresses, and try to call my old phone number.  ARRGGGHHHHHHH!!!

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 1st, 2007 at 1:37 pm and is filed under Frustration, OmegaMom, The Move. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

There are currently 10 responses to “Change of address”

  1. 1 On December 1st, 2007, WrapAroundSam said:

    Here I thought the smoke and lights I saw in the north were the Aurora and a snow squall. Now I know better…Good luck!!! I’ve been doing a bit of watching from the sidelines and admire you, your hubby, and the little one. Tough to pull up stakes and move to the god forsaken wilderness, is it not?

  2. 2 On December 1st, 2007, del said:

    You’re not the only blogger having trouble with paypal’s security measures:

    http://www.windley.com/archives/2007/11/paypal_really_makes_me_mad.shtml

  3. 3 On December 1st, 2007, Johnny said:

    The scary part is you can’t be _absolutely_ sure that the “paypal” site you’re visiting for confirmation or change of data is a true one or a phishing site. Thus, I ran my paypal account down to zero $ and haven’t used it in over a year.

  4. 4 On December 1st, 2007, noreen said:

    I never have the computer smarts to sorta figure this sort of thing out. I just get frustrated, swear, cry, write letters railing against the lack of person-to-person contact(this is all in my head) to someone (I never quite know who), and then take 24 hours and settle down. And yes, I’ve had great problems with Paypal and was beginning to think it was a hoax, or at least a joke. Best of luck with figuring out whatever it is that needs to be figured out. If you ever really need a shoulder to gripe on about this kind of thing, I’m all shoulder.

  5. 5 On December 1st, 2007, kris said:

    i changed my paypal account last year when we moved and i don’t remember it being that hard. i know it worked because i have used it a lot since we moved. maybe they changed how you do it now. if so i am glad i got my change in before!

  6. 6 On December 1st, 2007, figlet said:

    Paypal makes me insane. So insane that I now have 4 different Pay Pal accounts but can only get 1 of them to work. I’m sorry you got lost in the borg. It’s infuriating.

  7. 7 On December 1st, 2007, D said:

    Don’t get me (or K2, for that matter) started on Paypal customer service. Or more specifically the absolute complete lack thereof. I so want to like them. And when everything works, things are great. But behold if you ever need customer support. Because you changed addresses and phone number (as you experienced), or because something was charged twice by mistake (K2) or charges are randomly refused (K2, again), or arbitrary charges are added (me) or a foreign vendor makes a mistake, charges you 10x what they were supposed to charge and immediately refunds the amount - and Paypal charges you 4% (2% per conversion) of that 10x charge for conversion fees… which now is 40% of the ‘real’ charge (me again). ARRRRGGGGGHHHHH.

    See, I told you not to get me started…

  8. 8 On December 2nd, 2007, kate said:

    Know what I did?

    Signed up for a whole new Paypal account.

    Now, I know you said you had money in yours, so I’m sure you want to stick with it. But I didn’t. And I wanted something from Etsy. And I needed to change my address and I got stuck in the twisty, turny maze.

    So I signed up for a new one. They can bite me.

  9. 9 On December 2nd, 2007, Mrs Figby said:

    Ugh, that is SO maddening!

    So if you wanted to let certain people who might want to send you a Christmas card know what your new address is, you could just send those people an email and there would be no annoying maze of Internet hell. Hint, hint.

  10. 10 On December 4th, 2007, OmegaMom said:

    [...] PalPal change-of-address rant garnered many similar complaints.  The one that really caught my eye, though, was Del’s [...]

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