Damn 53 bank
Their customer service has gone down 10 fold.

My account was overdrawn abt 2 weeks ago..okay that's my fault, I accept, I get a phone call from someone abt it, I ask him how much its overdrawn by, he tells me, I agree to mail in a check to their Louisville bank since I'm all the way in f**#@$ Boston.

Mail the check and think all my troubles are done. I also include a letter telling them to close my account since I'm tired of maintaining a long distance bank account.

Today, f$#@ Aimee calls me with a cheery voice, telling me I owe them more money even after my check cleared.
I'm confused so I ask to see my account online, we put IT on three way so that they can resolve my issue. ..this is where it gets hilarious.

The IT lady, whoever it was..forgot her name but from her voice I could tell she was old and not married and definately didn't like her job.....she started off by grilling Aimmee...

Aimee:" Hi this is Aimee from 53 bank, I have a customer on the line whose having a problem with his account. "
IT lady: "what's your name?
Amee says her name
IT lady: "Dyu work for 53rd"
Aimee: yes
IT lady: What dept. ?
Aimee: Retail

(meanwhile I'm listening to all this feeling awkward, I can sense the tension rising btwn the two ladies)

Aimee: We have a customer on the line
IT lady: I know, but I just didn't know who u are, u did not properly identify urself so I had to make sure
Aimee: well, I didn't feel like going thru all that with customer on the phone

(a mini-bitch fight ensues between the two as they try to show each other who has more power and save face infront of customer-> me...meanwhile, I could care less abt their egotistical nonsense..all I wanted was my bill to be cleared. )

Finally, Aimee caves in and gets off the line, very heated ....at that point I'm glad I don't have to deal with her again.
IT lady is a bitch towards me (transfered anger from Aimee) and offers little help.

I call back 53 --- 502 589 4165 hoping to speak to someone that was not going through an anger session and thank God, I get Scott...53 Financial District. I'm thankful to be speaking with someone normal for once.
Then Scott tells me to hold so that he can see what he can do for me, I feel re-assured.
5 secs later , a lady picks the other line and says "Hello!"

Oh no! It's crazy Aimee again. And she already sounds pissed at being embarrassed infront of me from earlier on. Before we even had our conversation, I knew what the outcome was going to be.
I'm heated that I'm gonna have to throw a couple of hundreds down the drain, but at the same time, the memory of Aimee and IT lady's cat fight is priceless.

What is EASSY?
The Eastern Africa Submarine Cable System (EASSy) is an initiative to connect countries of eastern Africa via a high bandwidth fibre optic cable system to the rest of the world. EASSy is planned to run from Mtunzini in South Africa to Port Sudan in Sudan, with landing points in six countries, and connected to at least five landlocked countries – who will no longer have to rely on expensive satellite systems to carry voice and data services.
The project, funded by the World Bank and the Development Bank of Southern Africa, was initiated on January 2003, when a handful of companies investigated its feasibility. Although the African Development Bank and various governments have pledged financial support, funding has yet to be fully resolved.

Issues:
As always with any sensible project idea in Africa, there have been subtantial delays that have not only discouraged participating govts. and investors, but also the World Bank. When will we ever get our shit straight?
So at the moment Kenya is thinking of pulling out.
What does that mean?
Uganda , Rwanda and other landlocked countries are basically screwed as the cable was to pass through Kenya.

Personal thought: Just by looking at the website www.eassy.org. This whole project looks sketchy.... something that beaurocrats put together in order to spend more tax money enjoying meetings in different countries and achieving absolutely nothing.
I may be wrong, let' s wait and see what comes out of it

This was an interesting forward that I just had to post for the rest of the world to know since I know for sure everyone suffers from these telemarketers.

Three Little Words That Work !!

(1)The three little words are: "Hold On, Please..."

Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt.

Then when you eventually hear the phone company's "beep-beep-beep" tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task.

These three little words will help eliminate telephone soliciting.


(2) Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?

This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone.


This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a "real" sales person to call back and get someone at home.

What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible This confuses the machine that dialed the call and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer !!!

(3) Junk Mail Help:
When you get "ads" enclosed with your phone or utility bill, return these "ads" with your payment. Let the sending companies throw their own junk mail away.

When you get those "pre-approved" letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope.

Most of these come with postage-paid return envelopes, right? It costs them more than the regular 37 cents postage "IF" and when they receive them back.

It costs them nothing if you throw them away! The postage was around 50 cents before the last increase and it is according to the weight. In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-paid return envelopes.

One of Andy Rooney's (60 minutes) ideas.
Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send a pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them their blank application back!
If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them.

You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them 37 cents.

The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the mail, but folks, we need to OVERWHELM them. Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!

Let's help keep our postal service busy since they are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, and that's why they need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea !

If enough people follow these tips, it will work ---- I have been doing this for years, and I get very little junk mail anymore.