Let me start off by saying welcome firstyears! I was hanging out in Old Dorms on move-in day in an RA friend's room and I was envious of your fresh-faced excitement and move-in glee. Thanks to you all, I now feel decrepit and wizened and, like most old people, I enjoy complaining. What I am going on to rant about doesn't concern you or those who live on Grounds, but I am sure that all of us off-Grounders can agree that dealing with the utility companies in Charlottesville is the most frustrating and agonizing ordeal one experiences when moving.
When I was younger, I pictured utilities as the space on a Monopoly board with the whimsically-drawn light bulb that was a pain to land on because you had to pay, but fun to own because you profited from others' suffering. Now I realize Monopoly really was preparing us for the real world because dealing with the power and cable companies is like landing on the light bulb space over and over again. It really sucks.
My roommates and I were thrown into the lion's den upon moving into our apartment when we had to fax a copy of the lease to the power company -- let's just call them "Slowminion" for now. After three attempts at this, we were informed all our information didn't go through, so we faxed them about 30 copies of the lease in various different orders to be sure they received it, which may have provoked them to play dirty and get revenge for jamming their fax machine.
Alas, one morning we awoke to no fans, lights or AC and, essentially, no power. My roommate called "Slowminion" and asked politely when we were to expect the power to be turned back on, and she was curtly informed that someone would come within 48 to 72 hours.
Now, at this point, one might start to panic at the thought of being without AIM and Facebook for three days and be prompted to eat the entire contents of his or her freezer before it melted, but I calmly called the company back, figuring I could reason with them. After mustering my most authoritative phone voice after being placed on hold for 20 minutes, I told "Slowminion" that it was unacceptable to be punished without power for three days when we had no idea that what we had actually faxed turned out to be only a "copy" of the lease and not the real thing. You have to wonder at this point what kind of stickler is able to tell the difference between a real lease and a copy of the lease. The "Slowminion" employee with whom I was speaking told me there was nothing I could do, and that she knew that it would "hard," but we'd just have to find somewhere else to stay. My only response was to sputter "This is unacceptable!" several times before hanging up in defeat.
The finding the distinction between sounding angry and mean versus important and respected on the phone is a lost art to me. Luckily, one person I know who has mastered that art is my mother. I know calling your mom for help is kind of lame, especially for someone as old as I, but she's really good at arguing with people she doesn't know and, after all, I am trying to salvage any perks of childhood I have left. My mother calls me back 15 minutes later with "Slowminion" on conference call, having worked her special motherly "I mean business" magic, and they inform us that they can turn the power back on later in the day. I obviously did not inherit persuasive phone manner from her.
The company then informs me and my roommates that in order to turn the power back on, we must switch the circuit breakers off in our apartment before someone can come to reinstall it. Following inspection of every room, we realize there aren't circuit breakers in the apartment. We call our realty company who informs us that the circuit breakers are on the side of our building and that "Slowminion" shouldn't have turned our power off in the first place. It becomes clear that neither higher authority knows what it's talking about. This story does have a happy ending. Once we found our circuit box out of the 10 or so located on the back of the building, "Slowminion" finally gave us back our power. But it just goes to show that the companies have no respect for us college students, at least until the mothers get involved. And of course I could go on and on about the evils and inconveniences wrought by a certain cable company, but I will resist, and only mention that they just sent my roommate a bill for $1.85. We are tempted to pay it in Monopoly money.
Mary's column runs bi-weekly on Wednesdays. She can be reached at mbaroch@cavalierdaily.com.
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