(On a Saturday afternoon, I spend my time online shopping for Christmas presents. The card I use is issued by my bank. Come Monday, I attempt to make another purchase, this time at the mall, only to be told my card is declined. As it’s after my bank’s closing time, I can’t do anything to fix this right away, so instead, I double-check the Saturday purchases to ensure the payments went through, which they did. During the check, I also notice my checking account is frozen, so I dig into that, as well, to see if a check I wrote Monday morning cleared, which it did. So, on Tuesday while I’m running errands, I visit my bank to sort this out. Courtesy of what I later deem good fortune, the branch manager handles this personally from the beginning.)

Manager: “We noticed several fraudulent charges on your card, so we cancelled it. And since the card accessed your checking account, we froze it, too.”

(That’s an immediate alarm bell, since there wasn’t even a record of a fraudulent attempt when I reviewed my purchases.)

Me: “Did you? And what were the charges for?”

(The manager proceeds to list all of my purchases from Saturday afternoon, with me interjecting after every one to state I made that purchase. Then, there’s total silence.)

Me: “Was that everything?”

Manager: “Yes.”

Me: “So, there was no fraud.”

Manager: “Yes, there was. See?”

(He proceeds to spin the monitor and show me that every previously-mentioned purchase was labeled as fraud.)

Me: “But I just confirmed these were my purchases.”

Manager: “Right.”

Me: “So, there was no fraud.”

Manager: “Yes, there was. Someone bought…” *and lists the purchases again*

Me: “But those were from me.”

Manager: “Right.”

Me: “So, how is me spending my own money ‘fraud’?”

Manager: “It’s not.”

Me: “…”

Manager: “…”

Me: “Then there were no fraudulent purchases on my card.”

Manager: “Yes, there were!” *aaaand he lists my purchases again*

Me: “So, let’s be clear. There was suspicious activity on my card Saturday.”

Manager: “Right.”

Me: “Rather than reach out to inform me and confirm the charges actually were fraud, you made the decision yourselves, froze my accounts, and cancelled the card while leaving me completely in the dark.”

Manager: “Right.”

Me: “However, you put the holds on only after confirming payment on the suspicious charges; meaning had they actually not been me, you would have allowed a fraudster to obtain those goods on my dime.”

Manager: “R-Right.”

Me: “Then, when I wrote a check on Monday, it cleared with no trouble, despite the freeze on my account.”

Manager: “…”

Me: “I’m going to need you to close my accounts. I no longer believe that my money is safe here.”

(Despite his many pleas, I followed through. Luckily for the bank staff, they were just stupid, not malicious; I don’t know what their superiors did when my complaint made it to their desks, but there were no legal consequences for them to face. The next closest bank I could deposit my money into was about five more minutes away, took me off of my regular route when I ran errands, and didn’t offer rates that were as generous. However, when I made an unusual purchase most systems would flag as suspicious, I was emailed and texted almost instantly to clarify it was me and had no trouble keeping the accounts and cards active.)

This story is part of our crazy-online-shoppers roundup!

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Read the crazy-online-shoppers roundup!

(I’m a producer for a video game publishing company, attending a well-known gaming convention on behalf of my company. We have a few upcoming games on display, and we like to chat with and answer questions for players. A lot of the time, you get questions that might seem sort of silly or naive because people don’t understand the nuts and bolts of what’s actually involved in making a game, but I never mind answering. I’m talking to a guy who is a fan of one of our older games.)

Guy: “I just don’t get why you guys haven’t made a sequel.”

Me: “Well, it would be nice to consider one day if we had a good plan for it! Right now all our resources are tied up in these games, plus a few other projects we haven’t announced yet, but maybe one day!”

Guy: *scoffs* “So, just make it free.”

Me: “The… game you’re talking about?”

Guy: “No, make a free sequel. Free to play.”

Me: “Well, I mean… like I said, we’re committed to other projects right now, so it’ll be some time before we could even consider additional work.”

Guy: *staring at me as if I’m an idiot* “But it would be free.”

Bystander: “Games that are free-to-play still cost money and take time and people and other resources to make, dude.”

Guy: *still looking at me* “But it would be a free game.”

(We went back and forth like this a bit, and being that I was there representing our brand and trying to be professional I couldn’t say what I wanted to which was, “Is this a f****** joke? Are you deliberately messing with me?” To this day, I’m still not sure if he legitimately thought a game being free to play would somehow negate all the human and financial cost required to create it, as if it would be farted out of the ether, but he eventually just walked off looking annoyed. I still love conventions and interacting with fans, but some of them definitely really make you earn that round of drinks at the end of the day.)

(Not long after I move into the city, my family drives over to see how I’ve settled in and take me out to dinner. My dad drives, dropping us off at the restaurant before going to find a parking spot. When he joins us, he tells us he parked at a meter and gave it plenty of quarters. We have a nice dinner, and then my dad leads us to where he parked the car. He gets to it first and sees something that angers him.)

Dad: “Oh, are you kidding me?”

Me: “What?”

Dad: “There’s a parking ticket on the windshield, but there are still ten minutes left on the meter!”

Mom: “Wait, really?”

(Sure enough, there are about ten minutes left on the meter from when my dad originally put money in it. The time stamp on the ticket shows that it was issued about ten minutes before we got there, meaning the ticket was issued with twenty minutes left on the meter! My parents take photos showing the ticket, the meter, and their watches to prove the mistake so they can contest the ticket. After this, they take me back home, and I forget about the whole thing until a few months later when I’m with my mom.)

Me: “Oh, hey, remember back when you got that parking ticket even though there was still time on the meter?”

Mom: “Oh, yes.”

Me: “You contested it, right? What happened?”

Mom: “They wouldn’t admit that the officer was at fault, but they still accepted our appeal.”

Me: “So, they agreed that you shouldn’t have to pay the ticket — the ticket that their officer left for no reason — but it’s still not the officer’s fault somehow.”

Mom: “Yep.”

(Gotta love city parking.)

I’ve been a college professor for a long time now, and I am used to students sleeping in class, or catching a quick nap in a corner, but this one takes the cake.

The classroom for my 8:00 am class was in the library building. Being a library, there were various comfy reading chairs around. I came into my classroom to start setting up for a lecture to find that a random student had shoved two of these chairs together in the back of the room to make a bed and was fast asleep on them. I figured that he would wake up once my students started coming in, so I went on with my setup, making no effort to be quiet, but not being overly loud, either. 

My first couple of students came in. I greeted them as usual. They looked questioningly at the sleeper in the back. I shrugged, “He was here when I got here.” They shrugged back, and we went on preparing for class. By 8:00 am all 30 of my students had arrived and this guy was still snoring in the back. The whole lot of us were sort of giggling at how he could sleep through all the noise. Being of an experimental nature, I decided to start lecturing to see when he woke up.

A full 20 minutes into the lecture, this guy sat up, looking bleary-eyed and tousled, and looked around in confusion. I smiled brightly and said, “Hi! Don’t know if you noticed, but there’s a class going on here. Think you can go sleep somewhere else?” He looked confused for another second, and then staggered to his feet, grabbed his backpack, and stumbled out of the room, still half out of it. This was the point at which the entire class burst out laughing, collectively wondering what the heck had just happened. 

I mean, I know lectures can be boring, but to be dead to the world asleep before I even get in the door?

(As a Christmas present, my girlfriend buys me a wicker swivel rocker to replace an old, rickety chair in my den. For those who have never had a swivel rocker, the box is large enough to use as an office desk, and it contains three pieces: the chair’s wicker frame, the cushions that are placed on said frame, and the base that stands it up and allows swiveling and rocking. The Saturday after we get it, we attempt to put it together correctly. “Correctly” means rotating the swivel mechanism in the base so the slot for the bolt is lined up with the hole in the base proper we’re meant to feed the bolts through. However, this mechanism will not swivel. At all. At first, we assume we just have a bad grip on it, so we attempt to put the chair together by reaching into the top of the base. Though cramped, we are able to do it, but not correctly. The chair is very clearly crooked. This is where the alarm bells are raised. It could be that improper assembly resulted in a crooked chair, or it could mean the swivel mechanism itself is crooked and won’t spin because the base is interfering with it. I choose to take a seat and test this theory. The swivel rocker at my parents’ turns on the slightest pressure in my feet. Attempting to turn in this one, however, gets me nothing. Even as I dig in my heels and lean to different sides — an attempt to see if I could dislodge the swivel mechanism — the only thing I manage to do is slide the chair across the floor. The swivel base definitely doesn’t work. Armed with that knowledge, I call the company. After getting through to a human — I assume a sales rep, because a proper title is never given — the following conversation occurs:)

Me: “I recently acquired one of your swivel rockers, but it doesn’t swivel, so I’d like to return it and get a full refund.”

Sales Rep: “I’m sorry to hear that. Can I interest you in a 70% discount?”

Me: “No. The chair doesn’t swivel. It’s defective. I want to return it.”

Sales Rep: “Okay, I’m sorry you’re unhappy. We can refund that just as soon as we get the product back.”

Me: “So, will you be sending a truck?”

Sales Rep: “No. We don’t have any trucks of our own. We outsource deliveries to [Delivery Company]. You’ll have to drive the product to one of our stores for your refund.”

Me: “And how exactly do you propose I put this gigantic box into my car?”

Sales Rep: “Oh, those are kind of big, aren’t they? Well, why don’t you rent a moving truck?”

Me: “Will [Company] be paying for the truck rental?”

Sales Rep: “Why would we pay for your rental truck?”

Me: “Because you’re the ones who won’t send a truck to pick up your defective merchandise.”

Sales Rep: “Sir, I told you we outsource to [Delivery Company]. Their services aren’t free.”

Me: “Neither is truck rental.”

Sales Rep: “Sir, there… Sir, my supervisor is requesting I transfer the call. Please hold.”

(I don’t even hear one note of the hold music.)

Supervisor: “Mr. [Girlfriend’s Last Name], I’ve reviewed the call. We’ll be calling [Delivery Company] to set up an appointment for a pickup. They’ll call you to confirm the date. Will there be anything else?”

(I assure him we’re done and end the call. It should end there, but sadly, fate is never so kind. One day, I come home and find this message waiting for me on my voicemail.)

Voicemail: “Hi, this is [Delivery Company] calling to confirm a pickup scheduled for [Tomorrow]. Please be home on this date so we can pick up your package. Have a nice day.”

(Did you notice there was no time parameter stating when I can expect them tomorrow? So, as far as I can tell, I have about a six-hour warning that the company is coming tomorrow at any point between midnight and midnight the following day. Good thing I wasn’t scheduled to work tomorrow, anyway. So, I spend the day doing chores around my house and finding ways to occupy my time when those are done. The doorbell rings exactly zero times, there is exactly one knock on my front door — which come when the newspaper hits it — exactly one time my creaky gate swings up — the mail carrier — and no notice stating the driver has even been to my property. The following day, I drive down to a company depot to resolve this. The response:)

Customer Service: “Our driver says he rang your bell and knocked on your door, but there was no answer.”

Me: “And what time was that?”

Customer Service: “What?”

Me: “What time did the driver arrive at my house?”

Customer Service: “The file doesn’t say.”

Me: “Do you track your drivers’ vehicles?”

Customer Service: “Yes.”

Me: “Then why not look up when the GPS puts him at my address?”

Customer Service: “We’re not allowed to share the locations of our vehicles without a court order.”

Me: “So, how am I supposed to believe the driver ever actually came to my address yesterday?”

(Predictably, a manager pounces on that moment.)

Manager: “Sir, our driver arrived. It’s not our responsibility to ensure you’re home.”

Me: “All I want to know is the time of the arrival.”

Manager: “4:25 pm.”

Me: “You’re sure it was at my place at 4:25 pm?”

Manager: “Yes! 4:25 pm on the dot at [My Address], according to our computer.”

(I hold up my phone.)

Me: “So, fun little fact: I have a few surveillance cameras on my property. One of them monitors the front door. The feed is recorded on a cloud server I access on any device, such as my phone. So, let’s watch 4:15 to 4:45 yesterday.”

(As you can guess, the only thing my camera sees is a few people walking on the sidewalk. There’s not even a truck present.)

Me: “I didn’t see a truck, did you?”

Manager: “What’s your address again?”

Me: “The one you called out earlier.”

Manager: “Could you just confirm it?”

Me: “What address do you have on file?”

Manager: “[My Address].”

Me: “That’s me. So why was there no truck?”

Manager: *pause* “Any chance you’ll be home tomorrow?”

Me: “What time tomorrow?”

(Miraculously, I got a mere two-hour block of time, the driver actually showed up within that time, and the folks who made the chair gave my girlfriend a full refund. Far more aggravation than there should have been, but at least it worked out.)