Last year, I spent a while down in Florida. Before I left, I submitted a change of address to my newspaper subscription.
The paper was supposed to start coming a few days after I went down, but it never came. Well, their Florida delivery service had been flakey in previous years, so I wasn’t too surprised (once they sent it to Cedar Falls, Iowa, for the first two weeks). I went to check my account and found that this time the mistake was mine: I’d filled out my new rental address as 132 Street instead of 123 Street. I changed the address to 123 and waited.
And waited.
Another week. Still no paper. I’d been chatting online with customer service, and they had no idea why it wasn’t there. Reporting the paper as undelivered and getting a refund was becoming part of my morning routine.
One day, I was walking down the street, and what did I see in the driveway of 132? A familiar New York-based paper. Aha!
I got on chat again and told them that I knew what was happening: somehow, my address was still listed wrong on their end (even though it was now correct on my account). Problem fixed?
No. No papers on my doorstep. Same familiar, blue-wrapped bundle at the neighbor’s. (I thought about just taking it home, but it could have been possible that [Neighbor] really did subscribe to The Times, and I was too shy to knock on a stranger’s door).
More chats with customer service. More “I’m pretty sure I know what the problem is, you need to change the address”. More lack of newspaper.
After nearly a month of this, I finally talked to a representative over the phone. I repeated, for the umpteenth time, that they were sending the paper to the wrong address. I said that I thought it was possible that my updated address never made it to the local delivery service and begged them to check with the people on the ground and make sure they had the right information. The person on the phone told me, of course, right away, they were so sorry for my inconvenience.
The next day, my phone rang.
Woman: “Hi, I’m from [town paper delivery], and I wanted to talk to you about your reports of missing papers. Your address is 132 Street, correct?”
Me: “They said they were going to tell you! I just called them YESTERDAY, and they said they were going to give you the right address!”
I explained what had been going on.
Woman: *Sounding relieved.* “Oh, so that’s what it was. No one told us anything, just that we were being reported for failing to deliver the paper. We had our guy taking pictures of the paper on the driveway and everything, and they just kept telling us that we weren’t doing our job.”
I was absolutely outraged that HER team might have gotten in trouble for the COMPANY’S own screwup, and I told her so. In hindsight, maybe I should have called corporate and complained on their behalf, but I was so tired of the whole situation.
The paper started coming the next day.
A funny postscript to the saga:
I was at my volunteer job at the local aquarium, and I was going to take an Uber home because my bike had a flat tire. One of the other docents heard that I lived on [Street], and he offered me a ride home. It turned out he lived on [Street], too.
The car pulled into the driveway at 132 Street.
Me: “YOU live here?”
Coworker: “Yes.”
Me: “This is going to sound like a strange question, but… back in the fall, was there a period of time when you were inexplicably getting a New York newspaper you weren’t subscribed to?”
Coworker: “Yes, actually, I was.”
Me: “Let me explain what was going on…”
