the AT&T blues

When I tell you I am not good with technology, you probably think I am joking or exaggerating. Not so. I mean, would a tech-savvy person spend two hours and forty-seven minutes on the phone with AT&T only to end up never having solved her original problem? Probably not, but I did. No lie, no embellishment. I actually spent one hundred and sixty seven minutes on the phone this morning and have a stiff neck  to prove it. The main reason I was calling was to add a thirty minute international plan for some upcoming travel. Here's a list of what did and did not get accomplished.

Did get accomplished:

1. I made a new friend called Wilmer who I spoke with for two hours twenty minutes. I will be flying down to Acapulco to attend Wilmer's wedding next April. That's how tight we are now.

2. I got Wilmer to deduct twenty-five bucks from my last month's bill, just because I am such a good, longstanding customer (not to mention what a fun phone conversationalist I am).

3. Wilmer found me a better plan than the one I had, thus saving me sixteen dollars and thirty-six cents per month.

4. Wilmer talked me through signing up for AT&T app and the Apple apps store in a failed attempt to help me sign up for my thirty international minutes myself, as the wait time for the AT&T international plan rep. was so long. Notice I said failed attempt. Getting me through the myriad of screens and questions to even attempt this was a bizarre and painstaking ordeal akin to making a wig out of braided angel hair pasta, or perhaps herding a possee of ants across the Gobi desert.

Before he tried to talk me through this, he said, "Don't worry, it's easy. Last month, I helped a seventy-year-old lady. I had to force her to try and by the end, she was an app pro." Not to be outdone, I agreed to try as well. After about thirty minutes of listening me mutter stuff like... crap, dang it, why won't it take this password?, how did I get to this screen?, Wilmer goes, "Wait a minute, let me see if I can get a hold of that international representative now." He did and quickly transferred me off to her. Harrumph. Some buddy he turned out to be. I'll have to re-think that lavish wedding gift I was planning.

5. Got disconnected by two different international AT&T reps. When I started talking to the second one, I made sure he had my number, and got him to promise to call me back if we got disconnected, which, of course, we did just before I gave him the final go-ahead to add the thirty minutes to my plan. As usual, I had a few questions first. We got disconnected on my last question. It's been over an hour now and I'm still waiting for him to call me back. Is it me? I thought I was being polite, even jovial. Perhaps a mean voice would have scared him into calling me back. Note to self: develop mean voice.

Did not get accomplished:

1. Setting up a thirty minute international plan for my phone. You may recall this was the reason I called AT&T in the first place this morning. Isn't technology supposed to save time?

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Anyhow, after the second disconnection, I was resting with a cup of hot tea, waiting for my blood pressure to normalize, when my daughter Lauren happened to call. She barely got out, "Mom, how's it going?" before I blurted, "I'm going insane... I've just spent almost three hours...."

Turns out, she has access to the account on-line and she travels internationally a lot, so she knows how to set up all that crap. "Mom, do not try to call them back. It's easy to set that up on-line. I'll go into the account and take care of that for you this afternoon."

Yay! There is a God, I thought, and he has my back. I may be horrible at technology, but I do have some pretty darn stellar kids. As they say, it's not what you know...