Inevitably, my turn came around. Time again for soulless corporate America to extort from me to pay for their cupidity and stupidity. A letter slithered into my mailbox from an “AmSher Collection Services, Inc.” informing me that I owed DISH Network $1383.36. No other information regarding this bogus debt was on the letter – like what I bought or when or where or how I bought it. I’ve never received a prior bill from DISH Network itself, and I can honestly say that no satellite dish has ever sullied the purity of my property. In the blustery tones of bullies they called me “seriously delinquent”, a term that hadn’t been applied to me since my early teenage years when my mother caught me padding my bra.
They thoughtfully enclosed a payment coupon in case I wanted to send $1383.36 to somebody I’ve never heard of for a debt I didn’t incur at a place I’ve never been. It was especially insulting that the debt was presumably for television service. I haven’t had TV for the 10 years I’ve lived in my house. I haven’t missed it a bit. There is nothing there worth $1383.36, and I’m not fool enough to waste money on crap.
They said that if I didn’t write them a letter delineating their obvious egregiousness and moronicity within 30 days, they will assume that this totally undocumented previously nonexistent debt is indeed mine, and then they’re gonna … which they leave dangerously hanging. Torture is implied, using bureaucratic means to force me to write and write and write and make endless phone calls and fax my butt off – all because several bloated corporations behaved incompetently and irresponsibly.
I got this letter the evening after I returned from London to LAX and thence to Seattle and Olympia. When I’ve spent hours and hours confined to an airplane seat in the fetal position, or madly squirming to keep my butt from falling asleep, my mood is “dark”. I get cranky. Bullshit letters like this get me cranky, too. I have enough going on in my life, what with my 93 year old mother living next door, and the job and the tortoise, I don’t need the Wall St. fire drill they’re DISHing out. I know and they know they are trying to finger the wrong person, but they want to roll their shit ball out there anyway, and expect me to chase it. Now they’ve pissed me off. I think that was the gist of my phone message to AmSher Collection Services, Inc. when I called their 866 number, but I was so jet lagged and infuriated I might have said anything, and I kind of hope I did.
The next day, I contacted DISH Network via the Internet, where a helpful customer service screen typed out a friendly conversation. They use this remote method of communication because most people would have preferred to scream in their ears and bang the phone around. It also discourages those who struggle with typing, spelling, or grammar. Not me. I type fast and furious. They were paying a pittance to some underemployed foreign resident to pick out pre-arranged phrases in response to certain words, while I was composing an exquisitely cogent, emotionally-seasoned and well-reasoned argument in favor of leaving me the hell alone. My onscreen opponent soon relinquished a phone number. She wished me luck. I advised her to get a different job. Don’t be an apologist for sneaky dealers. If you want to help people, become a nurse.
The phone number belonged to a completely powerless person who earnestly reassured me that DISH Network was a multigazillion dollar business so of course it could do no wrong. The service was provided to an address in South Carolina. I pointed out that the letter was sent to Washington. The good Washington, the pot-smoking gay-marrying one; not the District of Congress one filled with all the white trash politicians. I’m strictly West Coast. I’ve lived in this house for ten years now. Never lived in South Carolina.
They claim to have been DISHing it up to me since late 2013, just about the time I was sucked into the Target data breach. Thanks a lot, Target. The very name took on a certain irony. I was giddy with resentment and lack of sleep. I astonished myself with my razor sharp wit. The lady on the phone decided she’d had enough sarcasm to last the rest of the day, and pushed me one step further down the ditch of denial and obfuscation that delimns this sort of corporate scam. I did NOT suggest that she become a nurse.
My information is freely and readily available on the Internet with a single Google. It’s not my fault the corporation was lazy or careless or criminal when checking out my Southern doppelganger. Maybe if he/she made more than minimum wage she/he would be more motivated to get it right. Used to be the companies earned employee loyalty. Now they don’t even bother to buy it.
The next phone voice assumed a firm and faintly disapproving motherly tone with me. I must prove my innocence. They don’t have to prove my guilt. If I don’t write my confession within thirty days I’m off to the stake. This lady refused to tell me where the alleged theft of service occurred. “She didn’t have to”, she sneered. It was a matter of “privacy”. This from the person whose company was invading my privacy the way those river worms swim up a guy’s penis. I didn’t tell her I already knew it was South Carolina. “Hypocritical bitch” is what my evil Southern couch potato twin thought.
I said I wanted to be put on the list of people that if they ever saw my name again I’d be instantly rejected because it would obviously be fraud. I’d never ever in a yotta years (look it up) be wanting their television service. It won’t be me applying. She said they didn’t have a list like that. Even if my South Carolina alternate personality stiffs them the bill, they will have gotten their satisfaction by wasting my time and keeping their miserable jobs for one more day. No one gets to be exempt from their predatory exploitation and their own inevitable data breach. There is no list.
I said I never got a bill. Had they perhaps noted over the 17 months of service that they hadn’t been paid? She said they generously give a “grace period” to their clients. I gagged on my V-8 juice and fought for breath. She hinted that perhaps I had friends or relatives whose television habit I supported. I thought my brain exploded out my nose then but it was just the V-8. When pressed for facts about the actual event (how much per month, who lived in the house, did they watch porn or loudmouthed preachers) she hustled up her “privacy” excuse again.
Hey, I’m not the one that failed to verify the identity and credit of their customer, if indeed the customer ever existed. There’s been no proof that any of this occurred. For all I know, DISH Network colluded with Target to use reaped data to create fake fake-accounts. Then they hired the collection agency thugs to see if they could get suckers to send them money. They shakedown the victims that refuse by using extortion. They’re probably committing tax fraud by writing off this electronically generated “bad debt”. From my perspective, she’s just a voice on the phone making claims she won’t or can’t back up. She thought I was being rude, because you know, DISH Network has a gazillion billion dollars so of course they wouldn’t be trying to take my money and ruin my credit for no good reason.
She offered to tell me how to extricate myself from this very unfortunate situation – if indeed it was an unfortunate situation. I only have to make 7 phone calls, fill out 5 pieces of paper, make a police report, copy my driver’s license, fax three copies of everything to a dead end postal address, and have a rectal exam. If I don’t do all that, they’re going to report me to the credit bureaus and ruin my credit score and tell my mother. Oh - and I need to pay for some Fraud Prevention Services at only $20/month if I don't want this to happen again soon.
They know I am the victim here. The victim of Target’s laxity, DISH Network’s failure to verify who their customer was, and AmSher’s lack of effort in finding the actual culprit. Because of their irresponsible unprofessional behaviors, I must waste precious moments of life running in their pointless needless circles or they will defame me. They have turned screwing with people into a booming industry. Seems to me that those who made the mess should be the ones cleaning it up.
P.S. Like Fox News, parts of this diary may have taken liberty with the literal truth. I don't have to have a rectal exam - a stool sample will do. I'll be sending it off, shortly.