Fed up

My email exchange with county officials regarding the miserable road conditions out at our place has continued. One of my email exchanges was CC’d out to an email list that a rep from the local paper saw and found interesting. She called my house and asked if she could turn it into a letter to the editor, I said “Sure” , the more people that see it, the better. County officials tell me that it is reasonable that an 8 mile project should take 5 years. I laugh at that but have not taken the time to present them a long list of projects that dwarf this in scope but have been completed in less time. Right now my favorite example is the Chesepeake Bay-Bridge tunnel that was COMPLETED in less than 4 years. Our straight as an arrow, flat, 8 mile segment takes 5 years, and this is deemed as reasonable, total BS.

Last night as I was cleaning off the kitchen counter I saw a letter from Capital One regarding their “new and improved” airmiles plan. They had just changed the plan less than a year ago so I thought it was odd that they would change it again. The way it used to work was whatever the price of the ticket, you multiplied it times 100 and that was how many miles it cost. So for example if I bought a $160 dollar ticket, that would be 16,000 miles. Well as I read the new redemption schedule I quickly got very pissed off. The new plan goes like this, if the ticket is less than 150 bucks, it costs you 15,000 miles. Of course it is very difficult to find a roundtrip ticket for 150 bucks anymore. If the ticket costs $150.01 to $350 it costs you a flat 35,000 MILES!!!! WTF?????? I was freaking and I picked up the phone and dialed. Ali said “You are going to call them now??” Hell yes. I got some robotic female on the phone and after giving my info I explained to her how outrageous the new plan is. I gave her the example of how the 160 dollar ticket that costs me 16,000 miles now will cost me 35,000 miles in the new plan. I asked her how this was “new and improved” from a customer standpoint? Reading from her script, she pointed out how I get 500 “bonus” miles when the new plan goes into effect and how I can get double miles if I buy from “preferrred” businesses. I immediately idenitifed those perks as next to useless if it was going to cost me so many more miles for a ticket. I told her I realized she had no control over it but I wanted her to pass along how ridiculous the new plan was and how it will likely result in me taking my business elsewhere. She apologized for the inconvenience but offered no counters to my proposal that the new plan sucks. I hung up knowing my gripe would probably never heard beyond the customer service sheep I just spoke to, yet it took a bit of a load off my back to at least express it. I mean come on, do they think people are stupid?? Jerks.