Finally did it, Power, The Angry Side

Last night I did something I have not done since moving into my house in March of 2023, flipped the thermostat to heat mode. I was tired of feeling chilled in the house. The temperature inside wasn’t awful, I think it read 66 when I turned the heat on. I set the thermostat to 70 and expected to experience the burning smell I always did at the old house when the heat was turned on for the first time a season. Normally dust that has accumulated on the heating coils will cause this.

Maybe the system at the new house is better or it’s just cleaner because I did have a PM done on the unit a month or so prior but there was no burning smell at all, just nice hot air coming from the vents. Within 15 minutes the house felt better. I left the heat on all night but turned it off this morning. I will make a day by day call if I need to enlist additional heating to the living space. I have also added one of the thick fuzzy blankets that Dawn advised me to buy last year to my bed for now. The thin bedspread was not enough but the extra insulation from the blanket definitely helps.

I also played my second WoW session in as many days. Playing the game on my 4K monitor is a new and enjoyable experience. The speed at which I can level is crazy. Last night I went from level 63 to 70 in maybe an hour of play time on my demon hunter. The game play with that class is chaotic and fast. I was just blowing through enemies and in the five man dungeons I ran I was the top DPS by large margins.

I now have three characters remaining on my FIRST account to get leveled to 70. I then have to reactivate my SECOND account that has my couple other characters that need to be leveled. Yes, it’s a lot I know.

You may recall back in November I did a couple videos on the Shift Robotic Moonwalkers. They were sent to me to evaluate. Most of the times if I am sent a product to review I get to keep the product as “payment”. In this situation instead the company agreed to pay me $300 to do the review. So I did the videos that presented my lukewarm feelings about the Moonwalkers. In a nutshell it’s interesting tech but there were two major and one minor thing wrong with them. They were too loud, too expensive, and you look sort of ridiculous while using them.

So after I made the videos I sent the links to the company and awaited instructions on what was next. It took two weeks and multiple emails until I got a response. They asked if I could upload the videos to them (instead of just YouTube) and told me I could send the product back using the return shipping label that was supposed to be in the box. I responded back asking if they had a site for me to upload the videos to and informed them there was no return shipping label in the box.

Another couple weeks passed, again requiring me to send multiple emails, asking for this information. Each subsequent email I sent had a slightly more irritated tone to it. Finally they tell me I can just put the videos in my Dropbox for them to grab and they sent me a return label which I used to ship the product back the next day. I anticipated getting payment from them to be equally annoying, I was right.

So I sent the email asking how do I get paid. Again I got no response until I sent three of them. This pattern of having to request things repeatedly obviously did not sit well with me. When they do respond it’s always with an apology but then it happens every subsequent time. The response I got was I had two options, I could send them an invoice and a W9 or create a bill.com account and they can pay me via an electronic transfer to my bank. I responded back I would choose option two. I created my account on Bill and then emailed Shift once again to tell them everything was good to go.

I waited another week before following up asking for an update. It again took multiple emails until the response came back that they were unsure why they payment had not been processed yet but they would check into it and get back to me ASAP. I let a few days go before I again asked for an update, this time indicating how my level of frustration with Shift was high with their poor responsiveness. I finally get a reply saying my issue was being forwarded to the director of marketing who actually did respond to me the same day. However I was unhappy with her response.

She said she was told by the payables department that I needed to submit an invoice and W9, the option I did not choose when given a choice. I responded back quickly, including the email that included my being told I had a choice to this person. She responded that she was sorry but she was told I had to do it this way if I wanted to get paid. That officially flipped my switch.

I normally am not the type to have a quick fuse. I gave Shift way more leeway than I should have in my opinion. However there was no more patience left in me. I told this person that this was ridiculous. I explained how frustrated I was by the lack of responsiveness and professionalism Shift has demonstrated during this process. I said I was at the point where I felt like I need to inform other content creators to not entertain working with Shift, meaning make a video about it. Yes, this was a threat. Magically, I get a follow up email in less than an hour saying that the payable department was making an exception and would process my payment via Bill. Later that night I got notification that the payment was in the pipeline, finally.

Although my inherit nature is to be understanding, patient, and polite, there are situations where those attributes no longer apply. The part of me that no longer is willing to tolerate bullshit is normally effective in getting things handled if being nice has proven to be fruitless. I try to avoid the truly angry side of me to take the wheel often as results are unpredictable.

Anyway, I got my money after nearly two months of effort. Persistence pays off.