Marc's Musings Reality from Marc's point of view!

** updated March 5, 2010 **
The refund came through on my credit card.

Michelle made the return trip on Megabus and was quite impressed. The bus was a modern double decker and was clean and pleasant. I think we’ll use the service again but we’ll just keep a very watchful eye on the weather and call them for updates before we get to the airport in the future. Do not trust that they will contact you if there are scheduling issues.
** end March 5, 2010 update **
** updated February 25, 2010 **
While I was crafting this entry I received notification of the refund for my original ticket price one way. So they were true to their word on that front.
** end February 25, 2010 update **

Nearly a month ago we arranged for Michelle to head up to Canada to visit her sister. As usual the airfare to fly directly into Toronto could only be described as “bend over and take it until you collapse”, so we booked an Airtran flight with a bus trip to Toronto using MegaBus.

Michelle arrived at Buffalo international airport early this evening in good time for her bus and then proceeded to wait.. and wait.. She wasn’t alone, there were another half dozen folks waiting with her. When the promised 7:45 pm bus didn’t show up she called me and I got on it.

I first called their contact us number (1-877-462-6342 per the website) and was informed that all buses had been canceled for the entire day due to weather. The guy I spoke with seemed rather surprised that we hadn’t been alerted.

I quickly checked the weather and saw that there actually was an advisory that we were not aware of, it certainly didn’t affect her flight.

The guy at 1-877-462-6342 told me that I could contact 773-890-6342 or inquiries.megabus.com (which I later found was inquiries@megabus.com an email address rather than a web site).

Calling that number got me put on hold and then eventually I was offered the option, if my call was regarding ongoing service disruptions to speak to a dispatcher. What I got was a lady (with loud laughing and raucous people in the background) who was somewhat confused that I was talking to her and she gave me the number of the New Jersey dispatch office (908-282-7420).

At *that* number I spoke with someone who knew what was going on who contacted the megabus dispatching office in Canada and determined that there would be NO service between there and Buffalo tonight.

She further determined that Coach Canada *was* running service and that we could likely get on one of their buses. At first she offered that, if we could get a Coach Canada ticket and keep the receipt, they would be willing to reimburse is, then she backed off and offered to refund the original ticket price saying that I could send a note to inquiries@megabus.com to explain what had occurred and that they might be able to work something out with us.

She also provided me with the Coach Canada phone number (1-800-644-5197 ext 1) .

So I called Michelle back to see where things stood for her before making any arrangements and found that she, and the other stranded passengers had managed to purchase tickets on the Coach Canada bus that had been sitting there at the airport while they were waiting for their Megabus.

So I’m going to send this story to Megabus and see what they say. I’ll update this post with any response. But my main points are:

1. We were never contacted regarding the outage. I had given them MY contact information as anybody who knows me also knows that I am VERY reachable via the web and phone. Had we suspected an issue we would have made arrangements many hours earlier.
2. Looking at my reservation screen below which I captured at about 35 minutes *after* departure there is still no indication of an issue with the reservation even though apparently ALL buses had been canceled.
   
3. I’m surprised that there is no agreement between the bus companies or that Megabus does not have any facility for ensuring that stranded passengers are handled. The new ticket was about twice as expensive as the original and, had Michelle had to wait overnight that would have been that much MORE expensive.
4. I’m further surprised that they wouldn’t run their buses while Coach Canada didn’t seem to have an issue continuing to service their routes.

What do I want from Megabus?

1. An acknowledgment that they screwed up the notifications and maybe some assurances that they have maybe done something to correct that issue.
2. Obviously I want the ticket refunded. I think it would be a nice gesture if they went the extra distance and reimbursed us for the extra ticket cost too. But the amount of money is not huge.

Anyway, I passed their contact information on to Michelle so that the other passengers could make whatever arrangements they may and she is now en route to Toronto and will arrive only a couple of hours later than planned.

I post this so others can know about our experience. If it’s an isolated incident then this post will get lost in the shuffle, if it’s a regular occurrence then my voice will be added to others who may choose to post as well.

Posted under Retail Experiences

I just got in after changing out my freshly blown tire for my spare. Thankfully that was still fully inflated.

The bad tire (A Michelin Energy MXV4, one of their XSE offerings) which I purchased new in October 2008 from Ed Voyles Honda, blew a nice 2 inch gash in the sidewall while I was driving home from work today along Highway 9 near Old Milton. Nothing special on the road, not even potholes around there.

Before you ask, I did check the manufactured date a few weeks ago and saw that it was 2807 (28th week of 2007) so one should think that dry rot is not a factor.

I suppose I should be happy, back in March of 2004 I put 4 new Michelin Harmony tires on my car. That lasted only until that November before one of my front tire sidewalls blew (while I was traveling at highway speeds next to a tractor trailer). So this tire lasted me a good 100% longer than that crappy one did. I managed to put a whole 19,000 miles on my current tires.

No more Michelins for me. I might understand this if I bought the cheapest and crappiest tires I could find, but I buy middle range tires from established outlets. This time I think I’ll just head to Sam’s club and buy whatever’s cheapest and have them slap them on. I don’t think I can do any worse than what I’ve been doing.

Posted under Opinions, Retail Experiences

As glasses styles get smaller and smaller, I find that my glasses no longer offer the protection for my eyes from wind and dust when I’m cycling.

So I decided to treat myself to a good pair of glasses that I would use for sporting purposes. They would be larger than my current glasses, they would curve a bit around my face and they would have transition lenses to offer some daylight dimming but would not interfere with evening and night activities.

I have a pretty modest prescription. I can see things at a distance but I just can’t focus well enough to read signs and see details at a distance easily.

I decided on a pair of Oakley Tightrope glasses as I thought the frame was pretty attractive and the Rx-able lenses would shield my eyes nicely.

I purchased the glasses on November 4, 2009 from my local Pearle Vision shop and would need to pick them up a couple of weeks later as I was headed out of state on a week long cruise.

When I picked up the glasses, I knew there was something odd about them as they made me a bit woozy but I couldn’t put my finger on the problem. immediately assuming that I just needed to get used to the new lenses I wore them out of the store and tried them for a full day.

It turns out that the curvature of the lens required for this wraparound style frame introduces some distortion on the inner portion of the lenses (this is the part between the pupil and the nose). Looking through the lens from my pupil toward the periphery was perfect, but trying to look toward the center had everything appearing to “bunch up”. Unless I’m looking straight ahead, at least one eye was always facing a compressed view of the world. Moving around, i.e. driving a car is so dynamic that the constant shift of perspective was nauseating.

So I took the glasses back and they actually experimented with a couple of lenses even grinding one on the spot to see if that would work. My desired frame could only work with a limited range of curvatures (I believe a “7″ or an “8″, whatever that means in optical terms).  But the result was still the same with that peculiar compression toward the center of my view.

They then ordered in a few alternate frames that I could try to see if any would meet my needs. Ironically, when I went in to check them out the original tightrope frame was also in the tray and I gravitated to it immediately before we all realized that those were my original frame choice. None of the other alternatives offered the protection that I was looking for. They were pretty stylish but not so sporty.

So the Pearle Vision folks then shipped the frames and prescription off to Oakley and, to their credit, did not charge me any extra for having the lenses ground there. Apparently there is a significant premium to doing so that they elected to eat as we were now in early January, about 2 months after this Odyssey had begun.

I picked up the glasses about a week ago and – ta da! – the lens is optically correct for me.

I was, for a while, worried that Pearle was just trying to make me overstay my 60 day chargeback limit for my credit card. I don’t deal often with things optical but my recent dealing with Wal-Mart’s optical department had made me very wary.

But the Pearle Vision folks were true to their word and they made sure that my prescription and my glasses needs were met. I’ll be popping in next week to thank them personally and to ensure that they know that their efforts are recognized and appreciated.

Posted under Retail Experiences

As promised, here is my final entry for my insulation experience with Wilson Insulation. January 12 they arrived as promised (this entry is a little delayed… hey I’ve been busy). They didn’t have an official dam to protect my master bedroom attic hatch access so they constructed one out of some kind of insulation board.

I’m not exactly sure how I’ll be getting into and out of the attic but I presume I’ll figure out the required technique when the time comes.

Overall I have to say I’m satisfied. There were some miscues between the sales and the install folks. These could be related to the time of year, vacations and other seasonal thoughts keeping folks from being as focused as they maybe could be. But they made the effort to ensure that my concerns were addressed and they were prompt and courteous. I would use them again if I had to start all over.

So Wilson Insulation gets a “Thumbs up” from me!

Posted under Retail Experiences

This past Saturday I purchased some software over the Internet (yes, I actually *do* pay for my software..). As part of the transaction I elected to use my VISA card.

Once I had entered the credit card information and clicked “Submit” a curious screen came up purporting to be some kind of confirmation screen. Among other details that it wanted to collect were the last 4 digits of my social security number. Being a reasonably aware netizen I decided that this was too hokey for me and elected to cancel the transaction. I knew that it was *probably* legitimate, but quite frankly I was not feeling too comfortable giving out additional info like that for a simple $30 purchase. I finished the transaction using paypal instead.

Well, fast forward to yesterday (Thursday) and my wife calls me. She was trying to make a purchase for yet more greeting cards and the $5 transaction had been declined by the credit card company. I checked online and my account wouldn’t show up on it’s secured web site so I called Chase (my VISA card brand owner) and found that the decision to cancel out of the transaction had flagged my account 5 days later as a potential fraud risk. I spoke with the fraud rep and they cleared everything up and I was able to use the card to buy gas on the way home an hour or so later.

Checking my online status this morning finds that the account is still missing from the Chase web site. So I called them up and they tell me that the account likely won’t show up for a few more days due to it’s “fraud status”. They ever so kindly offered me a new card that I could use right away (preapproved for a whole $500!) that I could cancel once my other card was up and running. Not sure how they’d get it to me in any kind of relevant time frame.

Anyway, the lessons learned from this:

• If anyone asks for any amount of information regarding your credit card online, just give it to them
• If your card information is stolen online, apparently the thieves have nearly a week to use it
• As fast as the fraud alert is at being set on your account, it’s apparently just as fast at being removed.

This isn’t crippling, just annoying. I use the online credit card information regularly to verify that no weird purchases are being made and to confirm that expected purchases have been made successfully. It’s odd that it takes SO long for a fraud alert to be triggered and then, once that happens, the best tool at my disposal for reviewing and validating purchases is disabled.

Color me not impressed.

Posted under Retail Experiences

As you may be aware from some of my other blog posts, I refinanced my mortgage with Suntrust earlier this year.

At the end of the process I received an offer for $150 if I signed up with their Surepay system. Basically just an automated drafting service to ensure that your mortgage is paid promptly each month.

I just received my 1099-INT from them a few days ago. From my checking account I received a *whopping* $1.81 in interest (I’m still trying to decide how to spend it). But there was this item, listed as “Premium” under Account Type that showed $150 in interest income.

It took me several moments to realize where that entry was coming from. After all, at the sorry .1% interest rate that the banks are paying these days I’m sure I would have noticed the extra $150,000 hanging around in my checking account. (BTW I had to calculate that interest rate since they’re so ashamed that you can’t get it off their web site, the little rate window just blanks out after you put in your state).

I must say that this is the first time I’m going to be nailed for taxes for receiving this kind of incentive. Probably to the tune of around $35.

I just bought an alienware computer and managed to score a $300-off deal for it. I wonder if I need to look out for my 1099 form for *that* next year…

BTW, if you’re reading this as a facebook note, click through to my blog in order to see any pictures/links that I refer to.

Posted under Opinions, Retail Experiences

My mother lives in Canada and recently purchased a plane ticket to fly from Toronto to Orlando, Florida.

Check out the price of the ticket and then how she gets positively hosed on the taxes and additional junk fees.

Airfare Price (Canadian Dollars): $119.00
Taxes and surcharges: $233.54
Total(Canadian Dollars): $352.54

By contrast, a single fare ticket from Atlanta, Georgia to Orlando costs this much.

1 adult:                      $178.00
Taxes & fees:               $28.39
_______________________________________________________________
Total:                         $206.39

I don’t know if the airlines build extra charges into the fees but those Canucks are getting screwed every which way from Sunday on them.

Have I mentioned lately how much I *love* living in America? If only we can solve the horror that is our medical system.

Posted under Opinions, Retail Experiences