This was a very stressful day. Today, we were moving (yet more) furniture and stuff of my husband's dead mother. This involved renting a U-Haul truck - and that was the first problem. My husband made the reservations on the internet through the U-Haul website, and reserved a $19.95 truck, some moving blankets, and a dolly.

When he got there, there was no $19.95 truck - so he was given a larger truck at no extra charge, but an extra pain to drive. There were no dollies, and no blankets available. The "customer service representative" - and I use that term loosely - also informed him that the $5.00 charged for this inconvenience would not be put toward his truck rental.

His brother met him at our house, and they moved a dresser, a chair, and some other dining room chairs. I was to meet them at the main house at 2PM, to go through the last of the items, and to pack them up.

Things went okay with the moving and dividing, and hubby and brother headed off for leg three of the transport, before returning to our house to unload. Then, we had to return the U-Haul truck to the service center before closing time.

That's when the merde hit the fan. I was wandering around the U-Haul center, looking at packing stuff, while my husband paid out his transaction. He immediately and forcefully reminded the CSR that he should not be charged for the blankets and dolly. Okay, but then I heard her say, "Did you call to say that you were going to be late bringing the truck back?"

What?!!! The reservation he made had been for the day. But, on the ticket, it stated that it was supposed to be returned in four hours! That's when things got ugly. My husband argued heatedly with the CSR - and she asserted that he would have to pay the penalty (which I found out later was supposed to be $50 an hour! - $200!), then take up his complaint with the website creators.

What idiots! I used to work retail and as a customer service representative - what has happened to customer satisfaction? Not one person apologized for the inconvenience this morning, and no one showed any empathy for our frustration this afternoon. It's seems that U-Haul's new motto is "I am not responsible for that."

Right now, he's working on my new (second-hand) computer. I will be happy to have a back-up, since I have already lost another entry for the recipe blog earlier this evening. Man, was I pissed. And no, I did not save, but I am now. It was a recipe for trifle. I was especially pissed because it was my first attempt to write out one of my own personal recipes, and not to cut and past from other sources!

I also tried calling Mexico, and apparently there are phone problems - I called Pablo 5 times and got "your phone call is not going through at this time" - or some such nonsense. Just to be sure, I tried to call Oaxaca, and the same thing happened. I will try again tomorrow.