Oct 18, 2019

What did we do to deserve a day ( s ) like this?

Now that Colin has an iPhone we were working on how to transfer/ call forward it to our home voicemail while we are away.  It would not transfer.  We have been doing this for over twenty years now with no issues.  It simply would not connect.  In a nutshell we have spent at least 14 hours ( sometimes both of us at the same time, resulting  in  even more man hours ) over the past 2.5 days trying to sort out the issue.  We dealt with both tech support in the residential area and then in the mobility division.  In fact as I am typing this this evening a Telus technician is sitting at my desk trying to sort this out.  He has been on hold for close to two hours.  So far no go.  So in total we are up over 16 hours of hold time.

What beautiful colours.  Yes those are Christmas lights hanging in the foreground.  I have decided to add my fall tree shots into this post as otherwise it would be dry narrative.

Colin took the Jeep in on Wednesday morning to do an oil change.  It was a new Chrysler dealership to us ( there are two here ) and they decided to do a full inspection at no charge to us.  They discovered the differential oil was discolored and as we were towing the car a long way it was suggested we change it.  Likely it has not been changed in a very long time, if ever. So Colin dealt with that on Thursday morning.

This tree sits at the end of our street. You will see it change colours in this post.

Between us we took turns holding online with a variety of Telus agents for what seems like forever.  No go. Unable to fix the problem.

I had a medical appointment Thursday morning but managed to get my final grocery shopping done beforehand and just had to stop at the dollar store for Canadian stickers for the RV windows, the post office to mail a card to Mommio, a quick stop at Save on and then the bank.  I got to the bank at 2:10PM and it was closed 🙁  They had closed at 2:00PM so that all the staff could go do some community volunteer work.  Apparently it had been advertised on the bank windows, which I haven’t been to for awhile and website which I never look at.  Well I obviously would have to come back as we did need to get out passports out of the safe box.

Our Mountain Ash which only has ten berries this year. Last year it was loaded with berries.  We hope it is alright.  I haven’t had a chance to see how other Mountain Ash are doing in the area.

Back home to take over the Telus ( Colin’s cell phone provider, our home and separate business line provider and one of our two online email providers ) online hold.  Colin had to go to the dentist. By the time he got back from the dentist I was still on hold.  We ended that about 5:45PM.  Turns out I had been dealing with a tech agent in El Salvador who had been putting me on hold while she was on hold to her each people 🙄  She did leave me a message today that she had installed something that had repaired the problem.  It did not!

So today Colin headed off to see his chiropractor, he always likes to see her before we leave. As it turns out, he thankfully picked up a Papa Murphys pizza for dinner for tonight.  I headed out to the bank to do a few simple transactions.  I made a deposit, opened a second savings account, arranged for a post dated cheque to be deposited  for November 1st and asked for $100.00 cash.  I distinctly remember asking three times for my cash as the teller appeared distracted. My final task was to get into our safe deposit box to pick up USD, Pesos and our passports.  I also had two US one hundred dollar bills to put into our safe box.  I was being very careful of remaining within the legal limit of monies that we could cross the border with.

Just a few days with very cold temps has made a colourful change to the tree at the end of the road.

I got back home and realized that I did not have my cash 😯  What the heck.  So I called the bank and was transferred here and there.  Close to two hours later ( I was supposed to be working in the the RV ) I finally spoke with the teller I had dealt with.  Another long story short, she says she got flustered and instead of giving me the $100.00 in cash, she had deposited it into my account and then later, she had merely erased our $100.00 transaction.  What!!  So I asked her how was I supposed to get my cash.  Come back to the bank she said.  That would make three visits to the bank when I should have been able to so it all on Thursday.  So I will have to go back tomorrow.  I could not go back today as once again we were dealing with Telus issues.

Over the past week we have some some very low temps, down to -9C.  Can you see the frost on the roof? The white patches. That bit of smoke on the right above the roof is from a furnace vent.

We called Adam the onsite tech who was assigned to our case on day one.  It really is not his job and has nothing to do with an onsite visit.  We had already spoken with dozens of Telus people over the phone these past few days who were reaching out to others within their field. All part of the being on hold process was while someone was checking with someone else.  I just wanted to update him on how we could get no further but had figured out ( on our own ) a possible solution using Colin’s cell phone which needs to be shut down while we are in Mexico.  There should have been no need for a solution.  We have been doing this call forward to our home line ( which then sends an email of the call to our computer in Mexico ) for close to twenty years, if not longer.  Adam said that he had just had a cancellation and was in the area and would come over and work on the problem.  Wonderful.  However he ended up arriving at an inopportune time but we let him in and he did his thing while we did ours.

Love the colours in the tree at then end of our street. Now, just a few days later, the wind is blowing off the leaves.

Adam was here for close to three hours.  He spent the majority of that time on hold.  He finally decided to call another department who was able to do a few things for him.  I believe that he had been checking things online while he was waiting on the phone ( same as we had to do ) and came up with an idea.  We all cheered when he got the okay to install some sort of feature ( which we used to have – things are changing in the Telus world ) and then he tried it 💡 It actually worked 😀  To paraphrase Adam, it was a simple thing yet dozens and dozens of people (most of whom were techs ) and many hours were involved to no avail.  Well done Adam and thank you for your perservereance.

Our Mountain Ash a few days later and now the leaves are being blown off.

The sun was out yesterday morning.

We were all ecstatic at the results this evening, most especially Adam.  He was working with three phones ( as had Colin and I been ) as well as his laptop and giving it all of his knowledge and company connections.

Adam was so happy to have figured out the problem.  We sent him away with wine and beer close to 6PM tonight.  Hopefully he gets overtime as well and then gets to enjoy the evening with his wife once their four  😥 kids are in bed.  Thank you so very much Adam, Sara and the final lady at the end ( sorry I forgot her name, there have been so many ) who enabled Adam to try a few things and reach the ultimate success.

We had some transiting geese on the lake yesterday morning and I managed to catch them as they headed out, hopefully south.  In the photo they are heading north.

It really has been a beyond crazy few days.  Sadly I have not got much packing done nor loading and putting away in the RV.  Good thing we started a bit earlier this year.  So very many needless glitches.

We were fortunate to catch the beaver last evening as he headed back to his home.  Likely we won’t see  him again until the spring.  I hope that he has a good winter.

Isn’t nature amazing as is Adam 😎

 

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8 responses so far

8 Responses to “What did we do to deserve a day ( s ) like this?”

  1. Maxx Trails says:

    What a frustrating time with Telus, lucky you had Adam on your side! Beautiful pictures, with beautiful colours.

    • contessa says:

      I wish that I had more time over the past few weeks to go for walks and enjoy the beauty up close. Feeling much better today about Telus.

  2. Glad you got all that sorted out. We forward our house phone to hubby’s cell while gone but only for trips up to 2 weeks, long term that would be too bloody expensive!

    • contessa says:

      The way we use the call forwarding prefect. This way we still get the business calls at no extra charge. I put a Mexican SIM card into my iPhone once we get to Mexico. Much cheaper to use Colin’s phone in the USA and mine for roaming when we travel to Europe. The system works for us.

  3. Kathryn Tycho says:

    Your perseverance is amazing!

    • contessa says:

      We had no choice but to get it done, our business depends on it. Much less stressful to do this before we then than the night before we cross into Mexico.

  4. AZGAL says:

    SO GLAD THE PHONE WAS FINALLY STRAIGHTENED OUT. WOW, YOU WERE WORRIED ABOUT BEING A FEW HUNDRED OVER THE ALLOTTED $10,000.00 EACH, CDN?? THE FOLIAGE IS BEAUTIFUL. PEOPLE LAUGH BECAUSE I PACK SO FAR AHEAD OF TIME. I NEVER KNOW HOW LONG MY ENERGY WILL LAST SO PLAN TO HAVE ENOUGH TIME TO SPIN IT OUT!!!!

  5. Contessa says:

    The 10k is per couple if you are a couple, if you are on your own then it is 10K.

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