I'm usually not one to hold a grudge very long (average grudge time: overnight). But I have been harboring bad feelings towards this Compaq for about 2 months now.
So what was the offense, you may be asking. Well, let me tell you...
In December, as I was trying to order one of my favorite Christmas gifts (the black boots pictured below)...
...and my computer was going so S L O W. It kept timing out and I had to keep re-entering my credit card info, it was so infuriating. But never fear I finally got the boots ordered...but not after about an hour of frustration.Then every day after that the Internet kept timing out and the laptop was running so incredibly S L O W. Not just slow, but slower than molasses left outside in January.
THEN after Christmas break in January, I got a notice from my bank stating that our account was low on funds...this was right after payday and we hadn't spent a dime! So I looked online and found out that someone (someone who wasn't Steve or I) had spent over $300 at an online store called Threadless.com. WHAT???? And get this, there was also a$1 charge to paypal (who we don't use) a $1.00 charge to google.com (who we don't buy things from) and a $.02 charge to some UK.com. DING DING DING all sorts of alarms going off: FRAUD!
So I immediately called up my bank and reported the fraudulant charges. "Oh don't worry, Mrs. Duncan, you caught the charges early. You are so lucky they didn't milk you for more! But don't worry, you are 100% covered against all fraudulant charges...But we can't do anything until they actually clear your account. Right now they are just pending. But don't worry we'll cancel your card right away so you don't get any more fraudulant charges...You'll get a new one in about 5 to 7 business days..." So not only was I stressed about the charges (not to mention I felt very violated and felt my privacy had been invaded), a lot of our money was tied up until the charges were resolved. AND I was left without a card for a week! So frustrating!
Naturally I blamed the Compaq because that was the last computer I used to make an online purchase and we had been having problems with our anti-virus/hacking software. So of course I gave the laptop the silent treatment and stuck to the Apple and iphone to do any online transactions. I could tell the Compaq was jealous with my affairs with the other technology. But I just couldn't bring myself to use the computer that had allowed some good outstanding citizen to be unable to resist tempation and use our bank account to make purchases that they were obviously unable to make for themselves. (funny side note: when I called threadless.com to tell them about the purchase they actually said, "Oh we get calls about this all the time"...hmmm maybe you should put some more protection on your website!)
Of course, we got all of our money back and I got a new card and we moved on. Steve was able to update our protection software and I worked on forgiving the Compaq. The breaking point came when I received a letter in the mail from UConn saying that their online store security had been breached and that I should take measures to protect my bank account....and I remembered that I had made a purchase through them (on the PC, NOT the laptop) when I was working on my masters.
Culprit found and apprehended. So of course I felt bad and I had to forgive the Compaq and make-up. And what better way than to blog for several hours!
So scroll down and enjoy the 17 blog posts.
Gosh, a lot can happen in 2 months.
