14 June 2010

Open Letter to the Gas Company

1644 W. Grace St. #3
Richmond, VA 23220

June 13, 2010


Dear Gas Company,

Enclosed you’ll find my check for $144.77, which I can’t afford but am paying to avoid having my service cut off.
When I first got hooked up you folks charged me a ludicrous $235 ($35 hookup fee and $200 security deposit) for the privilege. Why a public utility with the full force of City government behind it needs to charge this fee, so much greater than private companies charge for comparable services, is a question I have not yet found an answer for.
Still, having no choice, I have been paying that ridiculous fee off in installments. However, the installments have been very large and I’ve had trouble keeping up, in spite of the fact that I’ve kept my actual usage to around $30/month. In other words, I am behind in my payments exactly because of the security deposit you charged in case I fell behind in my payments. If you hadn’t charged me that, my payments would have been on time and in full every month.
Now you write that if I don’t send you $144.77 by the 21st you will disconnect my service and I’ll have to pay another deposit and hookup fee to start it up again. So, to summarize, you charge an outrageous deposit as security against my not paying my bill, which causes me to be unable to pay my bill, and if I fall far enough behind you’ll charge me another security deposit and I’ll fall even further behind, and we’ll be in a perfect cycle of you getting an extra $235 every few months. This instead of you simply charging me the fees for what I actually use, fees I would be able to pay.
I confess that it’s a pretty clever, if soulless, scam. I wish I had thought of it myself.
Anyway, here’s your $144.77. Assuming I don’t starve to death in the meantime, you’ll get the rest of your money next month. Until then I am apparently


Utterly yours,


Richard James Winters III

07 June 2010

I Couldn't Do It Any Worse

I just had to take one of those online personality tests on a job application. You know, the ones I always fail. One of the last questions was this one: You do not fake being polite (Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Agree, Strongly Agree).
Now, tell me if I’m wrong about this, but there’s no way to fake being polite. You either are polite or you aren’t. You might be polite even though you don’t feel like being polite, but even so, you are actually being polite. The question is therefore meaningless, and so what the hell am I supposed to say? Should I strongly agree because I am not a fake, or should I strongly disagree because I am always genuinely polite?
If someone is going to take upon himself the responsibility of trying to establish a stranger’s personality through a few questions, doesn’t he also have the responsibility of making sure those questions make sense? Maybe I should apply for THIS guy’s job.