Segacs’s World I Know

So Creed broke up. I guess the rest of the band got tired of Scott Stapp’s gorilla-sized ego. Oh well. They started off good but they’ve pretty much sucked since. I’m not gonna lose any sleep over this one.

Gas prices are in the high 90s and have been for a few weeks now. People are starting to adjust. I’ve seen them as high as 99.9.

But I have a feeling we’re not going to see that dollar mark crossed for a while. Why? Because then all the gas station owners would have to replace their big signs with ones that can accommodate 4 digits. And somehow I can’t see them being so anxious to shell out the big bucks that that’s going to cost.

So get used to 99.9 per litre. I think the prices are going to hover there for a while.

Working in a customer service field, I’ve developed somewhat of an intolerance to being treated poorly when I myself am the customer. But my recent dealings with several notorious large companies have led me to wonder whether my basic expectations for service are somehow unreasonable.

First, my dealings with Dell gave me nothing but sleepless nights and heartburn. My computer is still giving me hardware errors. It’s been doing it for over 6 months now. But since the customer service line has been utterly useless at helping me solve the errors, I’ve pretty much opted to live with them. It’s just easier that way.

Then, of course, there’s Air Canada, the national carrier Canadians love to hate. It’s the only monopoly I can think of that still can’t figure out how to stave off bankruptcy and make a profit. Horror stories are the norm rather than the exception. It’s as though the airline feels that “customer service” means not going bankrupt, as opposed to – er – actual service.

Today, Air Canada ranked up another strike, when I found out that my flights to and from Israel next month had changed times rather significantly, and nobody had let me know. When I called, I was told “oh, sorry, I see you were on a call list; someone would have called you eventually”. Er, that’s great. When exactly were they going to tell me that I was leaving 12 hours earlier? When I showed up at the gate?

My woes with Bell Mobility have to about top the list, though. My cell phone has been broken for over 3 months, and was sent in 3 times for repair without success. I got tossed back and forth between different service lines without any kind of problem resolution. The store would blame the manufacturer, the manufacturer would blame the store, the customer service line would blame everyone else… and nobody was willing to help.

I finally complained to the executive office, where I was finally offered a replacement cell phone. Today, I found out that on top of everything else, my replacement phone was sent out two weeks ago… to someone in Kitchener, Ontario. *Sigh*.

Companies are constantly looking for new ideas and innovations to be more profitable. They spend millions on customer research, millions more on advertising the latest products and features… and yet none of them seem to realize that all most of us want is helpful service and products that work.

Yes, it really is that simple.

Maybe we get such lousy service because we allow these companies to walk all over us. There’s only 4 cellphone companies in Canada, and only one major national airline. They get away with treating their customers like dirt, because none of their competitors are any better. So they know we’re a captive audience.

But enough is enough. I think it’s high time we demanded better.

Update 06/07: Problems solved with Bell Mobility, who sent me a brand-new fancy camera phone to replace my broken one. And hey, it *only* took 3 months!

Also, problems solved with Air Canada Aeroplan, where I found a – believe it or not – nice and helpful customer service supervisor who resolved everything for me, was friendly, and went out of her way to help. I rant and complain a lot but I have to give credit where credit is due.

Dell’s still messed up. But two out of three ain’t bad.

The megacity mayor will debate the former Westmount mayor and demerger activist this Sunday.

Should be interesting, if only because the whole merger/demerger campaign so far has been run on emotions and passions, manipulation tactics, misinformation, and dirty tricks. Citizens were deprived of any kind of chance to debate the issues when the mergers were forced upon us in the first place. So there’s been inadequate focus on the real facts.

I’ll try to watch… hopefully it’ll be over by the time the Sopranos season finale begins.

David seems happy at the decision of the state of New Jersey’s ban on Ladies’ Night, on the grounds that such promotions discriminate against men.

Give me a break! This is political-correctness gone way overboard.

What next? No more student or senior prices at the movies? No more youth tickets on trains?

*Sigh*.

Update: Whoops, that was Daniel who posted that opinion, not David. Apologies. By the way, read them both at Tainted Glass. (Plug, plug).

Lynn has some good news from Israel on the subject of religious marriages:

Former chief Sephardi rabbi Eliahu Bakshi-Doron yesterday advocated dismantling the Orthodox rabbinate’s monopoly over marriages – the first time any leading rabbi associated with the rabbinical establishment has publicly urged such a step.

[ . . . ]

In his speech, Bakshi-Doron gave several reasons why he thought the rabbinate’s monopoly on marriages must end. First, he said, the law has become irrelevant, as growing numbers of Israelis are choosing to marry in civil ceremonies either abroad or in Israel (the state recognizes civil marriages conducted overseas, but not those conducted locally). Second, he said, the law encourages hatred of the rabbinate, since it is seen as the primary expression of religious coercion in Israel.

Israel has been trying to work out the meaning of “Jewish democracy” for decades. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come, and other religious and secular leaders will speak out and work to change this law.

CTV News is reporting that the proposed extension of Cavendish Boulevard might finally go ahead.

Yeah right.

They’ve been saying that since before I was born. This is nothing but a thinly-veiled attempt by the megacity to swing votes in the demerger referendum. Which is all the more ironic, because pro-megacity councillor and former CSL mayor Robert Libman is one of the key reasons that the extension hasn’t happened all these years.

It’s an idea that’s long overdue. But there’s no reason that this time will be any different than every other time they make the announcement.

Update: According to the news report, the route will not be the direct, common-sense solution, but the “compromise” of linking the Northern part of Cavendish to Royalmount, and the Southern part to Jean-Talon. So people will still have to go East to Decarie to get around, and the traffic problems won’t be solved at all.

The city is openly admitting that this is a campaign ploy against the demerger. As though we needed to be told. I thought having Robert Libman, who fought for years against any kind of extention, making the announcement was a particularly nice touch, considering. *Sigh*.

This applies just as much to Canadian politics as to American:

Poll: Many Americans Still Unsure Whom To Vote Against

WASHINGTON, DC — According to Gallup Poll results released Monday, 6 percent of Americans are still undecided about whether to vote against President Bush or Democratic challenger John Kerry in November’s presidential election.

Gotta love the Onion.

Looks like the Conservatives are running a candidate in my riding after all.

Not that it really matters or anything. The Conservatives can’t get votes in Quebec. My riding’s overwhelmingly Liberal, and will probably remain that way. But it did strike me as a little odd that, with all of Harper’s expansive talk about including Quebec and being a truly national party, that he wasn’t even planning on running candidates in so many Quebec ridings. (Maybe it just took him this long to find enough actual Conservatives in Quebec willing to run…)

The political advertising is starting to get annoying. The Liberal ads claiming that “you can’t have Canadian values at US tax levels” are the most obnoxious of all, because the Liberals actually have the audacity to campaign on a platform of higher taxes when everyone knows the money is being squandered. Stephen Harper’s ads are doing little other than attacking the credibility of the Liberals, which, while valid enough, doesn’t say much for the Conservative ability to put forth a positive platform. Harper also seems to be having trouble muzzling his own party members before they get him in big trouble.

Some bloggers seem excited as the poll percentage gap seems to be narrowing between the Libs and the Tories. I can’t share their enthusiasm. Firstly, the Conservative party, with its right-wing ideology, makes me uncomfortable in a lot of ways. To be sure, so does the Liberal party… plus, I’m just annoyed with the Liberals in general. But that doesn’t mean I think that Harper’s renamed and thinly-veiled Canadian-Alliance-Reform-whatever party is the answer either.

Plus, the Conservative gain in popular vote is unlikely to translate into seats. No party can get into power without a fair number of seats in Quebec as well as in the ROC, and the Conservatives are nowheresville here in Quebec. The Bloc is going to gain from the Liberal downturn here, while the Conservatives gain elsewhere in Canada. It may mean a minority government for Martin’s Liberals, but it’s still going to be a Liberal government.

Equally nuts are the theories speculating about cooperation between the Tories and the Bloc. One only has to give a cursory glance to their respective platforms to realize that it would be like a marriage between a bird and a fish. They say politics make for strange bedfellows, but these two parties are so far apart that it would be a ridiculous alliance. A Bloc-NDP cooperation deal is much more realistic, as both parties are far-left on most social issues.

In fact, the only party to gain significantly from a minority government is likely to be the NDP. Their far-left platform will gain visibility and importance if the Liberals need them to oppose the Conservative opposition and pass legislation. And however you spin it, that’s not good news for Canada.

28 days till the election.