Big Company: 0; Stimey: $225

There is a Big Company out there that I consider myself to be at war with. They screwed me over with an order I placed a few months back. I placed a "same day" order for something only to discover four days and two trips to the store later that, huh, "someone must have deleted your order."

When, out of necessity, I resubmitted my $45 order, I received my same-day order the next day, but they were not the quality I was expecting. I was sorely disappointed in the company and the service, and wrote them to tell them so.

They didn't contact me for a long time until I finally got an email from them claiming that we had come to some sort of agreement over the phone (I had never spoken to them) and here's your store coupon for $25 that we said we'd send you. Oh, and by the way, it expires on January 19.

I was surly about the whole thing, but figured I would spend the $25 and then never go to the store again. And I told everyone I met that I was at war with the company, which is maybe a little dramatic, but, hey, have you ever listened to me?

But then I won a $200 gift card to the store from a blog contest.* See? Karma. Take that, Big Company!

But then I lost my $25 coupon. Part of me was devastated, because twenty-five dollars! And part of me was okay, because two hundred dollars! one hundred seventy-five dollars!

I used part of the gift card to buy a gift for Sam for Christmas as well as some batteries. Exciting, I know. But then I decided to use the bulk of it to buy me a digital frame to put on my desk. I kept meaning to buy it and meaning to buy it and forgetting.

Well, today, I bought myself a new wallet (trust me, it's relevant), and while I was going through my bag to transfer things into it, I found the coupon from the Big Company. Fucking A, right?

No.

It's January 20. If you recall, the coupon expired, oh, you're fucking kidding me, yesterday.

I figured that maybe the company's website was as dumb as the company itself, however, so decided to try to make my frame purchase online and apply the coupon. I found a frame that originally cost $169. It was marked down to $149. For some strange reason, when I put it in my online shopping cart, it gave me a $20 coupon, so it was $129. Then I put in my coupon code, crossed my fingers, and hit "Apply."

Bam.

$104. For a $169 frame. But lest you think that's where the story ends, you shouldn't underestimate the idiocy of Big Company. Big Company doesn't let you pay for things online with gift cards. I repeat: you can't use gift cards to buy items from bigcompany.com.

You see my dilemma, right? I didn't want to lose my $45 in coupons by buying the thing in the store, but I couldn't pay for it online. Not to mention, Really? Really, Big Company? What is this? 2005?

A short chat with customer service later, I saved my online shopping cart, gathered my documents, and drove down to the stupid store, after telling Quinn I'd buy him candy if he agreed to go. (And, no. I'm not proud.)

We got there, I pulled up my order on their little kiosk, and had to convince the guy that the address of the store on the screen was, in fact, the address of the store we were standing in. A few minutes and one corroboration from a different employee later, I was standing in line with my gift card and my stack of papers, ready to pay for the thing.

Does this seem overly complicated to anyone else? Oh, but we're not done. See, then the gift card wouldn't work.

"How much do you have on the card?" the guy (an entirely different employee) asked.

"About $160," I said.

"No, I need to know exactly how much is on it," he said.

Excuse me. I may need a moment. whatthehelliswrongwiththiscompany youareinsaneiamgoingtofreak outandhavetobeforciblyremovedfromthestore!!!!!

Okay. Better. The cashier had to call another employee over (that's four, if you're counting) to make my card work. "Hey, you're right! There's about $160 on it," he said. Then he tried to hand me the paper that said "CASHIER COPY" in giant, bold letters on the top, saying, "Here is your copy."

Well, needless to say, I left the store not entirely confident that my order had been placed correctly. But—and that's a big but—if it did get placed, I think that means I won this war. Take that Big Company.


* This is why I am not identifying the company. Not because I don't want to badmouth them on my blog (because I kinda really do), but because I don't want to disrespect the people I won the card from, who probably have a relationship with the company.

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