Holy Balls

I have been on the phone now with Kaspersky for 26 minutes and 9 seconds.

On or about October 10th I noticed that my virus software said that it had expired and was no longer protecting my darling computer.

That's odd, thinks I. I saw the payment come out for the renewal on September 27th.

So I contact Kaspersky to figure out what's wrong.

I got a delightful (ok not really, but he wasn't bad) guy who tried to upsell me to a better product at a 3 year renewal for only slightly more than I was paying now for one year. (Special introductory offer!)

I told him that was all well and good, but I had just paid for the renewal and didn't feel like paying for the service twice. Oh no, he said, you can get a refund for your renewal (of September 27) since it's within 30 days. I said I was doubtful, and I would need to first make sure I would get a refund before I would buy the upgrade. He was very patient with me as I called their accounts department and secured the refund (he couldn't do it, different department, of course) and then he took my money and gave me the new and improved virus software. (For what it's worth, I'm actually quite happy with Kaspersky, a product that framlingem introduced me to after McAfee failed to meet my expectations.)

Fast forward to November 4th when I still haven't seen the credit come through on my credit card. The charge is there for the new software, but not the credit.

So I'm on the phone with somebody in, I assume, Latin America (and to be clear, I don't have a problem being on the phone with somebody from Latin America, but I do wish she at least had a clue. Not understanding the language *and* being stupid is very difficult to deal with.)

So I told her that I wanted to check on the status of my credit. (By the way, I'm still on the call as I type this and we're now at 31 minutes, 37 seconds) And she said it had been posted. And I said, um... no it hadn't. And she was quite adamant that it had and sent me the email showing me that it had. Except the email that she sent was a copy of the invoice for the new and improved product, not the credit.

Hold on, I said. That's the invoice for the new and improved product, not the credit.

Oh. She said.

Why do you want a credit?

So I told her (again) about the upgrade and the refund.

(And, to be clear, all of this conversation has been punctuated by a lot of "holding")

So after a lot of holding, and asking, and more holding, she finally found the September 27th renewal invoice in question.

Except, lo and behold, she can't refund it because now it's more than 30 days past September 27th, the day it was applied to my credit card.

Um... yes, well, if you would have applied the credit when I requested the credit, I would have been within the 30 days.

Oh, yes, of course, she says.

And puts me on hold again.

Ok, I will now proceed the credit. She says

And why do you want the credit? She says

Because I have upgraded to a different product, I say.

Oh, and are you still using the old product? She says. (I kid you not!!)

Um.. NO, I say (Still managing to keep my temper) I. Have. Upgraded. To. A. New. Product.

And she puts me on hold.

And she comes back and tells me that she's unable to process my credit because I didn't agree to the terms and conditions (?) when I purchased it originally.

So I escalate it to her manager who listens to my story and has a credit issued within 5 minutes.

Total call time (according to my phone) 40 minutes and 9 seconds.

(25 minutes of which was me trying to decide if it was unseemly to pee in my garbage can since I was damned if I was going to hang up and go to the washroom, but my bladder was demanding some attention!)

Still, we'll see if the credit shows up within the 7-10 days as promised. It didn't last time.

I'll keep you posted.