Outrage: When will somebody invent the Internet!?

[Zkribbler]

Has anyone else noticed this trend with businesses? They want you to contact them by Internet and then they go out of the way to make it a pain in the butt for you to do so.

I had to contact my bank in the U.S. I had to use their own internal e-mail site to contact them. They responded back only on their own site, so I didn't find the response until a month after I needed to info.

I had to contact a governmental ageny here in the Phils. I has to set up an account at Google.mail in order to do so. They only respond to the Google.mail address.

I now have to contact my retirement provider. Guess what? The only way I can do so is to sign up for an account at Windows.mail!

I don't want e-mail addresses scattered all over, each with its own separate name and password! I want ONE place I can go and check to see if I have e-mail!! Is this too friggin' much to ask?!?!?

[Space05us]

Someone needs to invent the telephone, it would make all of that much easier. Talk to a live person and solve your problems on the spot.

[asleepathewheel]

two email accounts and use of a bank's internal system is pretty lightweight. I have 3 active personal accounts, hotmail, yahoo, and gmail (primary) and two work emails that are equally active and aren't synced, one of which I have to remote in to use if I'm at home or my field office. Oh, and I have another sbcyahoo account that came with my dsl, but I've synced it to my other yahoo account. ugh

[zakubandit]

I have a live email, hotmail, yahoo, gmail, and my work email. the live and work I use for work, the hotmail for family *too much junk*, yahoo and gmail for students, course work, and yahoo exclusively for things that have to do with my old band I was with *I hold all rights to lyrics, bass lines, and guitar riffs so my old guitarist works through me to get stuff done*. When I have to contact one of my banks its always press 1 for English then go through some standard crap, then routed, press 1 for English, enter account number *again*, then speak with someone, give them the account number again, get what I need. This is every bank I use, except my local China banks. I hate banks, royally hate them, but it isn't easy sending cash across oceans.

The days of live with people is over, machines are key. And English is a request, not a standard.

[Japher]

Didn't Al Gore have something like an interweb or something?

[Kuciwalker]

I have a work account, a Gmail account, and a school account that forwards everything to the Gmail account so I never have to look at it.

[-Jrabbit]

Hmm, sounds like a security-focused solution that says "screw customer service."

I maintain six accounts currently, 4 of which I actually use. My primary, then my business, and two at my primary client's URL, all synched through the Entourage client. Unsynched, away from my business life, I've got Gmail and (rarely if ever used) Yahoo.