Things you wish you could say

[Brooks_]

. My question is, without knowing each other's passwords, are these accessible?

Yes and no. hackers could get around it but the average person not so much.

 

[Ascholten]

Firstly, when I turn on my computer, sometimes I see another wifi connection other than mine listed. I'm guessing it's my neighbor's...? So I'm thinking that they can see mine. My question is, without knowing each other's passwords, are these accessible? I'm assuming not, but you know what happens when you assume. Sorry if that is a dumb question... BTW, I do trust my neighbors. Thank goodness

Secondly, I'm wondering what will happen if we ever have a major claim with State Farm? We've had some car damage claims, but nothing on the house. Everything we have is insured by them.

Thirdly, I'm glad for this rant thread where people can say things they wish they could say. It really helps. And people (like @Ascholten) have been helpful. Thanks, everyone, for keeping this a civil discourse where we can all get things off our chests.

Sally, unless you hide it, yes they can see it, and even if you do hide it, it's still easily found. This is why it is very important to have a good strong password. They can NOT use your connection without knowing the password, but as seems may be the case with the person who OP'd they did not use the wifi so never changed the default password, which, ironically many times IS password, ie username Admin, password, Password, hackers know this and that is one of the first scans when detecting wifi spots, to see if they changed it off the router's default. They got better with newer routers, making you type in the mac id that is printed on the thing but still, older equip is vulnerable. So now we have totally innocent people getting dragged thru the wringer. Here's another tidbit, I don't even need your wifi pword, just needed to get in ONCE to your system. They already said, the company informed them, that router passwords were compromised. Ok, so I get in ONCE, I set up a botnet, or keystroke sniffer, etc, I can be in Hawaii, you in New York, I have access to YOUR computer. I can download movies on your computer, so YOU get blamed for it, then have it send them to me, or just go in and FTP them off, nobody else knows unless they are looking. A good pirate knows how things are encoded and how they hash them to trace them, it's eazy peazy to change a file to change the hash so it's NOT the file they been watching anymore and send it over. Without getting into details, it's too easy to do stuff on others machines and let them take the fall for it, It happens ALL THE TIME. You get the idea.

This person needs to GO AFTER their ISP though for that garbage. They did not deserve that, and it's terrible customer service.

Snake Farm. I can not honestly tell you how they will treat you. Unfortunately the only way you will find out is when you have a claim. They treated me like garbage after 30 years, and from what we are seeing here, same with other people. You might want to shop around, and to be totally honest, state farm is NOT the cheapest insurance out there either, they are awfully proud of their products. You may very well find better coverage cheaper anyways with someone else. See that is ANOTHER BIG PROBLEM. people get insurance, it works and are happy with it, they never do a check up on it. They stick with the same coverage for years and years, never thinking of upgrading it. The insurance company is tickled pink because they are charging you 3x 5x what that coverage should cost and you are not complaining. I found that when I switched away from state farm with my auto insurance, the new company i was going to said Oh my god,you are SO lucky you never got into an accident, you were sooo under insured it was frightening. Back in 1986 when I got the insurance, 100k insurance coverage was plenty... not so much in 2016. You think snake farm would tell me I was underinsured, nope, why would they, they were ripping me off and I was happy with it!! Everyone should do this once every few years. Shop around, even if you have never had a claim, shop around see if you can get a better deal, or if you do find one, re negotiate prices with your current to keep you. It can't hurt.

Agreed. People need a place to be able to speak frankly, and not have a bunch of Wilbur Milquetoasts wetting their manties over it.

Aaron

 

[Sally PB]

^^Thank you.

 

[gtaus]

Sadly I have found that you are a relic.

Sadly, Dear Wife also finds me a relic.

I cannot afford to go to war with the one and only ISP we have for our rural area. At least, not until I can find a substitute for their internet service. But they know they have monopoly in my area, so they don't much care.

 

[muddy75]

FYI: Driving without headlights does not conserve energy!!!!!!

 

[gtaus]

see if you can get in with USAA.

I was in the military and have almost all my insurance through USAA. Only a few claims over many, many years, but USAA has always been good to me. The house with State Farm insurance was my parent's house and I just kept that insurance when I took over that house.

But let me say, as a member of USAA for over 30+ years, they are not the same company they used to be, either. Many of the benefits and products I purchased from USAA over the years have gone away. All my investments I had with USAA have been farmed off to Charles Schwab - and I get screwed over by Charles Schwab all the time. I hate that company and am looking somewhere else to transfer my IRA accounts.

USAA used to have mortgage line of credit accounts but they no longer do that, either.

Even easy things with USAA, like printing out a copy of a transaction confirmation does not work in Windows native Edge browser. Evidently you have to use a different browser to print out your confirmation copy. Is there anybody left at USAA maintaining their online system?

And USAA customer service has taken a nose dive since the pandemic. Now you have to interface with an AI bot and go through a series of questions before they will even let you talk to a real person. And then, when the bot says you need to talk to a live customer service rep, you get a notice that they are too busy and try again later. I recently had a couple large checks to deposit, over $50K, which is a lot of money for me and exceeds my daily deposit limit. I tried to contact USAA to talk to them about depositing the insurance checks but nobody would answer. I ended up deposing those checks into my local Wells Fargo bank account and then setting up multiple transfers under my $5,000.00 daily transfer limit.

As a long time, satisfied, member of USAA, I find myself more and more disappointed with their service compared to yesteryear. Having said that, my local Wells Fargo bank won't even let you through their doors to get banking done. You have to use the drive up window, queued up forever, or make an appointment to talk to some maybe in the next week or two.

So let me rant about Wells Fargo a bit more. I caught them charging my elderly parents for some scam insurance they never signed up for in the first place. This was before the class action suit filed against Wells Fargo. My father brought me his bank statements and could not understand why he was getting overdraft fees. Turns out, Wells Fargo was automatically taking out money every month for that scam insurance. I made Wells Fargo reverse the scam insurance payments and reverse all the overdraft fees as a result. But I have always had a bad taste in my mouth after that experience with my parents and watch my Wells Fargo statements like a hawk. The only reason I have a Wells Fargo account at all is that my local small bank got bought out by a larger bank in Minneapolis, and then Wells Fargo bought out that bank. But I need a local bank account in case I need quick access to cash.

Whew, that was a lot to rant about. But I truly believe that customer service in most companies was much better in years gone by. Maybe it's just the fallout from the pandemic, and maybe things will improve over time, but I am not holding my breath. I don't like the move to more and more AI bots to get things done at the expense of real live people who have been trained to assist their customers.

But let me end on a positive note. I was in WalMart, checking out my own groceries and bagging them myself, when the self check out scanner double charged me for a large $5.00 bulk jar of pickles. I called over one of the assistants who reversed the charge. When I got home, I discovered that she deleted both the original charge and the overcharge, so I got my pickles for free! Makes them taste all the better!

 

[Ascholten]

Customer service sucks everywhere, and NO it is NOT just the pandemic, it's everyone not caring anymore. They all make you use that stupid AI bot before talking to a person, I think hoping you say $$# it and hang up before they actually have to spend time with you. I had to go thru that too when I was filing my truck claim, it's horrible and I hate it.

The home equity loans, I find many banks are NOT doing that anymore. used to be you could get a loan on the equity on your home, not anymore. I ask WHY? THEY know why, they know that these houses they shilled for 400 - 500k are not going to be worth 200k in a few years when the big crash comes AGAIN! So don't want to lend you money on something they know will be upside down and under water when it comes time to pay.

I do not think you will ever see real customer support ever again. It's either going to be a machine to spin you in circles, or someone who can't speak your language trying to rip you off by changing the prices IN your shopping cart (Yes im talking about you you $#%$ob's at Bluehost !! )

It used to be you would pick who offered you the most for your money, now it's trying to find who will screw you over the least.

Aaron

 

[gtaus]

FYI: Driving without headlights does not conserve energy!!!!!!

Well, if you have a well maintained and good running car, I would agree. However, I have seen some old beaters on the road that when they turn on the headlights, you can tell the engine is not keeping up with the electrical demand. It does take some energy to drive the alternator, so driving without your lights on would reduce the demand load and your car would not have to work as hard.

Years ago, I had a car that had a hard time keeping up with the electrical demand in the winter when everything was turned on, such as the main defroster on high, the rear window defroster turned on, and then turning on the headlights was enough to drive my voltmeter into the red zone. On that car, I would literally have to decide what needed to be turned on first, second, and then third. And I would have to watch the voltmeter on the dashboard and turn off the defroster until the voltage got back up into the green. Thankfully, my cars are much better now. But I still remember....

 

[Ascholten]

Wells Fargo. If anyone were to get bit by a rattlesnake I wish it was them.

When my parents died, I had to deal with the estate, and the probate and all that. They had a mortgage and a home equity loan. Wells Fargo tried every nasty trick they could think of trying to steal the house, foreclose on it etc etc. Ironstone bank on the other hand, bent over backwards trying to HELP ME. Banks as a general rule seem like they go out of their way to rob you, it's terrible what you have to put up with. They have YOUR money and act like they are doing you a favor by charging you fees, for holding and using YOUR money.

Aaron

 

[gtaus]

Customer service sucks everywhere, and NO it is NOT just the pandemic,

Although I don't get much satisfaction with my own rants, I do somehow seem to feel better after reading your rants. Go figure.