I must really be out of touch

[VintageMusclecar]

with the way businesses are run these days.

I just called a parts house to place an order for a part for my Suburban. After innumerable button-pushing prompts I <span style="font-style: italic">finally</span> managed to contact an actual living, breathing human being on the other end of the line.

&quot;Can I help you?&quot; the young lady asked.

&quot;Yes, I'd like to place an order please&quot; I replied.

&quot;You can do that online on our website, I'd be happy to walk you through it&quot; she replied.

&quot;Thank you, but I prefer to speak with a person when I'm placing an order, I don't care to place orders online.&quot;

*Insert the sound of crickets chirping here*

&quot;Well sir, may I ask why you don't want to place your order online?&quot; she replied, with a clear hint of agitation in her voice now.

&quot;I just prefer to interact with a human being when I spend my money. I don't even use those self-checkout lines at the supermarket, I prefer to interact with a cashier.&quot;

&quot;Well sir, we're phasing out our phone ordering system, they plan to eliminate it completely by the end of the year, so you'll have to place your order on the website. Again, I'll be happy to walk you through it.&quot;

&quot;Thank you, but that's OK, I can do that myself. Good bye.&quot;

Call me old-fashioned, whatever, but dammit, if I'm going to spend my money somewhere like that I want to deal with a friggin' human being! This may be hard to believe, but I have <span style="font-weight: bold">never</span>, not even once in my life purchased anything online from a website shopping cart, and I have no intentions of doing so anytime soon.

I am sad to say this company has just lost me as a customer, and I've done quite a bit of business with them too. But if I am going to be denied the simple privilege of speaking to a human being when I want to order something then I will just have to take my business elsewhere.

I know someone's probably going to say I'm being curmudgeonly, but I don't care, that just bothers the hell out of me. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/mad.gif[/img]

If this is the present/future business model of America, I'm screwed.