The Wrong Email

UPDATED 08/19/2011 5:40pm
Unfortunately we now live in a non-humorous world where everyone lives in fear and feel they need to take legal action over anything for what ever reason (or at least claim they will). This is why I am forced to censor this post. Fortunately, for me, this post will retain it’s humor even with its anonymity. But I will state this about this unnamed business: I find them to be highly delusional if they think my blog will cause them any harm. Just ask the Velcro Pygmees. For someone to threaten legal action over a such a post like this one is completely ludicrous. They wouldn’t even have known it was here if I hadn’t emailed them the link. I can understand their concern over the fact that I do have their employees info in this post. But you could get the same info (and more) from their website. Needless to say there IS a lot of grey area here, and it isn’t worth my time to play in it. I also figured it would be best to keep them from spending money on an attorney, and instead, use that money to fix there BUSTED website!

Original but now “censored” POST ——————————-

I have been receiving emails recently from various staff members of (DELETED), who obviously have the wrong email address of another staff member there. I thought about just responding and letting them know they were sending emails to the wrong person, but where’s the fun in that?So I took an opportunity when I received the following emails:

---

On 8/19/2011 1:41 AM,  (DELETED) wrote:
Just a heads up…

Jon  (DELETED) is no longer allowed in the building.

Thanks

–
 (DELETED)

---

On 8/19/2011 8:19 AM, You (Me) wrote:

Damn it Ben! Now who’s going to give me hand jobs in the bathroom? It sure as hell won’t be you! Thanks a lot! Your a chode. Who gave you the ability to say who goes or stays? Wait, is this because Jon never gave you a reach around OR is this because he found out about you and Andrew? You are aware that we all know about you and Andrew, right? You are such a double dutch douche! By the way, this website design —>  (DELETED), sucks monkey balls. Looks like someone took a shit on my computer monitor. At any rate, I hope you have a good Friday, because I heard Jon is coming in later to chop your balls off.

---

** UPDATE 08/19/2011 12:58pm (cst): 

I just received another email from ANOTHER  (DELETED) staff member… And I responded again:

---

On 8/19/2011 12:55 PM,  (DELETED) wrote:
If anyone has monopoly twister dominoes or any other fun games can you let us know for tomorrows event?

Malissa “Mali” Hunter
Retnuh Productions Inc.

Growth & Influence through Truth & Respect…

 (DELETED)

Please excuse mispellings sent from Iphone.

---

On 8/19/2011 1:07 PM, You (Me) wrote:

 (DELETED),

I have a sugesstion for a fun game! It’s called “Corn-hole the Drunk”. You see you designate someone to be the Drunk and everyone else lines up and… Oh hell it’s hard to explain. Ask  (DELETED) in Operations to explain “Corn-hole the Drunk”. I believe he plays it every Tuesday, so we should go ahead and designate him as the Drunk. Other than that, I honestly would only be down for Twister if you were going to be playing naked. Just putting that out there.

Hope you think about it,
J

Oh by the way; Cheese signature quotes and iPhones suck!

---

** UPDATE 08/19/2011 1:35pm (cst):
I just received  a couple of responses to my last reply:

---

 Can never ever play drinking games ever! When we have liqour on premises we are liable!!!!

 (DELETED)

---

 What in the world? Has he lost his mind?

unknown person^

---

** UPDATE 08/19/2011 1:46pm (cst):
Still Responding:

---

On 8/19/2011 1:43 PM, (DELETED) wrote: 

BTW don’t ever call me  (DELETED)!!!!  It’s  (DELETED) to you unless ur my granny lol..

---

On 8/19/2011 1:53 PM, You (Me) wrote:

The typical response to your statement would be, “That’s not what you said last night”. But I will respect your wishes and dress up like your granny. Hey what ever floats your boat. But you have to admit, that is a strange fetish.

---

**UPDATE 08/19/2011 2:01pm (cst):

Fun is over.  (DELETED) seems to think I am a hacker. So I broke the news to her:

Hey  (DELETED),

No Gmails are being hacked. Some idiot at your company is using MY gmail address as his email contact for your studio. So when you send email to him or your “ (DELETED)” group, I receive the email.

But hey. Thanks for the fun!

#BoomSnickle
@JremyDeaton

——————————–

Censoring is something I can’t stand. I hate to fucking do it, so this is the last time. If this company want’s anything more than the above, they can suck it. And if they contact me one more time, threatening anything else, I will revert this post to it’s original form, and ride their legal thing as far as they want to take it. I mean it…. One more fucking word…. ahh ah!

Oh if you missed the uncensored post and you want to know who I am talking about, OOOOR… you are in Atlanta, looking for a sound studio Just do a Google search and look for the one with the busted website!

Adobe Muse beta, Hands On

So Adobe launched a beta version of their Adobe Muse today. This is a program where you can “Create websites as easily as you create layouts for print. You can design and publish original HTML pages to the latest web standards without writing code”.

This might sound like heaven to the many people with small businesses in need of a web site. But in all, that is just it. It only Sounds good.

As a web designer / programmer for the past 10 years, I can say that this is absolutely the worst product that Adobe has ever rolled out. Yes. Worse than Contribute! And I am ashamed to admit that before I gave it a test run, I felt somewhat threatened by Adobe Muse. Thankfully that feeling was short lived as I attempted to construct my first site with it.

Adobe Muse actually does what it says. You CAN create websites with ease with out writing code. However, it is what it doesn’t say that it doesn’t do is why I am writing this. After designing a fairly simple site, I went and inspected the code as any good programmer should. What I found was the nightmare of all coding “DONT’S” you could ever imagine. And as far as stating: “You can design and publish original HTML pages to the latest web standards without writing code”- That is a FAR stretch to be claiming as such, as per what I found, listed below:

1. Naming conventions for HTML elements and CSS styles had to be the ugliest thing over all. I had DIV tags with class names like “grpelem” and ids like “n1”, with no explination of what they stand for and absolutely no ability to change them to something I would prefer. In some cases they were given underscores before the name (e.g. _n1). Which is something that I never do in my HTML or CSS.
2. One doctype option. Or rather you don’t get an option. HTML5 “DOCTYPE” is all you get. I don’t mind that, but I know there are many people who still prefer using other doctypes.
3. Styling methods. This drove me nuts. There is no options for percentages or “em” when styling for the size of anything. Pixels is your only option. Which causes the most obsurd CSS coding I have ever seen when it comes to setting an element to 100% in the browser window. First off you have to physicly pull the sides of a rectangle (div) to either side of the page to make it 100%. Once you do that, take a look at the code and this is what you get:
   

   Adobe Muse Generated Code

4. This thing produces code that doesn’t validate. Need I even continue.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. There are other things that plague your pages using Muse. It will add on bloat files, such as unused jqurey files, empty DIVs. And I don’t even want to get into the whole cross browser compatibility thing here! Just expect some major issues with IE. I am, also defiantly sure SEO experts would sh*t a brick trying to work their magic around the code Muse produces.

Of course I can understand that this product was created with extreme beginners in mind. But I think it is inconsiderate of Adobe for giving said beginners a tool that will set their site up for failure.

Don’t take my word for it. After trying Adobe Muse out, I google “Adobe Muse crap” to see what I come up with. It returned with a result from another blogger who felt it didn’t even deserve a  lengthy post as I have written.

Overall I don’t see any benefit for this product, with the exception of quickly throwing up a mock-up site site for your client to review a “concept” of what you could produce for them. I would NEVER recommend Adobe Muse as an option for constructing an actual working site.

#BoomSnickle
@JremyDeaton 

A Little Hodge Podge

I went through some unfinished bits I had started to write and decided to post the good parts for your reading pleasure. I hope you enjoy.

I Need A Shower
Have you ever noticed that you always seem to run out of hot water, but there is never a shortage of cold water? Never in my life have I had to say “Honey, thanks for using up all the cold water! Now I can’t take a shower for like another hour.” Sure there are times when the cold water won’t turn on or isn’t working so your shower is scolding hot. But I bet if you leave that fucker on for a bit, it will cool down. It never seems to work that way with cold water.

Sometime I Think I’m Strange
Some people find me weird or strange and I am ok with that. Fuck‘em. They probably have a screw loose themselves. It is only when I personally find myself to be weird or strange is when I start to get concerned. Like when I talk to myself with out realizing it until the conversation with myself has gone a little too far. The other day when I was looking for a clean pair of pants to wear, I questioned myself, aloud mind you, about how good the pants were in the form of a Wizard of Oz reenactment. “Are you a good pair of pants? Or are you a bad pair of pants?” To which I replied “Why, I’m not a pair of pants at all!”

Loud And Clear
Oh damn! Someone gave me a microphone. It’s all over now, you know that right. I am in control. He who speaks the loudest is in command. Anyone with an amplified voice rules over everyone. It is a fact…. and an actual law (I think). It states, with-in the Amplified Voice law, that there are degrees of leadership. For however much louder your voice is over the other person, and the more people you can reach, determines how powerful you are. There by creating a chain of command, if you will.

Nothing To Fear But Fear Itself
Don’t you just love being afraid all the time? Don’t you just love living in fear? Our government with the help of our media has gotten the general public to be afraid anything and everything. And the worse part about it is that if there was nothing to fear, they would find a way to make us be afraid of that. News reports would be something like this: “Could this lack of nothing to fear mean that we should be on high alert? Does this mean something bad is going to happen? Find out next as Bob discusses every possible way to die!”

What Does It Mean?
I found this one sentence all by itself in a single “Untitled Document”:

Watching a really crazy movie because a documentary told me too.  

I am not sure what it means or what I was talking about, but it must have been really important for me to make a note of it. I am sure the fate of the world has something to do with this sentence. The clue is in the word “too” and its misuse. I’m sure of it!

I’ll Have What He’s Having
The majority of our society is nothing but lemmings. Most people will believe anything you present to them in a professional way, i.e. the media. And half of those people will buy anything that is presented to them by celebrities and entertainers. Case in point: Have you noticed that for the past few years when a particular liquor is mentioned in a popular song it becomes the thing that everyone thinks that they have to buy and drink? That would be an awesome power to have! If it was left up to me, I would have people drinking some nasty fucked up shit. I seriously think I could have quite a few people up in the club sippin’ on a bottle of Pennzoil or Pine Sol on ice! And you know the manufactures are happy as hell to get the publicity… Well Pine Sol might question it a little bit. “I don’t know Jeremy. I am not sure we want people to drink our product. It is probably harmful and we aren’t sure we want to deal with numerous law suits.”

I say, fuck that! Slap the words “Drink Responsibly” on the bottle and you’re covered. It works for all the other liquor companies… “Hey! We aren’t responsible for him drinking himself to death. We clearly said to drink responsibly!”
Can you imagine the liquor companies just hoping that they will be mentioned in a song as some point? I know the makers of McCormick Vodka are just sitting there wondering “When are they gonna say something about us in a song?”

#BoomSnickle
@jremydeaton

BBB / Breaks Plus Final

Well it seems that my assumption about the BBB in my previous post (http://bit.ly/dP7Ck2) may be highly accurate.

“leads me to believe that the BBB complaints may be easily resolved by the companies that subscribe to the BBB despite the consumers protest”

Yes, I am still droning on about Breaks Plus and the situation I had months ago, but more so now about the BBB process and outcome, which I will drone on about later. First, I will state, that I really am over the whole Joe Gamp, Dave Myers thing, I promise! I have come to terms that their asinine way of handling irate customers, such as yours truly,  is the best that they can do. Think about it… When your job requires you to lie to your customers on a daily basis, it hard to know what to do when one of those smart people come in and you calls you out. It is understandable that you will want to become aggressive, defend your territory by verbally and physically pushing that threat away. Hey, it’s what dogs do! It is also perfectly logical that you would feel the need amp your self-confidence about your inferior intellect by stating that your opposer is, for a lack of a better word, crazy. Hey it’s what politicians do! So with the realization of these things being just a fact of life, I am, in all sense of the word, DONE with Breaks Plus and it’s ill tempered employees. That is, unless Dave Myers, makes good on his word to sue me. To which I would have to go ahead state is just plain ludicrous for reasons that I mention in this earlier post.

Now on to the BBB… IS the BBB a joke? A scam? Helpful? Lets find out:
BBB is a joke – http://bit.ly/bbbJoke (google search results)
BBB is a scam – http://bit.ly/bbbScam (google search results)
BBB is helpful – http://bit.ly/bbbHelpful (google search results)
You be the judge.

While I am intelligent enough to know that the BBB does NOT resolve issues between a consumer and a business, I still find their system highly flawed and their existence to be a complete farce and pointless. Using my experience as an example, proves this to be true. Take some time and read over the details of my case (download it here .pdf)*. If you notice most of my initial complaints or concerns where never addressed by either the company (Breaks Plus) or the BBB. Even after I presented the BBB with my statement as to why I didn’t accept Breaks Plus’ response, the BBB some what regurgitated the company’s response in their case summary. All the while, they completely omitted a few of the points that I noted, even from my original complaint.

It seems I was a little naive in thinking I could “rock the boat” so to speak by trying to affect the BBB A+ rating that Breaks Plus currently, and will continue to have. An A+ rating? I’m sure they are having a nice chuckle at my expense. But I have come to the conclusion that an A+ rating, in and of it’s self, should have set off a red flag to begin with.

Think about it:
BBB – An organization that… Well you can read all their sugar coated goodness here. This is an organization who spends most of there over all time and resources taking consumer complaints. Complaints! That’s pretty much all they do!
Breaks Plus - An Auto Service business… A business that is synonymous with scamming, over charging, sabotage and down right dishonesty! Need I say more.

You do the math – Auto Service + Complaints =  A+ rating
Ha! Not in this lifetime!

If the BBB really can do nothing more than throw their hands in the air and “administratively close” a case, then I ask, why do they exist and what are they good for? And if they “administratively closed” a case, wouldn’t that indicate that there was no resolution, and there by reducing said business’ BBB ranking? You would think, right? Not so. It counts more as a free spin. Which makes me liken them to a corrupt cop at a mafia trial.
Over all, any dealings with the BBB is a big waste of time. In fact, in looking into this matter, I found more often than not, that if a company advertises as a BBB accredited business, it’s because they need to present that false sense of assurance, because of numerous issues in their past.

Over all, I am not complaining because I did not get the resolution I requested in my original complaint. Hell I got my money back by calling my bank and telling them that Breaks Plus didn’t provide the full service I paid for, as stated on the invoice I received from them. And I’m sure, unless they are complete dicks to everyone, Joe Gamp and Dave Myers are not getting fired. I am more or less clarifying the USELESSNESS of the BBB.

You know what’s USEFUL? This blog post, one’s like it and online user reviews. You see, things like that don’t accredit anyone or anything. User opinions are a far more influential and more meaningful than a falsified organization rating. Speaking of rating… Do so below.

*As always the BBB does provide a link to the consumers case. However, I did not post it here for two reasons. 1. It contains some personal contact data that I don’t want just anyone to have and 2. I am not to clear on the BBB’s policy about posting such a link.

#BoomSnickle
@JremyDeaton

TweetCaster / Facebook Integration

UPDATE 08/12/2011:
I have not used Tweetcaster as of version 2.8. Therefore I will not provide anymore assistance for integrating Facebook, and discontinuing any updates to this post. As of date the current version of Tweetcaster is 3.5 and I am unaware if Facebook integration is still a confusing issue.  If anyone knows that the instructions below no longer apply, please inform me so I may remove this post. Thank You. J.

Normally I don’t write tech how-to post… Well actually I never do. However I thought that this was needed because I had an issue with this particular subject and no one seem to have a real clear answer. So when I figured it out I thought I would share.

At the time this post was written, the version of TweetCaster is 2.6 (Current Version now 2.8)

**Note: Currently TweetCaster only allows you to POST  your status to Facebook and that is it. You can NOT comment on, “Like” or even view anyone’s FB status. As far as I know, you can only view the FB status you posted with TweetCaster. I have noticed related search queries that lead to this post asking if such a thing is possible…. Answer: Nope!

Steps 1 and 2 can be done in either order and will not affect anything. But you can’t complete step 3 without completing or verifying these steps first.

I am assuming that you already have TweetCaster installed on your device and you have already signed into you Twitter account within TweetCaster. Otherwise, if you have yet to install TweetCaster, then scroll down to the bottom and read the “*Alternative Setup“

Step 1. Adding your Twitter account’s email as a “New Contact Email” in Facebook.
This is the main reason why some people are having an issue with connecting TweetCaster with Facebook. It is the one step that is not so “self explanatory”, and is what caused me to write this post.

Some people may have used the same email to sign up for Twitter and Facebook, and this email address may already exist for both accounts. If so, move on to Step 2. But if you are like me and used a different email address to sign up and sign on to Twitter, as to Facebook then keep reading.

1. Go To you Facebook and select Account -> Account Settings -> and select the “Email” section under “Settings” tab.
2. Under Email settings there is an input field where you can add “New Contact Email:”
   
3. Enter the EMAIL USED TO SIGN IN TO TWEETCASTER. This is the same email use for your Default Twitter Account that you initially used to sign into TweetCaster.
4. A confirmation email will be sent to the email address you added. Click the link in that email and now your newly added email is confirmed.

Step 2. Connect your Twitter account to Facebook.
Ok, I know, to most, that this is a no-brainer. And I know most you have got this step down, but I want to make sure I got this thing covered completely for everyone.

1. Go to http://apps.facebook.com/twitter and you will see something like the screenshot below.
   
2. Click the BIG “Allow” button. You should then see something like this:
   
3. You can select any other options you want, however this step is done!

Step 3. Finally connect TweetCaster to Facebook.
*(Only if you already have TweetCaster installed on your device and you are logged into your Twitter account)

1. Open up that nifty TweetCaster app for whatever device you have it on.
2. Touch that little Pencil/Speech bubble icon at the top right of the initial screen.
3. This takes you to the screen you use to type out your tweet. Now tap the Facebook icon at the bottom left of the text input area.
4. You will now be at a screen for inputing your Facebook login.
5. Where it says “Username or Email” ENTER THE EMAIL YOU PROVIDED IN STEP 1. Again, this is the same email you use for you Twitter/TweetCaster account login.
6. UPDATE!! – Then enter you FACEBOOK Password in the “Password” field.
   (This was a slight over site on my part and I appologize. Again I don’t really write how-tos so please bare with me.)
7. Tap “Login” Then tap “Allow” on the next screen.

NOTE: If at any point you ever change your Facebook password, your integration needs to be reset. Open TweetCaster settings and select “Facebook login reset” and proceed with Step 3 using you your NEW Facebook password at #6.

There! You are now done. Now you can Tweet and update your Facebook Status all you want. Now if only TweetCaster alowed you to VIEW Facebook status updates.

*Alternative Setup

Of course there is a Reverse method to getting TweetCaster/Facebook integration to work, but only if you want to change your email used for Twitter.

1. Login to Twitter in your browser.
2. Change your email address in your Twitter profile to the same one that you use for Facebook.
3. If you haven’t yet, install TweetCaster for your device.
4. Use your Twitter login when you start up TweetCaster.
5. Proceed to Step 3.2. from above.

For this Alternative Process, I had to uninstall then reinstall TweetCaster on my device first. I can not confirm that this is necessary for all devices.

Like I said, this is what worked for me. If anyone has any other helpful tips reguarding TweetCaster/Facebook integration, please feel free to add into the comments.

#BoomSnickle
@JRemyDeaton

Boycott Brakes Plus BBB Response

I know some of you may be sick of this subject, but I’m not posting this for you. For all those interested, I finally got a BBB response to my complaint from Brakes Plus. I will let the ridiculousness speak for itself:

Read First:
http://thejremydeaton.wordpress.com/2010/11/30/boycott-brakes-plus/
http://thejremydeaton.wordpress.com/2010/12/02/boycott-brakes-plus-cont/

Breaks Plus Response to my BBB complaint:

After hearing the exchange between Mr. Rowland and the store personel upon his arrival I asked our Service manager to immediately pull in his vehicle and perform the test to hopefully get him on his way asap. When the inspector came to me stating the vehicle had several monitors that were not reset and the vehicle would fail the inspection I instructed him to bring the customer into the shop to show him the computer screen and prove that we had no way to manipulate the test results.Upon hearing this Mr. Rowland became very unruly with our employee and demanded that he would not leave until we had placed an inspection sticker on his vehicle. I stepped in and attempted to reason with him explaining that I would do everything I could do to help his vehicle pass the test. I asked our inspector what he thought needed done to pass. His statement was that if the initial problem was indeed repaired he simply needed to drive the vehicle a sufficiant number of miles (usually 150 or so) so that the computers could reset which is normally explained to the customer by the establishment performing the repairs. I explained to Mr. Rowland I would be more than happy to give him a free retest even after the 15 grace period to help him out. This was not good enough as he stated the only thing that would satisfy him today was for us to place a sticker claiming the vehicle had passed the state mandated inspection when it simply had not. I attempted to show him again how that there is no way for us to manipulate the test to force the vehicle to pass or fail. At this point he became more unreasonable and I finally asked our technician to pull his vehicle outside the shop so that Mr. Rowland could leave. Once outside I again attempted to reason with him explaining that I wanted to assist him in any legal way that I could-giving him my name and offering a hand to shake. He refused the gesture climbed in his vehicle and left.

My “Don’t Accept” Response:

(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
In response to this statement, I can only say that it is vague at best, while the events that are discussed in its contents are presented incorrectly, all with the intention to avoid some of the more serious accusations in my complaint. First off this testimony does not initially identify who is responding, which makes even the first sentence a complete fabrication. Even though this seems to be Mr. Gamp’s testimony, there is no way his statement here holds any value, and is completely untrue. He may have been informed about my initial exchange with the store personal. However, he was never a witness to it, as he seems to indicate in this response. In fact, he was no where to be seen until later when he approached me later in the service bay and proceeded to yell at me and invade my personal space. An action I complained about ad nauseum, and consider an overwhelming factor in my original report to the BBB, which is never admitted, denied or even addressed in this statement by this company’s representative. The fact that his testimony begins with a false statement should immediately discredit any statements that follow in his response. At no point did I ever demand that I “would not leave until they had placed an inspection sticker on my vehicle”. I am highly aware that these inspections are “mandated” by the state, and a demand such as that would be ridiculously useless. What I actually expressed, was that I should be compensated in some way for the inconvenience of their misinformation; All the while insinuating that they were possibly trying to take advantage of a situation, in order to make a profit. This was when Mr. Gamp aggressively approached me and escalated the tension. His offer, as stated in his response, for a retest after the 15 day grace period is untrue as well. At the time this encounter occurred, he offered that the test that they were presently conducting was to be the free retest and nothing more, because by that time, their only intention was to have me leave. Regretfully, I can not accept this response. Again, none of my overall complaints of aggression expressed by Mr. Gamp were admitted, denied, or even addressed in order to make this company’s response even remotely acceptable. I also don’t believe a formal response of my complaint should come from the source that provoked my complaint to begin with in a situation such as this. Their response was more of an attempt push fault from themselves and to discredit me, by falsely suggesting, three times, the idea that I had requested that they illegally pass my car. To make such an accusation, when nothing of the sort EVER accorded is an outrage. In fact, I will use this accusation as a means to extend my complaint even further and letting it show what kind of ethical values this company has. I can not accept this response from Mr. Gamp. Nor will I accept any future responses from a Dave Myers, General Manger. My formal complaint to him resulted in his assumption that, because I filed a BBB complaint and wrote a negative review about my experience, I am a “crazy person” who is merely an isolated case. I am still waiting for an appropriate response that addresses my complaints along with the action taken within my original resolution.

Mmmm…. Now that’s good reading!
* Yes I am aware that I misspelled “occurred” in my statement above… Damn internet spell check! There are possibly more.

UPDATE: MONDAY, JANUARY 24 2011-

In reviewing my case on the BBB website, recently I noticed a detailed overview of my BBB complaint process with this company:

01/04/2011	Receive Business Response (displayed above in original post)
12/28/2010	Member Pre-Suspension Notice
12/28/2010	Send Pre-Suspension Letter to Member
12/27/2010	No Response received from Member on Reminder
12/16/2010	Reminder of Dispute to Business – Member
12/16/2010	No response to first notice to member
11/30/2010	Notify Business of Dispute – Member
11/30/2010	Send Acknowledgement to Consumer
11/30/2010	Case Reviewed by BBB – Member
11/29/2010	Case Received by BBB

Take notice… It took over a month and a BBB “Member Pre-Suspension Notice” to receive ANY kind of response from Brakes Plus. I will just let that speak for its self. Currently the BBB has this case listed as  ”BBB Review Consumers Response” on it’s “BBB case#” page, as of my response on 01/06/2-11. However on Brakes Plus’ main BBB page they have 2 complaints listed as closed (one resolved and one administratively closed) with no others open at this time. I am Not sure if this includes my complaint, as the BBB doesn’t link to the complaint cases themselves. But keep in mind that the BBB isn’t a Government provided service to protect the consumer as most people tend to believe. The BBB is actually a non-profit organization, that companies subscribe to in order to maintain a more “professional” standing for consumers to review. This is not to say the BBB is favoring it’s subscribed companies over the consumers issues, because numerous BBB complaints can and will tarnish a company’s image. BUT… (and this is a big But), if my complaint is one of the two that is listed as “Administratively Closed” or “Resolved”, I wasn’t notified which leads me to believe that the BBB complaints may be easily resolved by the companies that subscribe to the BBB despite the consumers protest.

That being said, I am far from being deterred. Because in todays interslice world, it is my opinion that consumer review sites and… oh, I don’t know… BLOG POST, weigh more heavily than a BBB rating, when researching any product or company.

#BoomSnickle
@JRemyDeaton

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 2,400 times in 2010. That’s about 6 full 747s.

 

In 2010, there were 12 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 91 posts. There were 6 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 7mb.

The busiest day of the year was January 20th with 38 views. The most popular post that day was Valentines Day Takes Over, But Space Rockers Save The Day.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were velcropygmies.com, blogs.myspace.com, facebook.com, twitter.com, and opticalillusionsgallery.blogspot.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for mickey rourke, fear of glitter, stupid iphone 4, brakes plus, and anthrax vaccine eczema.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

Valentines Day Takes Over, But Space Rockers Save The Day February 2009
1 comment

2

Velcro Pygmies: The Return of the Crappiest Band Ever March 2009
28 comments

3

Top Ten Man Crushes September 2009
1 comment

4

Me and The Anthrax Vaccine! January 2010

5

Fear of Glitter August 2009
2 comments

Boycott Brakes Plus Cont.

Well I promised I would post an update about my current situation with Brakes Plus. And, wow! I have no idea where to begin on this one. I can state that I am no longer promoting a boycott on the Frisco, Brakes Plus location. No, I did not give in. I am now extending my boycott promotion to cover, not only every Brakes Plus service location, but the company as a whole as well. This is, of course, a result from the insulting remarks, uneducated claims, and out right unprofessional behavior from the General Manager at Brakes Plus corporate, Dave Myers.

On a side note here, Dave Myers told me if I wrote about him (after telling him I would), he would in return sue me for liability, although I think he meant slander. Either way I would have to question if he took company time and equipment (company phone) to threaten me with legal action for his own personal reasons… Or if he was taking the liberty to represent Brakes Plus and stating for Brakes Plus, that I would be sued. Either or, he really wasn’t too clear about it.

So anyway. I had made all my formal complaints as I stated in my previous post and I was awaiting a resolution when I received a call from aforementioned Dave Myers at Brakes Plus corporate. Did I get an apology? Did I get a refund? No. I didn’t even get the usual lie of “We are personally taking care of the mater”. Nope. Instead I was treated like I was the only person in this whole world that had a complaint against them. Well based on the numerous complaints I found online, I had to wonder if this is their usual SOP in handling dissatisfied or mistreated customers.

When I spoke with Mr. Myers he had first asked if I was Jeremy Rowland or Jeremy Deaton. Little did I know, when he had told me in our previous conversation, that he would investigate the matter, he meant he was going to investigate only me. His tone when he asked about my identity sounded as if he thought he was a genius for catching someone using another identity. However, if he did his investigation a little less inattentively, he would have realized that I make no secret about Jeremy Rowland and JRemy Deaton being one in the same. However, even though I knew why he asked this question, I acted confused as to why he was trying to identify me as either one so could tell what route he was going to take. You see, if he knew to address me as Jeremy Deaton (actually JRemy Deaton) that means he had already read my previous post and/or my Google HotSpot Review, and probably wouldn’t take me that seriously. For some reason companies don’t take online reviews that seriously, and consider them to be random griping. But if he was addressing me as Jeremy Rowland, the person who had filed a complaint with the BBB, he would take me a little more serious. Honestly I really don’t see the difference between the two in this circumstance. The only real significant difference is that my BBB complaint is a stripped down formal version of my Google review and former post. The BBB doesn’t need my opinionated side comments. However, make no mistake, the complaints made, no matter where they were posted, should all be taken seriously. And I stand behind every word. But it seems that Brakes Plus has employed someone who thinks other wise. In fact Mr. Myers stated that my post, along with my BBB claim, were, and I quote, “Laughable” at best. He had also inquired why I went ahead and posted a review while not giving him a chance to reply to me about my complaint. I told him an experience is an experience none the less. An apology or refund may put me at ease, but it doesn’t take away what I had to experience. In addition, if he was attempting to address a “JRemy Deaton”, tells me he had no intention of replying, until he read my post. There by not taking a complaint issued through the BBB too seriously at all.

Mr. Myers then went on to suggest that my complaint was an isolated one, and he knew of no other complaints regarding the Frisco location. This leads me to believe that either he is out of touch or just lying, because there are plenty of online resources with reviews of that location and other Brakes Plus location, that would prove him wrong.

Other than that, after reflecting on it, the rest of my conversation with him was quite pointless. He expressed his knowledge (or lack there of) of auto service and state inspections. He asked me questions that were irrelevant at that point, and proceeded to talk over me when I attempted to answer them. All the while claiming I made no sense and that I was talking in circles. A great tactic, I might add, because it caused me to become extremely irritated and flustered at points. It was quite reminiscent of how Frisco’s Brakes Plus regional manger conducted himself. Which leads me to assume that this must be covered in the Brakes Plus “Management Handbook”?

“Chapter 3: What to do when a customer claims they are being scammed…  Just talk over them, claim they aren’t listening, and insinuate that they are just crazy.”

With all joking aside, I am sure most people will agree with me when I say that it is obvious that I am not the only “crazy” person in the world who has a complaint against this company. I am sure somewhere out there, there are many others who have been screwed and scammed by this and other auto service companies. So remember to chalk it up as a lesson learned and make it a point to fully educate yourself on anything any auto service company does or says about your vehicle before letting them service it.

And to Brakes Plus, I really can’t say too much. In a word, I will use a word your employee used to describe my complaint: Lunacy! In a world where people are a little more educated about their cars, it is kind of sad that there are still places out there that will try and take advantage of people. It is also, in my opinion, ridiculous that a family owned company in this day and age, would want to employ rude uncompassionate personnel who don’t care about repeat business and positive word of mouth marketing. Now, when someone mentions to me that they need to get there vehicle serviced in any way, I will not tell them where to go, but rather state, “Just don’t go to Breaks Plus”.

#BoomSnickle

@JRemyDeaton

Boycott Brakes Plus

The following is a true story

Given the title of this post I don’t mean boycott the Brakes Plus company and their ENTIRE chain of “Complete Auto Service” stores. Based on my personal experience, I truthfully can only promote a boycott for only one of their locations and its employees. However, if my story here is familiar to the experience that any reader has had at any of the other Brakes Plus locations, please feel free to comment and share your experience.

With that said, the following is my experience at the Brakes Plus located at:

9049 Preston Vineyard Dr
Frisco, Texas 75035
469-633-9717

Every year over the Thanksgiving holiday I take the opportunity to have my state inspection done. That’s when it’s due and that’s when I have time to get it done. So every year prior to this year I have taken my vehicle to the same place where I have all my auto services needs met. So why did I go to Brakes Plus this year? Well, I don’t live near my usual auto service store any more. I moved further up north to the land of Frisco. So when the time came around for my inspection this year I chose a place that was close and convenient. Wait. Did I say convenient?

I arrived at the Frisco Brakes Plus location a little after 8am on Saturday morning (11/27/2010) for my inspection. Other than a little hassle of acquiring my up-to-date auto insurance info (something that was my fault for not having the current card on hand), they were able to get my car in right away and begin the inspection. When it was complete they called me up to the counter, and I arose from my seat with the joyful feeling that I knocked one more thing off my annual to-do list. Then that feeling was ripped away when the employee at the counter told me that my car passed but they had to fail me because my “Check Engine” light was on. Naturally I was confused, because before I came into their store, this light was not on. When I questioned this fact, the employee, all in one breath, mind you, insisted that “I may have not noticed the light being on” and suggested that “I could have them perform a $75 diagnostic to see what was causing the light to be on.”

Let me break from my story and tell you that this is where it all goes down hill. And I may stray away from my usual creative style of writing, as I now just want to present you with what happened. You see I was understandably upset that my vehicle had failed, but that isn’t what maked me irate about the whole thing. It was this employee’s consistent arrogant attitude and his poor attempt to out right lie and scam me, that kick started my now ongoing disgust. But I digress.

Anyway, after a back and forth argument about whether the light was on or off to begin with, this idiot employee kept trying to sell my their $75 diagnostic. Really! You just spent two minutes calling me a liar! Do you really think I want to give you any business? So in my attempt to shut him up I informed him that, if needed, I will take my vehicle to an auto service location that I know will charge me less for a diagnostic. Well that was a huge mistake. That only instigated him to argue with me over the fact that they were the only ones who provided the cheapest diagnostic. To which I finally stated to him “I am aware that a customer is not always right, but if I am being adamant about something that I know is fact, based off of past experiences, then I am right. So Please just say “Okay” and leave it at that” Needless to say that I was loudly vocal, caused a scene and even went as far as to call the employee an Ass Hole. I figure if you’re going to make yourself stand out unintelligently, you should have a nick-name. After that I regretfully paid my $39.75 for my inspection with the intention of returning for a free re-inspection*

In the long run I seemed to have made a bigger mistake by returning. As a consumer I always want to take advantage of freebies and avoid shelling out more money when I don’t need to. However the following experience has proven that sometimes it’s better to just bite it and forget about the freebie.

Upon my second arrival to Brakes Plus (Monday 11/29/30) I instantly knew they would fail my inspection again, even after fixing the issue that they created. How did I know? Why, one of the psychic employees told me so. I bet you didn’t know that Frisco’s Brake Plus employees can tell you what’s wrong with your vehicle before they even look at it. I know I am joking, but hey, the employees at Breaks Plus love to joke. It’s true. I stood there watching through that window into their bay, as they pointed me out and laughed. Almost as if they were saying “Look at this guy. I can’t believe he came back”. Right then I knew I wasn’t going to be a satisfied customer.

A minute later the psychic/now aspiring comedian came out of the bay and addressed me by my first name like he was my friend. I quickly reminded him that he wasn’t and he was to address me properly at which he rolled his eyes at mere notion of doing so. He asked me to follow him into the bay. So I followed him to where they had my car and proceeded to be educated by the technician about the pretty lights on a machine that explains why my car still fails.

I then said, “Look. I am a web programmer by trade. I could show you lines of code and tell you that they are rainbows and lollipops and it still won’t make any difference to you. So what makes you think that I am going to comprehend anything you show me on a machine I would rarely look at, much less understand”

Of course his only response was to tell me that he was just trying to show me. I then told him my issue wasn’t what the machine is telling me (or what HE told it to tell me). My issue was that I DIDN’T have an issue before I brought my car into them in the first place. I continually stress the fact that they were the ones that caused the issue to begin with and I kept insinuating that it was very obvious they were trying to cover up a failed attempt to scam me. So I told them that they could either properly inspect my car or refund me for the inconvenience.

Then out of no where a man I hadn’t seen before comes running up to me flailing his arms and yelling at me. Telling me that “We are just trying to tell you need to do”. So I turn my attention to this man, who I now identified as another employee, and informed him that I was done with doing anything that THEY wanted me to do and that I wanted to be compensated. At which point he said that I could just leave. I went back and forth with this man for a bit still set on being refunded or properly inspected. And he continued to extremely invade my personal space while yelling. I had to ask him to stop yelling several times and I had to ask him back away from me a few times as well. I will admit that I was responding to him with a raised voice and with an angry tone. However, I am a customer that feels he is being cheated, and I did nothing that deserves this man’s highly aggressive behavior.

Finally he orders the technician to remove my car out of the bay and orders me to leave. I then realized that trying to rationalize with a person who was this aggressive could only cause more of a hassle than I want to deal with.

So I reminded him that Brakes Plus was a BBB accredited business and that, although he may not care, I was intent on filing a complaint. He told me to go ahead, and I asked him for his name. He said “My name is Joseph Gams**. I am the Regional Manager!” This really surprised me; because of his juvenile and highly unprofessional demeanor I wasn’t expecting someone with his type of behavior to hold such a responsible position.

I finally got in to my car and started it up. And in doing so my car lunged forward a bit and stalled out. I then noticed the technician had left my stick shift (standard) half in gear so it would cause the car to jerk and stall. When I looked up I saw the technician and Joseph Gams having a good laugh at my expense. I did everything I could to remain in my car and proceeded to leave.

And there ends my horrific experience with Breaks Plus. I have since made a formal complaint with Dave Myers (General Manager) at Brakes Plus Corporate as well as filed a complaint with the BBB as I had stated to Mr. Gams.

I am now awaiting a resolution. I of course demanded a refund of $39.75, and for the removal of Joseph Gams from his position or for him to be terminated completely. It is very clear that he is very incapable of performing a job that requires patience, maturity and a level headedness that he does not even come close to having. Even one of the technicians I was originally talking to showed more professionalism than this man.

I will update this post with any information regarding my filed complaints.

In closing I would like to encourage anyone with in the Frisco area to avoid this location at all cost. And will also leave you with some links for your reading pleasure.

Breaks Plus Corporate BBB page:

http://www.bbb.org/denver/business-reviews/brake-service/brakes-plus-car-care-center-corporate-in-centennial-co-15001385

Breaks Plus Reviews:

http://brakes-plus.pissedconsumer.com/

http://brakes-plus.pissedconsumer.com/brakes-plus-rip-off-20080910134825.html

http://www.insiderpages.com/b/3711921087/brakes-plus-aurora

http://www.insiderpages.com/b/3711726044/brakes-plus-denver

http://www.my3cents.com/search.cgi?criteria=Brakes+plus

Or just do a Google search:

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=hp&biw=1319&bih=668&q=brakes+plus+reviews&aq=1&aqi=g10&aql=f&oq=brakes+plus+&gs_rfai=CxB84ZCr1TI6yKo3MhQSa5pyCCgAAAKoEBU_QMZP4&fp=7f91a0a84a177348

*Offer to which upon failing your inspection you have 15 days to fix known issues you can return to same inspection location to have the inspection repeated for free.

**Joe, if I got your last name wrong, just let me know so I can correct it.

#BoomSnickle

Back Again?

Yeah… I have been slacking on this blog. Truth is,m I’m not to sure if I have any material right now. Everything that floats by in my brain that I deem worthy of sharing has been jotted down elsewhere and is being reserved for a future project.

Yes… I also missed my “Second Annual Velcro Pygmies Haters” week. Not that anyone would have noticed anyway. But come on… Do I really need to remind you that they suck shit out of a dead poodle’s ass. Plus I don’t need to be reminded by the always clever, Pyg-Heads (fans) that I can’t get laid to save my life.

Hey speaking of getting laid (Segue if you will)… BabyMew and I had a beautiful baby boy last month. But that is a good thing and not really in tune with the usual “bitching” that I do here, so I will move on.

So yes… I have been slacking on this blog. The last thing I wrote was in JULY. And it was about the iPhone. What? What kind of nerdy shit was that? If this blog has any theme to it, that post is no where close to it. I guess I felt like I needed to write about something and that’s what came out. I rank that down there with my first post I wrote.

With that said, here is another lame ass post stating that I will go back to writing at least one post a week. Yeah…. I can see you are all just so excited!

#BoomSnickle
Twitter: @JRemyDeaton