Going into the third trimester, I hadn’t remembered just quite how unbalanced you can become with your posture though, and so after an afternoon meeting that day, I was walking back to my car when I turned my ankle and went flying across the pavement, smashing my head on the ground and splitting open my knee. A passing taxi driver had to help me up along with an elderly lady, and I hobbled to my car, a bit shaken up but knowing I had to get back to pick my son up from nursery. My knee was really starting to throb by then and I had an egg coming up on the side of my head, so the lovely ladies at the nursery bandaged me up and gave me a cold compress whilst I sobbed and my husband rang the doctors. I went to get baby and I checked out, and all was ok, my wounds were redressed and I was sent on my way.

All this was infinitely less painful than the problems encountered when trying to order some artwork for our son’s room, which we are making the first to be redecorated in our new house. We used Etsy for the first time to try and support smaller producers, and our first order arrived quickly with no fuss. The second order however proved more difficult, as this seller had only two options to pay – PayPal or cheque. The option to check out as a guest did not work via PayPal and, resenting being forced to make a PayPal account, we opted to pay by cheque. Unfortunately the seller had not included who to make the cheque payable to in the details and despite a couple of attempts to contact him, we had no response. This meant we had to contact Etsy direct to try and cancel the order. Well at least the ensuing nonsense took my mind off any immediate pregnancy anxieties.

We emailed to tell them the issue with contacting the seller, and asking how to cancel the order. The response didn’t get off to a great start with the greeting:

‘Hello this’

Mmm..bit impersonal but moving on.

‘Thank you for taking the time to reach out to Etsy…blah blah blah…I’m happy to assist you with this matter. Unfortunately, we are unable to assist you with this matter.’

Sorry, what? I just wasted a minute of my life reading that.

They then went on to ignore the question about cancellation and to advise we contact the seller about the cheque – the same seller who wasn’t responding to queries.

The email ended with ‘Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me by replying to this email. Best, Christine’

I’ll tell you what Christine, I’d like to reach out and pluck your addled brain from your skull, wring out the bullshit and place it back. I mean, what is this meaningless language, which hides a total disinterest in resolving anything, dragging out an issue in the hope you will get so frustrated you forget about it. The insincerity of the communication that seems to form much of modern day retail correspondence is what is so insulting. I think I would respect companies more if they actually expressed their real intentions:

Hello wanker,

I’m going to send you a load of generic nonsense that doesn’t answer your initial enquiry but I’m going to patronisingly imply I’m trying to help you out, whilst actually not giving a shit. I’m going to bypass any responsibility for your sale experience, despite making money from the sellers. If you have an issue with this, feel free to get back to me, and I will continue to not care less, whilst wearing down your resistance. Lots of love. Your nemesis.

Image from Pixabay