Questions are a burden to others............

[poltr1]

Mortgage update: I had the condo association's insurance guy fax a copy of the policy to my mortgage lender. A couple days later, I get another letter from them saying they need more information.

Today, I tried to fax a copy of the letter back to the insurance man, but it wouldn't go through, even after three times. And so I called the mortgage lender to find out what additional pieces of info they're looking for.

I got Vicky again -- the same woman I talked to last week. She asked for my name and loan number, which I can understand. But she also wanted the last four digits of my Social Security number, and the amount I pay every month. I presume this is for security reasons, which I'll discuss later.

After clearing the verification gauntlet, I found out that the information they wanted was the number of units in my condo complex. The policy they received had a total amount listed, but didn't list a total amount per unit. I told them and they said that was all they needed.

So I can check this off my to-do list. But I'm reasonably sure I'll go through this all over again next year, when the current policy expires, or the year after that.


Here's my beef with the whole process. First, they used form letters which aren't specific enough to my situation. Second, they didn't mail out the first notice soon enough, in my opinion. Third, I think they should be contacting my insurance man directly for this information, not me, now that they know who it is. And lastly, I don't understand why I need to give them so much personal information before I can even begin the transaction. What's the point? I'm trying to give them insurance information, not close out my account or make a withdrawal.

I'm not irritated with the person on the phone; they're just doing their job and following the instructions given to them. But I am irritated with the process that this bank and other companies use when people call them.

For some businesses and companies, specifically, credit card companies, I enter my credit card number via the touch-tone pad. Then when I finally get a human being, they ask for my card number again. Why? I've already given them that information once! If they'd only bother to check the call history, it should show up on their computer screen. Ditto that for the number I'm calling from. I'm sure they all have Caller ID by now, so they should know that information.

Then there is the personal information identifiers, like mother's maiden name, birth date, and Social Security number. In some situations, it's important to have a positive ID when conducting business over the phone. But these are poor identifiers to use.

A person's birthdate is too widely known for it to be used as a positive ID. And with all the interest in geneaology, it's easy to obtain a person's mother's maiden name. And the Social Security number was never designed to be used as a means of identification. I remember seeing some of the early cards, which said in red letters: NOT TO BE USED FOR IDENTIFICATION PURPOSES. Unfortunately, this has been conveniently forgotten. It's scary how many databases out there use this as a unique identifier.

I don't even give my Social over the phone, even if I'm the one making the call. I'll say "I'm sorry, I don't give that information over the phone". Or if I'm really irked, I'll say "I'm sorry, that's classified information". The telephone is one of the most non-secure communication devices out there. Land lines can be tapped, cell phone conversations can be eavesdropped upon (especially if you have an old radio scanner), and anyone within earshot of you can hear what you say. There are telephones out there which can encrypt and decrypt the signal (I'm thinking of the STU-III and STE phones, not DSS) when a special key is inserted in to the phone, and another such phone is at the other end. But these phones are rather hard to come by, especially outside of governement arenas. I really think banks and credit card companies should use this technology.

Lastly, is it the job of customer service to deliver exceptional service to their customers, or to be bureaucratic and annoying? Based on my experience, I'd rate my mortgage company's customer service department "average" to "mediocre".


Oh yeah. We got TP and paper towels yesterday. A case of each. Should be enough to last us a year.

Comments

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

There's a new movement away from using SS# as ID#. Unfortunately, it's not happening all that fast, not to mention all the legacy databases with just that setup. I expect that in five or ten years things will be better, but still not clear.

You guys are really sparing on your paper products. We go through three (?) of the large multiroll packs of paper towels from Costco/BJ's annually (then again, we use paper towels for napkins), and probably three to five large packs of TP.

[poltr1]

How many people do you have in your office/building? We have only 7.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

Ah. I thought you meant at home. That's what I was referring to.

This is a BIG office; we're a vendor/department with maybe eight people, on average (24/7) on this floor. But the rest of the floor, bank personnel, probably includes another forty or fifty folks, here mostly during office hours.