First of all, happy belated 4th of July. I'm just so proud to be an American...riight. Rather than focusing on all of the problems with America (poverty, racism, corruption, poor education, pollution, etc.), I'll focus on why America kicks ass (the Internet, turning on a red light, barbeques, eating 60+ hotdogs in 12 minutes, Dr. Seuss, and most importantly, freedom..ish).
Eh, sorry about that. I totally forgot I'm probably the biggest cynic I know. My most recent run at my local FedEx Kinkos made me realize how crappy customer service can be.
Still unemployed after a few months, I finally received some remotely encouraging reply email from some companies that I applied for. For awhile, I was kind of getting aggravated at the "you-suck-on-paper, we-don't-want-you-template-denial" email. Yeah, you guys know about it right? For those that don't, here are some samples (oh yeah crtl 'c' crtl 'v' baby, or in my case apple 'c' apple 'v'):
Note: Company Names and positions changed for privacy/humiliation reasons. Enjoy.
Example 1:
I wanted to express our appreciation for your interest in 1234BR, Student Intern. However, after careful consideration of your qualifications, a decision has been made to extend an offer to another canidate whose background is more in line with the project requirements. In the event that an internship opening occurs that is applicable to your background, please feel free to apply again.
Pssh, they spelled 'candidate' wrong, I can't take a company seriously when they start misspelling in formal emails. I didn't want to work for you anyway. Keep 'extending' out to those other nobodies with spectacular 'backgrounds'. Apply again? I'd just get denied AGAIN. I see that your job is to break down people's confidence by incessantly denying them. I see what you did there...Well I'm not playin'
Example 2:
Thank you for your interest in Crap Inc. and for giving us the opportunity to review your credentials for the position of College Intern. After careful consideration, we regret to inform you that we have decided to pursue other candidates that more closely fit the requirements of this position.
I really hate these types of emails, especially that 'we regret to inform you' part. Yeah, damn straight you better regret it. I feel like those rejected American Idol contestants when I get this type of email. It's the "I'll show you! One day I'm gonna be famous and then you're gonna regret it. They don't know what talent is." feeling.
Example 3:
Hi there. I got your message. I apologize for not updating you sooner. WE did select our interns, We had so many resumes that we narrowed it down to candidates who had done previous internships. Thank you for your interest!
Oh yeah, had to capitalize 'we' huh? Was it you and your dog? I'll just say this was from some GM marketing company. Look where you ended up now huh? I could have turned things around for GM, but "nooo, we want people who had previous internships". What kind of logic do these HR people have? Seriously? That last 'thank you for your interest' that they usually put at the end of every rejection email is a nice big FUCK YOU, we don't NEED anymore people, especially...YOU!
Hypothetical scenario: So the people who may have had their rich moms and dads hook them up (yeah, too much sucker free sunday on MTV2) with an internship will more than likely be in the running for another internship the following year. What kind of bullshit is that. It's the entire dilemma with the workforce today; hey, we only want to hire people with 'x' amount of years of experience, but yeah, we're not going to offer any experience to anyone. No experience? GTFO. So the people who are lucky enough to get an internship, will always prosper; while people who are working their asses off, looking anywhere and everywhere for a job to gain experience is left collecting welfare money or whatever. Rich stay rich, poor, get poorer..blah blah.
I could go on and on about how the U.S is not a meritocratic country and whatnot, but then it'll just sound like a college paper. And I'm not necessarily in the mood for that.
Back on track to why I'm not too fond of FedEx Kinkos at the moment. Alright, so I got some email recently saying they were somewhat interested in me...but they need more information. Oh crap. It was a long lengthy email, but basically, they needed my transcript. Oh double crap. After ordering my transcripts and getting them in the mail, I needed to go to FedEx Kinkos to have it scanned to a PDF and have it emailed to them. Right. No problem. Wrong!
Some of this frustration could have been avoided if I went there prepared (forgot to bring a flash drive), but eh, most places that offer some kind of service should just assume most customers are forgetful/unprepared and offer some respectable accommodation, but to no avail. So I walked in, greeted in by some woman at the counter.
Me: "Hi, I wanted to scan my documents into a PDF file and email it to myself."
Kinko's Woman: "Oh no problem, just use one of those work stations over there in that corner where the scanner is and scan your documents. By the way, it's 30 cents per minute. Do you have a flash drive?"
Me: "Oh darn, I have one, but not on me."
Kinko's Woman: "If you bring a flash drive, we can scan it for you and put it on your flash drive for 99 cents. We can't scan it for you and email to you for various reasons."
Me: "Oh thanks, I guess I'll try scanning it myself then."
Yeah, I really didn't want to make another 8 mile round trip from my house back to Kinko's to get a flash drive. If only I wasn't driving a Chevy Blazer that happens to do keg stands and power hours of gasoline, I wouldn't have minded. Stubbornly, I went to scan my transcripts hoping that my tech savvy-ness would allow me to scan two documents within 3-4 minutes to keep the cost of scanning the same.
Total fail. I guess the two years I have spent with my macbook have made me fairly illiterate with the windows interface. Yeah, I can go around clicking stuff, but it'll get me nowhere in terms of scanning documents. It also didn't help that the computer was logging every second I was on it with its ominous counter adding up the total cost of my session. I happened to scanned them, but they were blurry as hell. Thanks Adobe Acrobat. It also didn't help that their scanner was such a piece of crap. It must have been at least 7-8 years old, but I guess that is purposely there. The slower the scanner scans your document, the more it'll cost you since you're paying $0.30 per minute. Pssh. Absolute crap. After 10 minutes($3.00) of frustrating scanning and feeling dejected, I pissingly (you like how I made that word up huh?) walked out with the intention to return with my flash drive.
I returned, pissed off, but calmly walked to the desk again. Greeted by a man this time.
Grotesquely Hairy Kinko's Man: "Hi, may I help you?"
Me: "Hi, I came here earlier and tried to scan my documents to PDF at the self-scan center, but had trouble with the quality of the scan. I came back with a flash drive and want it scanned to my flash drive instead."
Grotesquely Hairy Kinko's Man: "Oh that's no problem at all."
In a matter of two minutes he had it scanned. Oh see! They have the kick ass scanner for the employees only. Those Kinko's rip-off artists. Hmm, is it Kinko's or FedEx ripping me off? Let's just say both. I'm an equal opportunity hater anyway. After he handed my flash drive back, I wanted to double check whether the quality of the scan was clear enough to see my crappy transcript. He plugged the flash drive back in and showed me. Perfect.
Me: "Oh do I owe you anything?"
Grotesquely Hairy Kinko's Man: "Oh, no charge, since you had trouble scanning it over there."
Ha. damn straight. I better not pay extra since I had already spent probably $8-$10 on gas money traveling back and forth. When I came back home, I wanted to get that entire fiasco over and email my damned transcript, but when I plugged in my flash drive and looked for my PDF document...WHAT? NOT HERE?!
That file was nowhere to be found. Space wasn't even an issue since it was an empty flash drive with no data on it. Grr. WTF. Complete fail. Aggh. It was on there when the hairy Kinko's guy showed me! Dejected once again, I went and took a nap.
So what's the moral of the story? Screw online applications/emailing out official documents. Don't trust merged companies, they will always have some hiccups; in corporate and at local locations. I learned recently that Staples can do the same thing. They supposedly make things "easy". It'd be ironic if I post another similar blog later in the week about Staples. Don't fail me now Staples.
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