So I just got an email from my brother. Apparently, I’ve been neglecting my blog for too long and he wants me to have at it. I offered to let him guest blog. We’ll see if he takes me up on it!
Anyway, work is going well, although totally exhausting. It’s hard being completely new after you spent nine years with your former employer. I’ve decided that being laid off completely sucks, and if I ever feel I’m at risk for losing my job again, I just might do what a lot of people around me did and bail before they can nail me.
Fortunately, I think my new job is secure, so no bailing required. Plus, I love what I’m doing and the people there are fantastic. I’m incredibly fortunate, even if exhausted.
I did think about blogging this weekend when I renewed my Norton subscription online. I read the fine print on my receipt, and it said they had signed me up to autorenew on my credit card every year. What the hell? I never authorized that. It also said I could log in to my account online and opt out. Well, I went to my account online and no such opt out link existed. Then it took half an hour of digging to figure out how to contact them to tell them they may NOT help themselves to my credit card next year, and if they do, I’m going to promptly call VISA to complain about an unauthorized charge.
In my note to them, I told them that I’d be switching to McAfee next year. Then I did some Googling and discovered that the State of New York recently won a lawsuit against both Symantec (Norton) and McAfee for signing customers up for autorenew without telling them, then refusing to refund the charges (or charging fees to reverse the charges).
What the heck? You’re telling me that the two major companies that you pay every year to protect your computer so nobody steals anything from you have been stealing money from their paying customers? Because that’s what it is in my mind, plain and simple. Unless I specificially authorize a charge, if you charge my card, you’re a thief.
So I’m not doing business with either of them when my current Norton subscription is up in a year. I did a search and found that PC Magazine highly rated a product called BitDefender. I’ll Google closer to the time to make sure that’s who I want to go with, but I guarantee I will not go with Symantec or McAfee. Symantic support did get back to me right away to say that they had set my account to not autorenew, but they have now permanently damaged my trust with their slimy business practices.
I imagine they’re hoping I’ll forget that they did this and next year I’ll renew when the software prompts me to. Nope, ain’t gonna happen. I set a calendar reminder to myself to look into new antivirus software next May. Plenty of time to buy a different product before my current subscription expires. And Symantec had better not autorenew me, because that complaint is going straight to VISA, and I will not be paying the charges. I saved the email from the support person saying they had removed me from autorenew.
Anyway, that’s my big rant for the weekend. I hope my brother is satisfied now. If anyone is still stopping by to read, I’d love it if you left a comment to encourage him to guest blog here. I think if he’s going to harass his older and wiser sister about her blog, he should write a post for my trouble, don’t you think?
Hey, don’t drag me into your delusional fantasy world of reality. I have enough trouble coming up with 140 characters at a time for all my twitter fans. And if we use the number of followers I have as the yard stick, I think I’m failing even at that.
What, isn’t my delusional fantasy world of reality good enough for you? It’s the hippos, isn’t it. I always knew you didn’t like the hippos.
The hippos were fine. I never minded the hippos (other than the occasional ill-placed step [try cleaning *that* off your shoe when you're in a hurry]). The unicorn on the other hand kept getting into my stash of Oreos. No matter how well I hid them… Grrr…
The trick is to eat the cream filling before you hide them. Unicorns only like Oreos because of the cream filling.
Now she tells me…
Although, then it wouldn’t have been a stash of Oreos. It would have been a stash of chocolate cookies. I am one who prefers to eat his Oreos as a whole; cookie and filling shared with each bite. Therefore you’re solution, while admirable in spirit, is flawed in acceptability.
Life is full of tradeoffs like that. At least you got to eat a few cookies before the unicorn nibbled on the rest. That’s something, at least.
Nice conversation about fantasy and hippos and unicorns, Amy and Brother Jon. You could do this sort of thing as a post, you know.
As for your trouble with Norton/Symantec, Amy, I’ve had my own issues with the company. I paid for an upgrade I couldn’t download or properly use and customer service was no help. A friend of mine had a similar problem. They’re very willing to take your money, but not so willing to deliver the customer service you need. For shame! Hearing about their practice of charging your credit card without permission makes me glad I dumped their service when I did. I use AVG Free for my anti-virus software.
Hey Mary, good to see you! I’m glad you enjoyed our crazy banter.
Yeah, the internet seems to be riddled with tales of Symantec not treating its customers well. You’d think a company that was geared toward online protection would get a clue, but I guess they’ve got enough market share they just don’t care.
I did get a follow up email yesterday from customer support asking if the problem had been resolved to my satisfaction. How the heck will I even know until a year goes by and I know for certain they don’t charge my credit card? Nope, still not satisfied, and it’s simply not possible to satisfy me, so I’m ignoring the inquiry. I don’t feel it’s my job to point out to them yet again that the link where I’m supposed to be able to turn off auto-renew simply isn’t there. It’s their job to test and make sure their systems work, they ignored that part of my complaint, and I’m suspicious that they know it’s not there and are lying about its existence. Who can trust them?