No “get lost!” option
I have a whole menagerie of pet peeves, and here’s one of them.
Way too many websites push some action or other with a choice to do it or not do it. Sounds reasonable and inoffensive, right? And it is, in theory. But all too often no simple “yes” or “no” option is offered. They get way too cute about it instead.
For example, the other day a website urged me to do something I have no intent of ever doing. But the options were: “Resolve now” or “Remind me later.” How about “Go away and never come back”? Or “Quit bugging me, pest”? Not available.
Sometimes you do get, “Do not ask me this again.” I’m grateful for those few times. But far more often there’s some cutesy forced choice. A trivial problem indeed, but annoying and very common.
At least most websites have finally stopped the highly highly annoying, “No, I don’t want to accept the deal and save tons of money; I’d rather pay more” option. Feedback must have been horrendous.
This I deal with by hitting “delete”.
In conjunction with selling (finally!) our previous house, I’ve been cancelling services. This can be extremely annoying. It can take a LONG time to convince the provider that I don’t want to move their service to my new location. It took me 45 minutes on the phone to cancel DISH TV. The saleswoman refused to believe that my newly-built house does not have cable receptacles so using their service would be physically impossible here.
Neo really wants reply buttons which have the sharp retorts she used to give to men hitting on her in bars back in 1967.
I’m pretty sure I didn’t dream this but when I cancelled my mother’s internet, phone and cable they wanted a copy of her death certificate. I went ahead and sent it maybe I shouldn’t have.
The one I’ve been dealing with for several years at least, is the cookies issue. A long time ago I set my browser to never allow cookies to be deposited on my system without a prompt. So I was constantly getting the prompt, and the usual one was “Install basic cookies – OR – Choose additional cookies.” Where is the install no cookies option? I just skipped many web sites because of this.
For some reason, now 90% of the time the prompt has the No Cookies option. I don’t know why it changed, but it did. Maybe the webmasters and their bosses wised up.
When my father died, I tried changing various accounts to my mom’s name and I got the “send the death certificate” routine. Mom didn’t want to do that, so the accounts remained in his name.
When she died, I took both death certificates to the cable office. I was not amused when I was told that the death certificates were not required. Maybe it was because I had actually walked into the office instead of having a phone conversation. I wonder how many people get their accounts closed due to a prank call?
I remember having to send death certificates when my mother died. It seems absurd. At least they let me send a photocopy.
Re: “Remind me later.”
neo suggests, “Get lost.”
I’m more of an FOAD kind of guy.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/FOAD
I too have fantasized a “FO” button.
I still remember the service I canceled by saying, “Look, I was told I could cancel this. If you don’t cancel it, I will hang up to call the police and report I have been a victim of telephonic fraud.”
Yeah, it’s snarky. I have met a number of young web designers and marketing people. There can be a sense of superiority among them, because they know how to build web pages, and few people do. Their impatience with the rest of us shows in those prompts.
They’ve never had to mind a literal shop, where the door chime alerts the owner to someone entering, and calls for humility, accommodation, learning, and gratitude. The customer might leave with nothing, but could also recruit the next customer.
Sennacherib dealing with technology is one of the funny highlights of life.