Wednesday, May 28, 2008
I'm bored
Per the procedure on this forum, my band name will be History of the English Penny, my debut album will be The Way it Started, and the cover art will be this image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/twistedsun/2517715711/
Friday, May 23, 2008
It's not news, it's foxnews.com
Foxnews.com headline today : WHO: Wealthier Lifestyles Fueling Global Health Crisis
Article:
Increased wealth appears to be making people sicker, rather than healthier, according to the World Health Organization.
By 2030, the only contagious disease in the list of Top 10 global killers will be HIV/AIDS, the Daily Mail reported citing figures from the World Health Organization.
According to the WHO, a third of deaths will be caused by road crashes, cancer or cardiovascular disease by 2050, while tobacco will remain the single largest preventable killer.
By 2030, worldwide cardiovascular disease deaths are expected to rise to 23.4 million, up from 17.1 million, the report said.
And, as greater wealth enables more people to buy automobiles, road deaths are expected to almost double over the same time period. Meanwhile, diseases like malaria, TB and bowel disease are expected to kill fewer people as mosquito nets, clean water and vaccines become more widely available.
I'm sorry, what? How does any part of this say that wealthier lifestyles are fueling a global health crisis? What global health crisis? Here's what the article actually says and does not say:
1. AIDS will be the only contagious disease in the top 10 (good)
2. 1/3 of deaths will be caused by crashes, cancer, or cardiovascular disease (presumably because other causes of death are becoming less prevalent). This does not mean more people will be dying. It means of the people who die, more of them will die because of this. It says nothing about total death rates, which presumably are dropping.
3. Cardiovascular diseases will rise from 17.1 million to 23.4 million. This is completely meaningless unless we know the expected population at that time. Obviously as there are more people on earth there will be a greater number of deaths. Duh. What matters is the death RATE. Also, when people are living longer and not dying as infants, they will be around to risk death by cardiovascular disease, so even if the rates of this type of death increase, part of that is because right now people are dying too soon for that to happen.
4. more cars = more road deaths. This is the ONLY place in the whole article that actually links wealth to death, but this isn't a health issue! And again, this is not a death rate so we don't know if a doubling in the number of deaths equals a doubling in the rate of deaths.
5. Diseases are going to kill fewer people as wealth increases (!!). This necessarily means decreased death rates since population will be increasing.
To summarize, wealthier lifestyles lower health-related death rates and foxnews.com is retarded.
Article:
Increased wealth appears to be making people sicker, rather than healthier, according to the World Health Organization.
By 2030, the only contagious disease in the list of Top 10 global killers will be HIV/AIDS, the Daily Mail reported citing figures from the World Health Organization.
According to the WHO, a third of deaths will be caused by road crashes, cancer or cardiovascular disease by 2050, while tobacco will remain the single largest preventable killer.
By 2030, worldwide cardiovascular disease deaths are expected to rise to 23.4 million, up from 17.1 million, the report said.
And, as greater wealth enables more people to buy automobiles, road deaths are expected to almost double over the same time period. Meanwhile, diseases like malaria, TB and bowel disease are expected to kill fewer people as mosquito nets, clean water and vaccines become more widely available.
I'm sorry, what? How does any part of this say that wealthier lifestyles are fueling a global health crisis? What global health crisis? Here's what the article actually says and does not say:
1. AIDS will be the only contagious disease in the top 10 (good)
2. 1/3 of deaths will be caused by crashes, cancer, or cardiovascular disease (presumably because other causes of death are becoming less prevalent). This does not mean more people will be dying. It means of the people who die, more of them will die because of this. It says nothing about total death rates, which presumably are dropping.
3. Cardiovascular diseases will rise from 17.1 million to 23.4 million. This is completely meaningless unless we know the expected population at that time. Obviously as there are more people on earth there will be a greater number of deaths. Duh. What matters is the death RATE. Also, when people are living longer and not dying as infants, they will be around to risk death by cardiovascular disease, so even if the rates of this type of death increase, part of that is because right now people are dying too soon for that to happen.
4. more cars = more road deaths. This is the ONLY place in the whole article that actually links wealth to death, but this isn't a health issue! And again, this is not a death rate so we don't know if a doubling in the number of deaths equals a doubling in the rate of deaths.
5. Diseases are going to kill fewer people as wealth increases (!!). This necessarily means decreased death rates since population will be increasing.
To summarize, wealthier lifestyles lower health-related death rates and foxnews.com is retarded.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
An open letter to Bank of America
Dear Bank of America,
I feel no regret at informing you that I will not be choosing you as my mortgage lender, despite your apparent willingness to undercut the competition as many times as it takes. My reasons are as follows:
1) Your bank center loan staff repeatedly fails to follow through on commitments. The first person I spoke to at a banking center promised to email me certain documents on the following day. This did not happen. When I spoke to him again a few days later, he once again promised to send them. Again, he did not. A second employee at another banking center promised to acquire and pass on to me a good faith estimate and to call me if, for any reason, this could not be done. He failed to contact me in any way. Finally, someone at the loan call center promised to fax over a good faith estimate once the computer system came back online. She did not do this, and the loan specialist assisting me had to call in all over again and request the document all over again the following day, as if no prior request had been made.
2) You require your own employees to phone the automated call center to give clients simple loan documents such as a good faith estimate. I spent approximately 5 hours sitting in banking centers over the course of a week simply trying to get a good faith estimate with a different number of points than had been requested on the initial application. 90% of this time consisted of me sitting at a desk while the loan specialist helping me was on hold. With his own employer. For 30 minutes at a time. He was also shuffled between different call center areas and required to wait on hold anew each time. Apparently, being a "Loan Specialist" consists in filling out loan applications for customers and faxing them to the real loan people.
3) You have left messages on my home answering machine every weekday for the past two weeks. I have two different women from your loan area switching off leaving me messages asking me to call back to verify information. This is a problem for several reasons. First of all, I have a day job. You know this because you took my employment information for the loan application. I know you know the number, because you once called me there. You also have my cell phone number which I listed during the application process as my primary contact number and which you have never used to contact me. Yet, you insist on calling me at home between the hours of noon and 3pm. Secondly, I fail to see why it is necessary to leave a new message every day. Is it really likely that the last 6 didn't go through? What if I were on vacation? Do you think I want to come home to 30 messages from Bank of America on my answering machine? And why do you have two different agents calling me? Are they tag-teaming? Maybe the protocol is to call every other day, and these two women don't know about each other and have each been independently assigned to my loan. Or maybe they are competing, and whoever gets the lucky callback from me gets a promotion. This would not surprise me because--and this is point number three--I already spoke to yet a third woman two weeks ago about this information that needed to be verified. I verified it. I have not given any new information since then that would need to be verified. Everything is the same.
4) You have sent me THREE identical loan information packets since I filed the loan application. I suspect that one new packet was sent out when I requested the second good faith estimate, since apparently this was a very confusing process and required changing the application. However, why was there a third one? And what if I had already signed and returned all the forms in the first packet? Would I have to sign them again? Also, the packet says right on it that the offer expires Sept 30 or some such date and that if I do not respond by then, no further action will be taken by you. It does not say that I will be harassed by phone on a daily basis if I have not sent in the forms.
In summary, working with you has been a complete nightmare. The inefficiency is mind-boggling. That your own employees had to spend hours on hold with your own automated call center (that they even had to call the call center in the first place, for that matter) just to get a simple document that my other lender gave me in 5 minutes is ridiculous. I may have been able to get a lower rate by sticking it out, but it is not worth the headache. The complete incompetence of everyone involved in this process failed to inspire me with confidence about the handling of any actual loan that I might get from you. Ultimately, you fail. Big time.
Sincerely,
Sara
Note: If anyone has any kind of email address to which I could send this letter, please let me know. I am pretty sure BofA does not even use email, since one of the employees said he would go home and SCAN a document and email it to me.
I feel no regret at informing you that I will not be choosing you as my mortgage lender, despite your apparent willingness to undercut the competition as many times as it takes. My reasons are as follows:
1) Your bank center loan staff repeatedly fails to follow through on commitments. The first person I spoke to at a banking center promised to email me certain documents on the following day. This did not happen. When I spoke to him again a few days later, he once again promised to send them. Again, he did not. A second employee at another banking center promised to acquire and pass on to me a good faith estimate and to call me if, for any reason, this could not be done. He failed to contact me in any way. Finally, someone at the loan call center promised to fax over a good faith estimate once the computer system came back online. She did not do this, and the loan specialist assisting me had to call in all over again and request the document all over again the following day, as if no prior request had been made.
2) You require your own employees to phone the automated call center to give clients simple loan documents such as a good faith estimate. I spent approximately 5 hours sitting in banking centers over the course of a week simply trying to get a good faith estimate with a different number of points than had been requested on the initial application. 90% of this time consisted of me sitting at a desk while the loan specialist helping me was on hold. With his own employer. For 30 minutes at a time. He was also shuffled between different call center areas and required to wait on hold anew each time. Apparently, being a "Loan Specialist" consists in filling out loan applications for customers and faxing them to the real loan people.
3) You have left messages on my home answering machine every weekday for the past two weeks. I have two different women from your loan area switching off leaving me messages asking me to call back to verify information. This is a problem for several reasons. First of all, I have a day job. You know this because you took my employment information for the loan application. I know you know the number, because you once called me there. You also have my cell phone number which I listed during the application process as my primary contact number and which you have never used to contact me. Yet, you insist on calling me at home between the hours of noon and 3pm. Secondly, I fail to see why it is necessary to leave a new message every day. Is it really likely that the last 6 didn't go through? What if I were on vacation? Do you think I want to come home to 30 messages from Bank of America on my answering machine? And why do you have two different agents calling me? Are they tag-teaming? Maybe the protocol is to call every other day, and these two women don't know about each other and have each been independently assigned to my loan. Or maybe they are competing, and whoever gets the lucky callback from me gets a promotion. This would not surprise me because--and this is point number three--I already spoke to yet a third woman two weeks ago about this information that needed to be verified. I verified it. I have not given any new information since then that would need to be verified. Everything is the same.
4) You have sent me THREE identical loan information packets since I filed the loan application. I suspect that one new packet was sent out when I requested the second good faith estimate, since apparently this was a very confusing process and required changing the application. However, why was there a third one? And what if I had already signed and returned all the forms in the first packet? Would I have to sign them again? Also, the packet says right on it that the offer expires Sept 30 or some such date and that if I do not respond by then, no further action will be taken by you. It does not say that I will be harassed by phone on a daily basis if I have not sent in the forms.
In summary, working with you has been a complete nightmare. The inefficiency is mind-boggling. That your own employees had to spend hours on hold with your own automated call center (that they even had to call the call center in the first place, for that matter) just to get a simple document that my other lender gave me in 5 minutes is ridiculous. I may have been able to get a lower rate by sticking it out, but it is not worth the headache. The complete incompetence of everyone involved in this process failed to inspire me with confidence about the handling of any actual loan that I might get from you. Ultimately, you fail. Big time.
Sincerely,
Sara
Note: If anyone has any kind of email address to which I could send this letter, please let me know. I am pretty sure BofA does not even use email, since one of the employees said he would go home and SCAN a document and email it to me.
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