Do you ever want to ask...

...if some people ate paint chips as a child?!? Or wonder if people actually think ...ever.

So here's the deal, a hurricane destroyed my house back in August.  As of today I am still not back in said house.  Why you may ask...well gee where to start?  I have fought with so many  people I can't even begin to explain my level of frustration.  So I will highlight the two main issues for you.  I did everything right...I swear!  The day after the flood, still sitting in my ravaged home with bugs and worms crawling on my muddy floor, I called my flood insurance company and my car insurance company (BRAND NEW car flooded too) and made claims.  Both were very quick to respond and I had a wonderful feeling that things would get back to normal soon.  Boy was I wrong!

I was the second appointment for my home adjuster.  The 2nd out of a hundred or so...I was number TWO. And he was an idiot.  I'm not exaggerating, he turned out to be an utter moron and that is putting it ridiculously nice.  Not only did he not take enough pictures because he "didn't want to go digging in another persons personal stuff" but he also started from the top of his stack of claims.  As in the persons who were seen last were assisted first.  Makes sense right?  I mean being an adjuster you surely don't want to open any cabinets or closets and see what sat in water, no that would be an invasion of privacy.  And that person you saw four days after the storm, sure they can wait a MONTH for you to finally get to their claim.  Now I didn't just sit back and take this, I complained and fussed and lamented until someone higher than moron called me back and got things going for me.  Finally progress, sweet victory you are mine.  And then the bottom fell out and I had yet another mental breakdown of sorts.  You see after supplying pictures of things he didn't take pictures of and submitting my list of contents not once but twice because his "computer deleted my other emails", I got checks.  A mere 3 months after the storm...I should be excited right. . . WRONG, the big check, the one we need to start repairs was made out to a mortgage company I have never done business with in the 7 years I have lived in my home. So begins the process of getting all that corrected...in the midst of Thanksgiving holidays, just shoot me now.

Moving on, in the thick of all of that I was contacting my REAL mortgage company trying to find out what processes I need to go through with them.  They said they will send a packet and I need to return it with the check, etc etc etc.  That was 11/5.  I get a new check at the beginning of December, whoohoo.  I called the mortgage company as instructed previously and asked why I never got that packet.  Wait for it. . .they sent it to the WRONG address.  I'm sorry you "own" the loan on my residence and you don't know the correct address, oh this should be fun.  I get the packet (well over a week later).  I fill it out, sign everything, get the proper pages notarized and send it certified mail back to them before mid month, all while dealing with Christmas stuff, family parties, friends in from out of town and my husbands grad school graduation.  I am super woman.  They cash the check but I hear crickets. . . no calls. . . nothing.  I call and leave message after message after message.  I send emails to generic email addresses, still zilch.  Finally the Friday before Christmas I get a call.  We don't have your paperwork.  WHAT!?!?!  How do you have the check and not everything else?  They don't have it, can't find it, threw it away, who knows.  My only option is to re-sign and re-notarize everything because they need originals.  I got to the notary 30 minutes after they closed for the holidays, not to reopen until after the new year *beating head on door*.

I called them back and had the ultimate freakout on the phone with this poor customer service rep that just had no idea that when she went in to work she would be dealing with a mentally deranged person.  She tried desperately to get a manager on the phone to deal with the hyperventilating psycho that I had become.  No one in the claims department would pick up.  She was so sweet I felt awful for losing it.  She just wanted to help but her hands were tied, she just didn't have access to that part of the system.  She clearly put some scathing note in there about how pissed off/upset I was because before the end of the day I received a call from the Claims Department Manager.  She felt horrible and said once I get the necessary stuff resigned I can email or fax it to her to get things started and then worry about sending in originals.  There is a God. 

And he thinks its fun to watch me go off the deep end.  I sent her the necessary forms THREE times.  That's right three times via email because for some reason she couldn't figure out how to download it or something. After another couple weeks of living with my new found crazy she called. . .she called last Friday and said a check will be issued and mailed Monday.  I saw angels and heard hallelujah being sung all around.  Did that really just happen, have I actually understood?  Nope someone up there is a jokester because come Monday, after business hours, I get a call.  Something about the W9 my contractor filled out is wrong.  WHAT!?  She said and I quote

"the EIN is legit but the legal name doesn't come up."
Well what name comes up with the EIN? 
"I can't see it."
So how do you know it's wrong???
 "It just doesn't match.  Its like a comma or an apostrophe that's missing from the name, the IRS is picky, sorry but I need a new form signed." 

Cue the mother of all breakdowns.  I am ashamed to say I lost it.  I know she has rules and regs she needs to follow. . . I deal with that daily at my job.  If you are missing a comma or have to many periods or abbreviate incorrectly you are declined until the paperwork is corrected.  But I had to get her to my level.  I had to make her see why I was now losing my mind.  I have been out of my house for near 5 months.     I received the necessary check way back at the beginning of December.  If I didn't have to deal with all the B.S. they've been doling out, my house would have been repaired and I would have been living in it well before Christmas!  She says and I quote again "well you can submit a letter stating you will do the repairs yourself and we will pay you based on submitted receipts".  To which I replied great, good to know, I have all the confidence in the world that you will actually honor that and I will get any money from you.  Then she said "well if you don't like that deal with the contractor" or something of that nature, it became hard for me to hear with all the blood pounding/rushing in my ears.  I may have been a bit more rude at that point, I'm not sure, things get a little hazy from this point. 

All I know is that by the end of the conversation I did apologize for going a bit bonkers, she said she understands and said I can send the new paperwork, whatever it is, to her email as soon as I get it.  I hung up, curled up in a ball on my bed and cried...no that's not the right word...I sobbed.  99.9% of the time I manage to stay calm.  I don't "lose my cool" but I have been pushed to my limits.  I had nothing left to do but lose it.

So as of this day I have been "homeless" for 4 months and 24 days, all because of a punctuation error...oh and people who ate paint chips as children...actually I think they still eat paint chips, that is the only explanation.