Gut Instinct

Okay, I relented. My family was concerned about not having internet. I was considering the campaign of the usb modem for wireless broadband. That option was about to run out.  I tried to call the Madinat Zayed outlet that I had been to, to see if they actually had any of the units and the status of my application. Got no reply. So I ventured over to the headoffice.  Things seemed to go reasonably well. I found a car park a short walk away. The surveyor looked at the site map I had and seemed to be able to determine the location to his satisfaction. The queue for the transfer was not too long and I was soon being dealt with. It was confirmed that I couldn’t keep the number but I got offered a pretty good one as an alternative. He was also convinced that it should only take 3~4 day and therefore I didn’t need to put the services on hold and go for the wireless alternative. My area was not in the process of upgrading to fibre optic cable and that meant there should be no delays.   So I have to confess that Etisalat HO had worked out contrary to my expectations. But what was my reason for not wanting to go there? I found that out again quickly when a returned to my car to find that someone had smashed the wing mirror off. Bing, I didn’t want to go near the place because of the parking!!! The repair of this is another story in itself but it only needs to be noted here that it cost just on 1,000drh.  I would have been better off getting the usb modem from an outlet, it would have been cheaper… Lesson, next time stick to gut instincts.

The not-so online services.

Time to take on the behemoth. With an impending move, I am now faced with the transfer of my landline and internet services. Oh no, this means dealing with Etisalat. First off, they tell me I can’t transfer my existing landline number so I’ll have to get a new one. That is a shame as not only is it a good number it is also only really used by family in New Zealand and Japan so changing it is rather inconvenient. Secondly, I can’t organise the transfer over the phone or online. I have to visit one of their offices. So once I get a site plan of the house location I ventured into Madinet Zayed mall to an Etisalat outlet to do the business. I refuse to go to the head office as there is never any parking and always interminable delays there. However, the outlet refuses to take my forms saying they are not allowed to process them since two weeks ago. What do they do all day if they don’t process applications I wonder? They tell me I have to go to the main office. I tell them that I refuse to go there and that if they can’t do it then they had better just cancel both services. I don’t really need the landline and there are other ways of getting the internet. Ah, but they can’t cancel either, I have to go to the main office! I complain, and bully them, and they relinquish, and take the paper work. Probably a mistake as they may just throw it away… How would I know?

Talking to some colleagues I find that one who has just moved is still without internet services 3 weeks later and I begin to wonder how long this process might take for me. Actually I can probably make do with my work connectivity but the girls are on the internet for homework and social networking a lot. They will suffer the most. Unfortunately I sold my mobile broadband router some time ago. I began to think maybe I should go back on one of those wireless units to cover the outage. Actually Etisalat is just at the end of a campaign that would give me a month’s free connection for the price of the usb modem 499drh, and the option of cancelling or downgrading at the end of that month. If I didn’t have to pay for my landline and broadband for the month it wouldn’t be such a steep price.

It is always good to shop around so I thought I’d check out the competition – Du. Du have a usb modem for 399drh with a half price rate for 6 months. That sounds goods but it doesn’t say if it includes the first month (half of 360 = 180). Probably would have to pay that ½ rate for the first month which takes it up to 579. Thought I’d better check that out. My daughter has a Du phone so I hopped on that and called 155 to check the details. Three times I called and waited over 10 minutes each time and still failed to get through to someone! That doesn’t bode well for getting assistance with setting up notoriously flaky modems. Maybe I won’t be switching to Du for my internet. I fired off a complaint to their website about their lousy phone service for good measure.

Okay, that means back to Etisalat, so I got on the phone to 101 to find out what the deal is with getting the services put on hold for a month while waiting for the transfer to take place. Well what do you know, can’t do that without going into the office. I politely informed them that they were a phone and internet company, why then could they not offer these services electronically like the rest of the world. I suggested that he make a note of my request and past it to a supervisor. They always say that the calls may be monitored for quality service and training reasons so I figure you might as well give them something to listen in on! So next I called 101 again to talk to the broadband services, would they put the service on hold? Well, yes, but again I would have to go to the office to do so, and there would be a 60drh fee! This customer service representative also got a lecture about how a telco should be providing services online…

The Puppy Scam

Now that we are moving into a new villa that lets us have pets, my girls have been nagging me about getting a dog.

We talked about getting one from the pound (SAD) so they went and had a look to see what was there. Unfortunately, not very many were on offer, so they went looking further afield, and came across some cute ones that were free for adoption in Abu Dhabi. A pair of Maltese free for adoption on www.muamat.com . So I used the contact box to get some more information.

Two days later I got a reply from Jessica Adama (adamajessica@yahoo.com) which read

hello thanks for your interest towards my puppies which are available i got 2 male and femal e

so where are you located?

will you need both?

do you wish to have more of their pics?

thanks and waiting on you

I wrote back saying we really only wanted one, that we were currently in Khalifa A and were about to move onto the Island. And yes I did want some more pictures.

The girls were excited and kept asking me if there was a reply but nothing turned up for a couple of days. Then finally I found a reply in the spam box on Googlemail, but it hadn’t been languishing there, it had only been there for 40mins by the time I found it.

Alarm bells immediately went off as I read the text, and I didn’t tell the girls about it until I could do some research. Here is the text.

Hello

Sorry for all the Questions and the late reply. (i mean no offense)

but just that i

really need a very loving home for this puppies

As you can see i am giving this puppies out for free, i

am giving out them for free since they were owned and taken care

of by my late wife whom i lost to a drunk driver couple of weeks ago.and

i have relocated to QATAR due to the mobile nature of my

job as a company driver. right now i can't take proper care of this

puppies which was a

sole responsibility of my late wife. they really do remind me of her

sad memories all the time i look at them and hurts deeply. So, my

greatest desire is to find someone who can properly take care of the

puppies and if you can, i can arrange for delivery if you cannot come

right up here for the pick. Delivery am sure will be moderate since we

spend just too little bringing the puppies up there (if you will be

taking both as you said then you are to pay 1250AED ) .

If this is ok by you, i will immediately need the following

details

full names.?

home address?

city?

postal code..?

phone number?

in order to change the ownership papers and get them registered for a

home delivery to your home(at your door step)

Be reminded that these puppies are for free and all you will have

to do is to pay only for the home delivery of these puppies to the

delivery agency which will deliver the them to your home.My prayer

is that you love and care for this puppy just as my wife did and i

will be always great full to you if you should.Do let me know if all

is fine ... again i will like you to mail me as soon as you receive

the the puppies ok so we can talk also on their feeding schedule

thanks for understanding _

And waiting

thanks...

Something also to note is that the email came from a different email account! This time is was jenniffer lucas (lucasjenniffer@gmail.com)

Neither email had been signed. Hmmm, so they want me to send money for delivery. They have advertised as free for adoption in Abu Dhabi. They have ascertained from the first contact that I am in Abu Dhabi, but now state that they are in Qatar so a transport service is required. Now money is involved and we are talking about a distance that is a little too far to go and pick them up. Convenient that!

So the first thing I did was do a google search on the names and email addresses. And low and behold they showed more puppies for sale ads on muamat.com but this time in Dubai and Sharjah! Most of the ads on muamat.com don’t have email address showing so I think this scam artist probably is behind a whole lot more of the pet ads they are hosting. To their credit muamat.com do have a scam warning which does specifically mention this kind of deal – I found it at the bottom of their scam advice page.

8. Free Pet Delivery at the cost of shipping price

• The user offer you to take the pet free, but you have to send him shipping and insurance cost
• You are requested to send the shipping and insurance cost for the pet through Western Union or any other mean
• If you sent the money, the user demand more and never send you the pet.

Armed with my evidence I showed the girls. It was a good lesson for them in internet dishonesty. They were disappointed though.

Gulf bad news – how to get your credit card details stolen.

We are in the process of looking for a new house to live in and find ourselves pouring over property ads in the paper. It occurred to me that instead of trying to search out the direct from owner ads which would avoid exorbitant real estate agent commissions, that I should let them find me! An ad in the accommodation wanted column was called for. So I sat down and wrote a short ad that I thought would get them banging down the door to me. The number to call is in the front of the paper so I phoned in to place my ad. The Gulfnews classifieds receptionist thanked me for the call, explained the rates and said that I could place the ad online. That was fine but I wanted to place the ad now, could she please take it. No, I needed to put it online and then someone would contact me. But if I put it online why would they need to contact me? Well they would tell me how much it would cost and give me the number to fax or email the payment details to. Hang on, I said – surely I would put the credit card details on the site. No she explained, I had to email them and no I couldn’t give them over the phone then either. Needless to say I was astounded. They expected me to fax or email my credit card details! I might as well post them here on this blog for all the security that involved.

Now over the last month I’ve had two calls from the subscription dept of Gulfnews reminding me to renew my subscription, and how if I did it online I’d go into an extra prize draw…

So I thought I’d test out this online renewal and see what the deal was. I went into their site and armed with my subscription number and credit card, I painless connected to a secure https site and in a few minutes had signed up for another year’s delivery. Okay, so let’s try the classified. I logged back in to their site with my gulfnews log on (they have all my details of course from the subscription) entered the details, dates and content of my ad and pressed enter. Nothing much happens except the screen tells me that their staff will be in contact with me. So far it seems it is going downhill the way the receptionist foretold.

A day or so later, as promised, I got an email to say my ad would be a paid one (as opposed to their free categories), fine, I knew and expected that, and that I should send my credit card details by email or fax to … Stop. I AM NOT GOING TO SEND MY CC DETAILS BY EMAIL! Also I don’t have a fax, its old tech and also not secure. Email is definitely not secure.

The return email tells me not to worry, that their site is secure and all the other people send their details that way, but if I’m worried I should send a fax.

I reply, that the fact that their site may be secure is immaterial because the email that is travelling to them is not. It is passing through an unknown number of nodes to get there. When it arrives, it could also easily be forwarded on to some other people without my knowledge. There is plenty of sniffing software freely available that will look for emails with credit card number strings in them. The bank itself would not cover me for any loss resulting from the misuse of my card if it could be shown that I had sent the details by email. They would claim I was negligent. In addition, even if I did have a fax machine, one wrong number dialled and my details could be anywhere. If I get the correct number it would be sitting in a pile of faxes in some unknown part of some office. No, No, I will not be faxing the number. Not only that, I believe that asking me to send my cc details by email would make Gulfnews complicit in any misuse. They should desist the process immediately. As well as addressing this directly with the classifieds, I also emailed a complaint to the paper as a whole. Why, when they have subscription on a secure website, don’t they have payment for classifieds on the same system. I point out that I am happy to phone the number to a live operator that I have dialled, where I can have a little more trust in the authenticity of the process and can also get some accountability details.

The only option they can offer me is to drive all the way across town to the parking nightmare near the corniche and find their office which is a villa somewhere near a mosque (no, that’s me being sarcastic, its near the Sri Lankan embassy, but it would have been more inspiring if they could give better location details, such as an address). I suggest that they should invoice me, after all I am a registered customer. They ignore this suggestion.

A few days later I receive a reply from the paper to say they will be creating a web payment for classifieds in the future...

The result. I don’t place an ad! :-(

The car registration saga.

A year is up and my trusty Mitsubishi came up for re-registration. This is meant to be a relatively straight forward procedure since it is only one year old, therefore it doesn’t require an inspection. I queried a friend about the process as he had just been through it and apart from having to pay an unexpected traffic fine, had no trouble. I had recently checked online with Abu Dhabi police via my driver’s license and had no fines listed so I thought that should be okay. I downloaded the instructions from their website of what I’d need in the way of documentation, and after the normal amount of prodding I got the necessary letter out of the college addressed to the traffic department. A passport and visa copy are always at hand so that was not problem. The other requirement is an insurance policy for the car. As part of my car loan, with HSBC I got a three year policy from AXA with the full premiums locked into the loan (which is pretty good because it locks the no claims rate in for the full period). So armed with my insurance, letter from the college, passport copy, old rego card and money in pocket I headed off to the police department promptly one morning.

I got there early before they started issuing numbered tickets so I was told to sit in a line in front of the couple of stations that were processing people early. After sitting for quite a while behind someone who must have been a dealer with a number of multiple registrations, I noticed the number system had started so I wandered over and got lucky number seven and returned to my nesting spot. Needless to say the number got called before my dealer got finished so I skipped over to that booth. I handed over all my documents and the woman behind the counter began to enter details then stopped and told me I had 600drh speeding fine! What, where, when, I had looked on line and there was no record of that. But she showed me a photo of the car from 4 months back so there was no denying it, but I failed to understand why I wasn’t able to find out about it before. I had to race over to the conveniently located ATMs by the door and withdraw the money to pay to be able to continue the process. However, that having been paid was the not the end of things. She asked me where my insurance was. I showed her the policy but she said no, that I couldn’t have a three year policy. Well, that was what the car company registered it with, and that was all I had. She needed a current policy that lasted 13 months (12+1 is the rule here) and mine did that so I didn’t see what the problem was. She insisted that you can’t have a 3 year policy. Finish. She sent me off to her superior who also insisted you can’t have a three year policy, that I’d have to get a new one from AXA.

Outside, fuming in the car I phoned AXA, but they told me that they didn’t issue 3 year policies, that must be HSBC and kindly gave me their number. HSBC didn’t seem to know anything about the policies being a problem… Was I the first to run into this problem? They said they would issue me with a one year version. Could I come in and collect it? No! Not with the parking around their offices I couldn’t. They could send it to me, and why hadn’t they done that prior to my having to call them since it was obviously going to be necessary???

Now to add to the complications here, my renewal came due during the Eid holiday break at the end of Ramadan. My first visit to the traffic department was Tuesday. That left two working days to get the letter delivered. It was going to be touch and go, since from Friday on would be public holidays.

To my relief, at 10am on Thursday the courier arrived with the one year policy. I got straight in the car and went back to the traffic department. Got my number and felt happy that there weren’t too many numbers in front of me. I handed over my documents and sat wondering how long the process would actually take when the woman (a different one this time) said that the insurance was no good. The date was for the 20^th and today was the 17^th, she couldn’t put in a future date. But the car registration runs out on the 20^th, so that was when the new insurance ran from. The existing insurance was still current and indeed would run for 13 months (one more) if it complied to the previous registration rules, and actually of course still had two years to go. So what was the problem? The system can’t handle it. Can’t you put it in with today’s date? No! Off to see the superior again. Remember me, I got the one year policy you told me to get. “Why did you put the 20^th on it,” he asks me. I didn’t put it on. Can’t have a future date, even one for the day the car registration is for. But the office is going to be closed, if I wait until the 20^th and then the registration will be overdue. I don’t want to pay a fine! He assures me that I won’t pay a fine for the first month and unless I want to go to the bank and get another letter there is nothing I can do that day. So Eid begins and the car registration runs out. Three days late, on the 23^rd when business begins again, I make my third trip to the traffic department! I handed over my documents, she handed back the letter from the college and my passport photocopy with a look of, what did you give me those for (well they were listed as required by on the website). And taking my 105drh gave me a sticker and new registration card. I texted my friend. “Hallelujah” was his texted reply.