Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Show me MY money

Some share options that are worth something -- finally -- vest. I get a little message in my email to tell me. Off I head to eTrade's site to see what I can do with them.

OK. Enter user id and password. How would I know this? I've never been to their site before.

Get user id. Hmm, it needs company name (done) and employee number. Oooh, I asked for this once. Let me use the incredibly slow Outlook search tool to find it.

Ten minutes later, enter employee number. OK, now it wants my user name (don't know this), my surname (I do know that), and my zip code. What zip code? Of my company HQ? Of my current address? Of the address I was at when this account was first set up -- SEVEN YEARS AGO???

Great, locked out of the system. Please call eTrade.

Call eTrade. The AVR system wants either my user id (WHICH I DON'T HAVE - that's why I'm calling!) or my US social security code, even though I'm calling the number for those outside the US, which would imply that I don't have a frackin' US social security number!!!! I can't even tell a customer service representative this because I can't get past the AVR system.

I'm going to cry.

2 comments:

CSS said...

Call HR/finance dillweed. They'll probably uncover something vert sinister which will mean that you'll have to pay US Federal, Mass., state, UK and NL tax on the trade and you'll owe everyone a stash :-(

Anonymous said...

The EXACT same thing happened to Woodring last week, which got me curious enough to try checking my own options on E*TRADE. Fat chance of that happening -- it has to be one of the most frustrating user experiences ever foisted on an unsuspecting public, and the frustration is compounded by leaching into the IVR as well.