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Mail and Ride snafu


skidork

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I learned a lot about Mail and Ride the past month. Seems I've got TransitChek from work and they used to pay a portion of my Visa bill monthly. I used a Visa to pay the full amount, had it registered at the Mail and Ride site, which covered the entire amount.

 

Well, back in March the company says we now have to switch over to a new method of getting TransitChek reimbursements - the TransitChek Visa. OK whatever.

 

So I registered the new card on the Mail and Ride site figuring I'm all set. Dumb move. My entire bill comes to $312 including subway. But apparently the TransitChek portion is only $230

 

So Mail and Ride tries to withdraw $312 to cover the cost of the ticket and the CC transation gets refused because only $230 is in there. So Mail and Ride cancels the CC registration and defaults back to paying by check. All this is going on without my knowledge until I get a nasty letter from Mail and Ride that I'm not gonna get a May ticket and I'm risking them cancelling my account altogether

 

Anyway, I go back and forth with Mail and Ride and TransitCheck, dump a check for the difference in the Mail and Ride box at Penn, re-register the CC, gets refused again, get another nasty letter from Mail and Ride, back and forth.

 

Finally TransitCheck says they can take the full amount to cover everything out of my paycheck, some pre-tax and the rest post-tax. So HOPEFULLY that will fix things.

 

What a nightmare in the meantime.

 

Things I learned:

 

1) When an operational change like this occurs, be prepared for some major learning curves, screw ups etc.

 

2) Mail and Ride is more than happy to dump a long standing customer (since Mail and Ride inception) over some admin mistakes in charging for the commuter ticket. They're pretty heavy handed

 

3) WHO THE HELL trained Mail and Ride Customer service? Are they paid extra to be as mean and nasty as possible to customers who call on the phone? I can understand maybe 1 rep having that problem but its consistent throughout. And I'm the nicest sweetest guy when dealing with CS on the phone. Not sure what the issue is there...

 

[/rant]

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TransitChek out of your paycheck is soooo much better. It saves you money in the long run too since it gets taken out before taxes.

 

This is true. Unfortunately as the OP indicated, no more than $230 can be taken out per month pretax. This is the first I've heard additional can be taken out taxed to cover the remaining balance.

 

To the OP.

 

I want to preface this by saying I am not directly affiliated with mail and ride, nor are my comments official comments from the MTA or any affiliate there of.

 

With that said, I do have a limited working knowledge of the operation of Metro North mail and ride. I am not sure which agency you are dealing with (LIRR, MNR, MTA) but I'm suspecting it's LIRR since you are dealing with them at Penn Station.

 

While the mistakes that are made may be administrative, they are not the fault of mail and ride. I'm sorry that their demeanor is lacking but they are only doing what they are supposed to do, that is bill based on the information the customer provides. If the transaction gets declined, it's not mail and rides fault. Again, they are only processing the sale based on the information provided.

 

While you may be a long standing customer, there are too many people out there that think they are entitled to their pass whether or not they are a long standing customer or not. From a business standpoint it can't be done. No business is out there to give out products that are not paid for. Therefore it gets kicked back and yes, the customer suffers.

 

While not directly the same as mail and ride, the principle is the same in that I'm a long standing customer of my local power company. I have debit card information on file that they bill me on. If there are insufficient funds in the account and they can't bill me I would expect my power to get cut off. It's not the power company's fault my account is overdrawn.

 

On a personal note, I'm am sorry for the problems you are having and moving forward hope you can get them resolved.

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thanks for the reply. I realize the goofs that occurred were mainly my own doing through my misunderstanding of how this new transitchek credit card would work. My old CC covered the entire cost and I assumed the new one would work the same way. Dumb assumption on my part.

 

I think the harshest part of my rant was the absolute nastiness of the CS reps, and the fact that its pervasive. It;s hard to believe that everyone is like that, its almost as if management has told them to be as nasty as they can be to all callers. I guess we're a captive audience. oh well...

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