Talk to a Human Being

I recently ordered a book from Amazon, one that was technical in nature. I had a book on the subject but I ordered this one specifically because it was current, a November 2006 edition. Imagine my unhappiness when I received a UPS package containing a 2003 printing of the book, about the same vintage as the book that I already had. This is a subject that is fairly dynamic and a 2003 edition is about as useful as last month's newspapers. So I went to their website and looked all over the place for a phone number but ended up begrudgingly doing the return via the website. The closest reason-for-returning in the dropdown list was that the product was defective. There was, however, a second box that popped up allowing me to explain what was wrong. I packed the thing up and finally had a chance to visit a post office this morning. (I didn't know if the book and package was over 13 oz. If it was you could not drop it in a mailbox.) About two hours ago UPS showed up with another copy of the 2003 edition of the book.

Aaaarghh

Then I found this website, a great list of how to talk to a human being at a huge list of companies. Bookmark this thing, it is invaluable.

I think I got Amazon straight. The nice lady in India that I spoke to said that they were going to stop selling this book until they got it straight, that I should check back in 10 days and if it was back on the website it would be safe to order. Meanwhile, I will get a refund but will have to visit the post office once again.