When I got home today, I had a letter saying that my rent was late, and that if I didn’t pay in the next seven days, I would have a lawsuit filed against me. The letter was dated 2/17. It’s 2/25.
Why was my rent late?
I knew I’d be in Europe for the start of the month, so I set up the auto-pay on the tenant website. “Your auto payment is scheduled for February 1“. Fantastic.
Stupid of me, but I never checked that my rent was actually paid and obviously auto-pay never fired, so I paid it today. I paid an extra $155 because the auto-payment didn’t fire. I’m pretty annoyed.
I go to call the number on the letter to tell them I paid and naturally they don’t answer, so I leave a voicemail. In the middle of my voicemail I’m interrupted by a call from UNKNOWN NAME. I’m mad. I answer.
Me: “Hi”
Her: “Yes is this Mr. Stortz?” she says with a thick accent.
Me: “No, fuck off.” *click*
I get 5-10 spam calls a day and they’re annoying. Telling this spammer to fuck off was a combo of constant spam calls and being mad that she interrupted my voicemail.
THEN I thought to myself “What if that UNKNOWN NAME was actually Ursinus Phone-a-thon? And a recent alum just told an ethnic freshman to ‘FUCK OFF’. And not just any recent alum, but the defending Ursinus Alumni Mile Champ! I’m going to get absolutely ROASTED on Twitter by every liberal arts college student across the country!!“
That’s crazy talk. But, is it? Is it that out of the realm of possibility in 2020?
Two hours later, I haven’t gotten any twitter mentions. But if I do, please go easy on me. I was mad.
Should have called them to explain to possibly get the late fee removed. People understand if you complain, especially if you have a good track record with payments.
I explained that I set up automatic payments and he said “We don’t have automatic payments. You always have to login and make the payment manually”, which I explained was extremely confusing since the site literally says “Auto payment scheduled for March 1” and I don’t get why it would say that if it wasn’t offered. He just kind of said “No there’s no auto payment”.