i can't get no satisfaction

Remember when I posted about getting a nine year subscription to Rolling Stone magazine because they'd screwed up my back-orders request, sent me duplicates, and reimbursed me for that mistake by tacking on 4 more years to my current subscription?

Well, on Thursday, I decided that I was finally going to call them and cancel my subscription, as I never read it anymore, and it's just costing me money that I want back. So, looking at my newest issue of Rolling Stone, I found the main offices number, located in New York, New York. Long distance, no big deal, I have free long distance. They immediately direct me to the toll-free number to call, so I hang up and call the new number.

The toll-free number tells me that they are only in charge of making sure that I get my magazine, and that I am actually set up through two different agencies to recieve this magazine. Weird. They give me two more toll-free numbers to call. The second number quickly sends me to their billing number, which I call instead of having them redirect me, so in case I got disconnected, I could just call them back. So now I am on phone call number four, and still have no information. Also, there's screaming kids in the background of the billing number that I called. Running a daycare? They tell me that my subscription was only for a year's worth of magazines, and that it had ended June of 2004. Hmm.

I call the other number that Rolling Stone gave me, and they informed me that my subscription through them had started in June of last year, and was a four-year long deal, but since it had just passed the one year mark, I couldn't get my money back. And they also told me I had a subscription to Spin magazine, as well. What the crap?

So I called back Rolling Stone. They told me that I was actually set up through THREE agencies, but that they only had the information for two of them, 'cause the third one was so old. So that wasn't a big deal, I guess. But they also told me that my subscription to the first agency they gave me hadn't actually started yet, and that it was a four year subscription, due to start when my current one ended, the current one being held through the second agency who's number they'd given me.

Confused yet? Yeah, me too.

So I call the first agency back, and they claim that my subscription has already ended, and that it started back in 2003, and ended in 2004. Arg. Basically, they filed a complaint for me, and I wasn't to expect to hear back from them until sometime next week. Yesterday, while my phone was missing, I got a call from them, asking me to call them back, but by the time I got the message, it was today, Saturday afternoon, and their offices were closed. So now I have to wait until Monday to call them.

Jeeez. Who would have though canceling a subscription and getting your freakin' money back would be so hard?!