To Hate or Not to Hate

There has been quite the shopping drama happening across the world if you didn't know about it. Oh yes, it affects the States and even New Zealand. Okay, well it actually only directly affects one person in the States and one person in New Zealand, those being my brother and me. But you know you're dying to know now! :)

Simply put, my brother and I share a gap.com account so I can help him shop from afar. He recently moved. Here is the dilemma: 1) he ordered pants but they got shipped to his old address in spite of his diligence to change the shipping address. 2) they would not be forwarded because the package would have my name instead of his. 3) gap.com and UPS are in a wicked plot to keep the coolest pants ever from my brother. Both he and I have called both companies involved and it occurred to me that being on hold for a company is like Chinese water torture. It slowly drives you insane. I was honestly and literally tempted to bash the phone into my head to stop the repeating "would you like to get free shipping?" and the "fastest shipping anywhere in the continental United States!!" slogans. Why do you have a twenty second long repeating message when the average wait time is over ten minutes?

After many more futile and disturbing attempts to track down the pants (which will someday be funny, but not now... it's still too soon), we have found that a mysterious "Steve" has signed for the pants. While my brother has to hire a private eye to locate said Steve (I kid, I kid), I decided I hated gap.com, UPS and shopping online. A drastic switch for me. However, gap.com (who were very helpful and apologetic on the phone and all, but after that wait time...) emailed me after I politely complained about the situation. They told me that they would entirely refund the purchase! How nice is that? If they would have had the pants still in stock, they would have sent a replacement pair. Now, my moral brother will not accept the refunded money until he knows the pants are long gone (seriously, how are we related?!), but it has restored my faith in gap.com.

Moral of the story? Huzzah, gap.com, huzzah. Boo, UPS, you ought to be ashamed of yourselves.