Fear on Magazine Subscription

While I was in college in US, subscribing to magazines or publications was normal. My favorite magazine, GQ, even arrived in my mailbox before anyone could find it on the shelves. Besides, you get some discounts off the published price, free gifts and avoiding the trouble to look around town for special edition like the end-of-year Sports Illustrated, etc. Not to forget, if you subscribe to Playboy, Penthouse or other magazines alike, they'll mail the magazine in black plastic wrapper, which people can't see what magazine is inside, than having to keep yourself being stared on (or feel like putting the hood on) when paying for it at the 7-Eleven cashier.

Here in this BOLEH land, I always wanted to subscribe to some magazines but I'm always worry of things to happen. The worry of the magaziine not reaching my mailbox, someone steal the magazine from my mailbox, the magazine received not in good condition, or I received it late when anyone else finished reading it, etc etc. The worry was still with me when I decided to subscribe to 'Off the Edge' - the arts & culture magazine for the businessperson. It's a light reading material on lifestyle with article contributors include the likes of Hishamuddin Rais, Khoo Kay Kim, Patrick Teoh, Kam Raslan, etc.

And my fearmost worries... is when my worries came true, right from the beginning of my subscription process.

1) I faxed the reply card with details of my credit card. I even enlarged the size to make the small writing clearer. Not long after, I received a call asking me to re-fax as it was dark. What do you expect if the color of the reply card is grey, genius? They even refused when I wanted to spell out my name and address or read out my credit card number and insisted me to re-fax, or mail it instead which I didn't bother doing it.

2) They call me again three days later, asking me to read out my credit card number. At last, BOLEH pun?! They said, if the transaction is successful, I will receive my first edition in the second week of March. (this happened in middle of February)

3) My credit card was charged three days after the call. Very BOLEH when comes to collecting payment!

4) Until the third week of March, I still haven't received my magazine and I don't want to buy from the shelf because I may ended up having two copies of the same magazine. And my credit card has been charged.

5) I called the subscription desk on the start of 4th week of March. After being passed on by three people, I managed to talk to the person in charge. I managed to keep myself calm (which seldomly happened!) and I asked her whether this is normal, which obviously she said no.

6) I was even asked to re-confirm my address. She even suggested that my mailbox is too small for the magazine? I told her, I receive my Astro magazine every month, and even if the mailbox is small, the postman would leave it with the security. She even suggested that my mailbox is not locked. BULLSH*T <-- Malaysia BOLEH blah!

7) Finally (at LAST BOLEH pun), she said she will send another copy to my adddress.

8) And now when March has gone and when everyone who reads the magazine already or almost finished reading the April edition, I just received my March edition and have not even started reading it since I want to blog this entry first.

What a PISSed off experience and a Malaysia BOLEH blah syndrome!