[Friday, 25 May, 2007]

I got to sleep from 2am to 8am and was satisfied with my performance to sleep early. I continued with some work before setting off to my company.

I was intending to fulfil the client’s request by changing an advertisement banner of the S-League website but somehow there was no changes reflected on the actual site. It was only till an hour later, Sheila dropped by and told me I was only uploading it to the company’s server and not the actual one. That was the IP which she saw in my email and told me to transfer the new file into. It seemed like I had to put in much more effort to really figure out everything.

I continued with transferring of contents from an old website to the developing site and I was getting a better hand of it. However, I was not sure of my speed and the most important thing was to meet the deadline. Liza told me it was okay for I was only a beginner but that did not justify the speed of my work. I had been working so hard, trying to avoid errors and also made extra effort to check the actual day of the week of each article when only the date was provided, such that the entire date format would be really standardised. I did not want to work too slow nor fast, which would cause delay or extra workload.

I took a half day leave in this first week of my new job. I left for home at 1pm and my mum had bought nasi lemak for me. While travelling to Toa Payoh, I almost overshot after dozing off and managed to dash out of the train seconds before the doors closed. I took a seat at the first level of the HDB Hub and was shocked to realise Kelly was already at level two, and was more surprised that she did not give me a call. George and his wife arrived later and somehow, we were delayed.

Rinna called Kelly and I quickly went down to meet her. It was the first time I dealt with non JTC resale flat and I was not sure of the actual procedure; worst still, there was a bank loan and non HDB lawyer involved.

The lawyer, Wendy, had told me hours ago that there was a problem with Maybank issuing the Cashier Order (cheque) and she would call me back to update me. I received no news from her and Rinna asked me to give Wendy a call and since it was my job, I tried it but Wendy was not in the office, placing question marks in my brain.

I was so shocked of these “professionals” – Chris Chong Law Firm and Maybank. I was not sure who was at fault but what we were facing was huge transaction of money and existing big players of this market should never give such crap that the appointment time was ripe but we heard no news from them.

We had to embarrassingly tell the HDB officer that the lawyer was not there yet and also told the sellers to go and have some food. Meanwhile, Rinna pressed me to follow up on Wendy and only at the third call, she was back in office. Yet again, she told me she would get back to me when the bank’s Cashier Order was released.

This time, Rinna told me to call the banker directly and I went to the Maybank branch nearby to seek for Grace’s number and the receptionist refused to give me the number. I had to go back to the HDB officer’s room embarrassingly again to retrieve the bank’s letter of offer to search for Grace’s number. Eventually, I was able to contact her but she told me it was not her problem anymore. She put my line on hold for a couple of minutes before giving me a number to contact someone called Steven Lee. I could not get through his line and after a few minutes, I finally succeeded and he sounded quite polite and offered to help me check about it without shrinking responsibility. Rinna got me to call Wendy back and this time, she was besides me and said loudly that the law firm should have collected the Cashier Order a day before. Wendy was already not in a very polite tone, sounding quite pissed, and upon hearing about this, she raised her voice and claimed that it was Maybank’s practise not to release the Cashier Order a day before the appointment. Since I was new to the line, I was not very sure who was at fault but I was glad that I had done my part, and definitely more than that.

After some time, almost an hour after the actual appointment time, Wendy called me back and told me her runner was collecting the Cashier Order at Maybank’s Ang Mo Kio branch and would take another fifteen more minutes to arrive. Steven Lee called me back soon after and told me it was done and I was too boiled to talk more. After some time, Rinna told me to call the runner, Edmund, and he was already at the car park. We finally went back into the officer’s room and did everything, which ended fast.

By the time we finished everything, I realised it was near 5pm and there was no chance for me to hurry back to the agency to submit the cheque from George and to collect the cheque of 219 Ang Mo Kio – my plan was screwed up by either the law firm or bank, or both of them. it was a rare chance that I could take a half day leave to settle stuffs, which was a great sacrifice since I could have saved the leave to go out with friends and not giving any bad impression to my new company for taking leave on the first week of work. Moreover, the following Monday onwards I had to continue to work and the agency would not wait for me after 6pm. The law firm and bank had given me such big problem that I was unable to go back to the agency to settle my stuffs.

I could not help but feel so pissed off even though I had told myself not to get so fed up over bastards. It was just too ridiculous for them to display such unprofessional service. Apart from me, the sellers had taken time off from his work just to attend the appointment and the delay would give problems for him to return back to work in time. In fact, the HDB officer complained to us about the bank as well for their repeatedly delaying of time. Rinna was asking me to cool down but I was the one facing all the stupid phone calls and obviously she was not as pissed off as me.

If any bank is causing delay of more than an hour, it does reflect and clearly show their capability. They play with investment and each second can pose so much difference to the huge sum of money that their clients have entrusted in them. How can anyone trust them then?

If any bank cannot meet the timing of the appointments, causing more than an hour of delay each time, their license for home loan should be annulled. Why would Singapore’s government want to continue the service of lousy bank which gives problems to the entire country, causing inconvenience and time lost?

Law firm:
– had typo errors on the document on the first meet-up
– failed to push the bank to release Cashier Order on time
– failed to contact me to update me earlier as promised
– played “missing” at crucial time
– failed to present proper tone on phone

Bank:
– failed to submit documents to law firm
– refused to submit documents to law firm
– did not practise releasing of Cashier Order a day before
– failed to release Cashier Order on actual day
– refused to give contact of banker
– denied responsibility

Kaven finally called me back from overseas but everything was already solved. Rinna told me to apply SP services for Kaven and I left soon after that. Right after getting up the train, I remembered Mingfa wanted to meet me at Toa Payoh at 5pm and I had earlier told him that I could be rushing to the agency. I called him immediately since it was near 5pm and I could have waited for him there but he told me he had cancelled his appointment. Kaven called me again and I accidentally cancelled it. After calling him back, I checked my phone and realised I had exceeded the free talk time for the month; moreover I gave Kaven an overseas call minutes ago.

After reaching home, I dozed off. Backache was terrorising me the entire day. After waking up, I started packing my work area lazily.