Topic: Government Regulation
"We Never Make Mistakes" Government Agencies, Banks, Bill Collectors all know the mantra of the bureaucratby rtbohan
(Libertarian)
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Our second youngest daughter, now a mother in her early thirties, suddenly has a problem not with one government agency, but with at least two, and potentially many more public and private bureaucracies.
Maybe it has something to do with her zodiac sign. Maybe she violated some arcane tabu. But she has run into "We mever make mistakes" before. The first time its was with a bank which had not properly credited a deposit to her account ; When she complained, she was told "We never make mistakes." Because Debbie has a hard head, a hot temper and the vocabulary of a fishwife, she finally intimidated the bank into checking the transaction, and they admitted the error. Now she faces the problem again.
Yesterday, she tried to file her income tax return electronically. On the electronic filing system, she was required not merely to list her social security number, but her date of birth. The IRS rejected the return on the grounds that she had given a false date of birth. In fact, she had given her correct date of birth, May 21, as recorded on her birth certificate. But the IRS insisted that she had been born on May 24.
She asked if the IRS could correct their information if she sent them a copy of the birth certificate. No, she was told, because the IRS was acting on information from the Social Security Administration. Her Social Security Account, which she had to provide this same birth certificate to apply for, listed her birthday as May 24.
So she called the Social Security office and asked them to correct the error they had made. She was told that she would have to come to the office with her birth certificate and her driver's license and wait in line to discuss the problem. Since it was their mistake for putting an incorrect date into the computer, she asked why she sould miss work to correct their mistake.
The answer was, "We can't correct the mistake." Having typed in the wrong date, the Agency was forbidden to make any changes to the original information. The only way that SSA could inform the IRS of her correct birth date was for her to come in and apply for a new Social Security card, opening a new account. This promised even more problems.
Given the time lag between applying for and receiving a new social security number, she will not be able to file her income tax return electronically. Next month, when her driver's license is due for renewal, she faces problems from the DMV for having a social security number different from the number in DMV's files. She will have to go to her bank and her employer to change her social security number there. And whenever she retires, she may find that she has no record of payments into her social sedurity account for all the years she has worked prior to 2008
But the bureaucrats never make mistakes, and when they do, the problem is yours, not theirs.
"We never make mistakes" should be ranked with "The Check is in the Mail" and "I'm from the government, I'm here to help you." on the list of great lies.
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2008 rtbohan, all rights reserved.
Published: Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Last modified: Thursday, April 10, 2008
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Posted By: patrick henry
Date: 2008-04-09 11:47:51
Agreed we all make mistakes, but responsible people admitt the mistake an correct it. Why is that the enitre governemetnal system, hell society can take no repsonsibilty?
Today on the way to work a woman ran me (and my 2 children) off the road while talking on her cell phone. When I honked from the shoulder to let her know I was there, she ignored me. At the next light she proceeded to cuss me out for honking at her, even after I explained to her I honked to avoid an accident as she was running me off the road. At that point with 3 young kids in back proceeded to cuss me out like a first sergeant in war. I responded how classy it was to talk such language in front of little kids. She responded with "fuck you cracker". I couldnt help but laugh at the originality of the cracker comment, and only further confused her when I told her I was so offended at being called a cracker that I needed to form an organization. The point is a "oh I am sorry I didnt see you" would have been sufficient, but instead I wronged her by honking, while she remained oblivious or careless to the point that she had committed the wrong. I just guess its the mean old white guy again.
BOTTOM LINE: No self responsibility, community nor social skills anymore.
Seems to me that given all of the complictions of fixing their mistake, your daugher is better off keeping the May 24 date thus claiming to be three days younger. Of course if those agencies did not exist it would have been easier to begin with.
You are right, of course, in the short term. But in the long term, she will have to go through the rigamarole, or when she retires she will be turned down for social security because the birth date on her birth certificate and her driver's license do not match the date which the SSA has mistakenly entered.
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2008 rtbohan, all rights reserved.