Today I reluctantly canceled my subscription to the Sunday NEW YORK TIMES…
The newspaper has been part of my Sunday morning ritual for nearly a decade, but lately it’s been more trouble than it’s worth.
Allow me to explain.
The Sunday New York Times is now apparently delivered to my home by the same individual who throws the Sunday KANSAS CITY STAR. And since both newspapers are usually pretty weighty -primarily due to ad inserts as opposed to reading material – my carrier normally throws them two separate bags.
One for the STAR. One for the TIMES.
Until about four weeks ago.
That’s when both papers landed on my lawn in a single bag.
WOW! How did they manage to stuff TWO giant papers into a single bag?
The short answer is they didn’t.
What I got instead was a full-of-inserts K.C. Star and HALF of the New York Times. Specifically, the arts & leisure, books, travel and NY Times magazine sections.
The news, sports, business, style and Sunday review sections didn’t make it.
I called Times customer service office which informed me that a replacement—or recovery—edition would be delivered between 10:30 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. that day.
It never came.
So on Monday I called again and received a credit.
The same thing happened again a week later. And again last week. Which brings me to this past Sunday—the FOURTH Sunday.
I looked out in the front yard and guess what, just ONE bag AGAIN.
Ah, but this time it had the news, sports, business, Sunday review and style sections. Art & leisure, books, travel and the NY Times magazine were the lost sections.
Well, I called again at around 7:30 a.m. and apologies were made with promises of a repeat delivery after 10:30 a.m.—ONLY IF I called back AGAIN after 9:30 a.m.
Surely they were kidding.
They were not. They took my information, but their computer I was told, wouldn’t allow a re-delivery request to be entered until the later hour.
Needless to say the missing sections never showed up.
So today I made yet another weekly call to the New York Times requesting another credit and decided that enough was enough and pulled the plug.
The process entailed dealing with two persons on their end.
One to listen and apologize and a second retention specialist trying to keep me as a Sunday subscriber.
“You’ve been with us for over 10 years,” she pleaded.
Hey, that’s three years longer than my marriage lasted.
She even offered a 50% price reduction of my annual subscription.
But guess what, this now former subscriber wouldn’t be swayed. Mess with me once, no problem. Twice? Let’s see what happens next week. Three times? OK, I’ll give them one more chance.
Four times and I’m pulling the plug.
So bye-bye Sunday New York Times, hello CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood.
It makes for far less hassle over my freshly brewed cup of Jacobs Kroenung coffee.
You should’ve pulled the plug on the Star as well. Talk about a worthless fish wrap their Sunday editions have become. Come to think of it there isn’t enough paper left to wrap a lot of fish with any more. It’s hard to wrap fish with NFM and Target inserts.
Pull the plug on the Star. I haven’t had problems with my Sunday Times delivery (ok, they missed a few Sundays, but I got credit). At least it’s all there, in a bag by itself.
The star contract carriers are refugees from the funny farm. Getting proper service from any of them is a complete and total joke. If you lined up fifty of ’em, there wouldn’t be a total of twenty teeth in the whole bunch. And the NYT is such a worthless liberal rag, it ain’t worth having your parakeet shit on it.
I love the NYT online for about $15/month. Read it every day. Worth every penny.