by Robert Gillis
Boston City paper 3/2008

So, long MBTA horror story short, the blinking LED sign o’doom flashes that due to mechanical failure (quelle surprise!) the 8:16 will be late and adds that there are “crowded conditions.”

So we happy commuters wait in the pouring rain as the sign soon changes to state that the “8:16 will not be excepting (sic) any passengers.” (Grammar isn’t big at MBTA headquarters, apparently, but hey, it isn’t on this site, either, so they get a pass on that one).

The alleged 8:16 shows up at around, oh, 8:45, and for some reason STOPS, although it’s not “excepting” any passengers and no one leaves the train. The 8:47 arrives about 10 minutes later, and I’m only 50 minutes late for work. “Dependabili-T.” Hah!

So as usual I go to the MBTA web site to fill in my refund request. I go through the FOUR PAGES of web forms and then I click CONTINUE and get this little beauty of a message:

On-time Service Guarantee
An error occurred on the server when processing the URL. Please contact webmaster@mbta.com.

LOVELY. I think I'll pass on contacting the webmaster. I'm trying to give up profanity for Lent.

...And on the subject or refunds, I'm still keeping track of the refund requests. They take months but so far I HAVE been receiving them... And once I do, then I just go through the simple process of waiting in the long line at South Station, signing my letter from the T, presenting the complementary tickets and my fecking driver's license, and hoping the clerk knows what s/he's doing so I can get my $9.00 back. Arg.