Tangled wires

I was trying to think of another analogy for how things are going and I think I’ve settled on this process being like throwing a boomerang. You send something out and it comes flying back at your head. Except our boomerangs keep coming back on fire.

In anticipation of Josh getting his Emirates ID this week, the landlord requested that we send him 1/2 of the total annual rent in a wire transfer. Josh got on the phone with our bank, set up the wire transfer (for almost 25 thousand dollars) and poof! The money disappeared from our account. Side note: it’s a good thing the landlord only wanted 1/2 up front because that’s all we had after the government decimated our paycheck on September 1st.

I was just starting to enjoy the fact that the wire transfer was the first thing to process perfectly smoothly when Josh got a message from our future landlord’s agent: “We have notice of the transfer, but the bank says the money will not be available until Sept 19. That is too far away. You need to cancel the wire transfer and resend it to our US bank. We will provide the account information so you can do that.”

Say what now? First of all, our lease doesn’t officially start until the 15th. What difference does four days make when you have confirmation that the money is yours?

Second, I can confirm that this chap does not need the money. It’s like Donald Trump asking me to rearrange my life so he can get my rent money a few days faster. Fine, it’s like Donald Trump’s brother. Same. Same.  🙄

Third, does this minion/agent of the VIP know how wire transfers work? Or how money works? The cash is gone from my account and canceling it means waiting for it to come back before I can think about sending it out again, plus wire transfer fees, currency conversion fees, etc. That’s not happening.

My instinct was to reply with an “oh hell no!” but I asked Josh to call our bank first and confirm the details of our transfer. It turns out the money was sitting in the guy’s bank so any delay was on his end, not ours. Second, to cancel meant more fees (of course), plus a minimum of 5 days to get the money back before it could be sent again. The shortest distance between him and that money was to chill and let things be.

So Josh called the agent and told him to bug off — and as soon as Josh resisted, the guy backpedaled and said, “No problem” because he got an update from the bank and would have the money available in just a few days anyway so everything was fine now. Grrrr. Such is the way things go here. Everyone tries to push everything off on someone else as their problem to fix, even when it’s not. What causes the least amount of work and trouble for me? I’m going to do that. Doesn’t make sense? Doesn’t matter.

This happened almost a week ago and I’m still mad about it. People stomping all over my life with no care for the actual people that are at the end of their actions. Sigh. On the bright side, Josh got his Emirates ID today. On the dark side, the leasing agency can’t get the lease done until Wednesday at the earliest. Did I mention Thursday is a national holiday? (Islamic New Year) . . . soon enough we’ll be in our place. Soon enough . . .