The holidays are over, Christmas decorations are back in storage and, as far as I know, nothing new is happening around here.
Knock Knock, stopped by once last week, to show me her newly pierced ears and again today just to let me know she was around …… but I’m sure she was expecting I’d have a treat for her, which I did not.
I didn’t have a treat for last week either, so maybe she’ll take this as a sign to stop knocking on my door.
It’s not meant that way at all, but I won’t be mad if it's taken that way, turns into a situation like a cat …… If you don’t feed the cat, the cat stops coming by.
This is the Feng Shui Year of the Snake, a time for reflection and spiritual growth in the midst of turmoil, so my mind has been so preoccupied with detaching from appearances, getting clarity so as to see behind the scenes ……… the what and whys of it, listening, that buying something to prepare for Knock Knock next visit never crossed my mind. I even forgot my girls birthday, failed to send them a text on the day of.
I’ve also been too busy with my crafts and further efforts at getting rid of clutter to nose around, ferret out what the seniors are up to.
Not receiving the usual Monthly Calendar is helping me to detach from the happenings.
It’s not meant to aid in my detaching, instead it’s meant as a weapon by management to get me to sign up for the Rent Café.
It’s not personal. No one on the complex received the Monthly Calendar, advising us of events, rule changes, maintenance notes, office hours, etc, because Manager last month announced the Monthly Calendar would go paperless first of this year.
For last two years, management has been pushing for us to pay rent via the Rent Café.
Rent Café is some kind of third-party portal, designed to make work life easier for management.
It seems to me Manager’s work life is already too easy, as she has time to sit in her office, spy on us via her video equipment. So, if signing up for Rent Café to pay rent online makes less paperwork for her, more free time, I’m not interested.
In addition, it’s not free — an additional $3.00 a month.
Not a lot of money, but the nerves ……… you want us to make work life easier for management and pay for the privilege?
I don’t think so.
I’m good with issuing a monthly check.
I’m guessing other residents feel the same way, because management is always coming up with creative measures to try to lure us over to Rent Café.
They’ve offered a gift card lottery for us to sign up, offered to dispense with the $3.00 a month fee ……… but just for the initial signing up month and just generally tried to cajole us into signing up by stressing how easy it is to have rent automatically deducted from our accounts.
Not getting the response they wanted thus far, just last year management dispensed with the paper form we’d fill out for work orders and tied it into Rent Café …… making it necessary for us to join Rent Café in order to submit work orders online.
Management is failing to take into consideration, it's not just that some of us don't trust them or their third-party portal, want nothing to do with it, but that not many here have computers or smart phones to access the portal even if they wanted to.
Consequently, I don’t know what everyone else is doing to bypass that roadblock — maybe just walk into the office and verbally request repairs be taken care of, maybe catch one of the guys out on the property, request service. I myself keep a paper trail by emailing the office when I need something in the unit fixed.
At any rate, the Monthly Calendar is the latest ploy to force our signing up for Rent Café — no more paper calendar posted to our doors. Calendars can be accessed through Rent Café.
Again, I don’t know how others are working around this, but I don’t care if I get a Calendar or not; plus, I can visualize this backfiring, causing more work for management, rather than less.
Say tree trimmers are scheduled to be on site, or another paving project comes up. Inasmuch as I and others have not signed up for Rent Café, management is going to have to notify us to move our cars out of the way …… probably by some sort of paper notice posted to our doors.
Likewise when an inspection or Community Meeting is scheduled …… If they want us to show up, some sort of notification is in order.
No matter how one looks at it — if it’s important, management will have to notify us regardless of our not being signed up for Rent Café; if it’s not important, and we get no notification because we're not on Rent Café, all the better to not know, clutter my mind.
