The mental exhaustion of tech

[blandana]

School requests payment for something (hurrah!)
Log into payment site
Site always takes you to the admin page and not the parent log in so faff about trying to get into the correct log in area. Find correct school, find correct log in details
Select child (I have multiple so have to find the right one)
Find what I have to pay for
Give consent
Fill in details (medical, emergency)
Pay for item
Fill in payment details, payment rejected
Try again - payment method accepted but needs to be verified on banking app first
Banking app doesn’t log in because face recognition doesn’t work
Log in manually to banking app
Approve payment
Go back to site
Payment goes through
Finally, exhausted, my child can go on the school trip.

At this point I’d much rather put £15 in an envelope and be done with it.

Yes, I know we are in the era of everything tech and that’s just the way it is. And the idea of filling out paper forms isn’t thrilling either. But I hate the screens, the tech, the facelessness and thanklessness of it,
it’s exhausting and I don’t like it.

I’ve had a hard day and that’s the tip of the iceberg.

Feel marginally better now I’m going to get off this screen and climb a hill.

I think there needs to be a movement to circumvent this deliberate attempt to alienate human beings from one another and mechanise everything :

I was thinking about this today.

In some areas we really don't have a lot of control. It should be possible for school parents to band together, mind you. Refuse to engage with any school communications unless they come on a paper newsletter once a week etc. Although I wouldn't hold your breath.

Possibly if you got even a dozen parents to say "I struggle with technology, please can you print me out a form?" etc it would make it worth the school's while to always offer a paper option?

I thought of this thread this evening. I'm applying for a grant for DD for third level. I've been asked to send in tax statements from the Revenue Commissioners. What a pity the two government departments can't share this information with each other, eh?

Anyway, one tax statement was available to download straight away. I had to wait a few days for the other one. I got an e-mail today to say that the second one is ready to download. So I attempted to log into my account in the Revenue website. They sent a verification code to my phone. Except it never arrived. Tried again. No code. I got the code on my third attempt. Successfully logged into my account. Tried to download the tax statement. Got an error message. Gave up at this point and went to bed!

I've found my people.

The tide will change and our children or grandchildren will rush to tell us about how they were able to do a complicated bank transaction in an actual building talking to an actual person and it took 5 minutes.

The security checks with banks and e.g. buying Premium Bonds are almost so tight (have you checked, have you really checked, could this be a scam, are you sure it's not a scam) that you doubt yourself. 75 layers of authentication, 65 security questions (all of which you've written down on an actual piece of paper anyway).

I've filtered so many emails that I'm sure I'm missing some I actually need to address.

Eugh...I'm going to bed to read an actual book.

We are all stupid because we are all doing it. Technology use to mean more convenience for the customer. But in many cases it’s become less convenient for the customer (sometimes so much they can’t access the service at all) and more convenient and less cost for the company.

Even a blasted gift card. In the old days you just took it to the shop and exchanged it for goods. Not any more now you have to go to their site, download an app, do other things, fail, then try again and the damned thing tells you to to go to your settings and cancel cookies which then eradicates all your saved passwords. Card ends up in the bin. I can't cope with it. I have a £40 gift card I can't use.

my small rebellion is to refuse to use self service. I just quietly stand in the queue for the human…

Recaptcha - whoever thought that up should be flogged.

Just how thin a sliver of a motorbike, traffic light or bus have to be before it won’t count? Took over five attempts last time. I don’t think I’ve ever got right on the first go.

Recaptcha - whoever thought that up should be flogged.

Recaptcha is maddening and also those codes which are hard to read so you can’t see if it’s a 1 or a I or a lower case L.

I just type in a four letter word.

Then close that website.

I'm the same..I won't work for free.

Don’t blame you OP. Hadn’t we all thought tech was supposed to make life simpler and easier?

My main peeve ATM is our new burglar alarm system - had to be digitalised or it’d stop working. So now, instead of a crystal clear panel where you just put 4 numbers in to set it or turn it off, it’s now a much smaller, VERY unclear one - I need the light on plus glasses! - with a more complicated means of setting/turning off.

Plus, there’s an iPad size screen telling us what the weather and temp are today - not needed or wanted! - and a bloody annoying American woman’s voice telling us loudly every time the system is ‘armed or disarmed’!

I hate it!

Electric radiators which you can only set one temperature on, and then press to cycle down by a degree twice, third time to eco setting. I just want a variable analogue dial which gives full range of possible temperatures.

I hate my radiators. I reckon the digital control will be the first to break down as well, as happened with DD's washing machine. She replaced the machine, wasn't worth doing the repair <sigh>