so much for technology

three weeks after signing up i'm wondering why my health insurance cards and new member info hadn't arrived by mail yet. well, turns out that despite my following the the on-line benefits sign-up process (confirmed by the fact that the benefits portal indicated i was siged up) and despite that the money was taken from my paycheck and that my employer's share was paid, i'm not in the system. some lady in the benefits office had to send an e-mail to the company to get me in their system (a call to the company had revealed that i wasn't in the system). she also had to indicate who my primary care doc was. yes, i had made that choice when signing up.

also? aaa auto club hadn't gotten around to sending me the info that repeated e-mails confirming my on-line actions indicated was coming, this 4 weeks after i used the aaa website to switch the membership from aaa south to aaa here. necessitated a visit to the office, which mercifully is a few blocks from my apartment. no record of the switch being requested.

so why did i bother? i only ended up having to make the very same calls and visits that the on-line processes were ostensibly designed to eliminate.