The Frog and PenguINN: rants

Showing posts with label rants. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 27, 2024

Enough Already !

A question today, more of a rant — not against fellow bloggers — but spammers.

Has anyone else been bothered by an onset of spammers in recent days/weeks ?

A fellow blogger recently commented on this issue posting that she had been bombarded with over 80 spam comments in a single week.

It's been happening here too. Recently, on the pull down menu above published comments, there were some 50 that blogger had flagged as potential spam — Most of these were actual spam, others that were not flagged were more of the same.

Nearly all spammers spew their garbage overnight, many contain links to online betting. Daily morning checks show postings within the past 4-6 hours of a 7 am check.

Unfortunately, actual blogger comments are sometimes marked as spam. These need to be checked as OK to publish. It's become a morning routine to check comments, delete spam, OK legitimate comments to publish.

Seriously, do these spammers think anyone in his/her right mind would click on any of the included links?

WHY do spammers bother; paid commissions on the number of spammed sites?
WHY if blogger can ID a comment as spam is it still published?
WHY when marked as spam and deleted, a spam comment returns on another post?

What I've been doing

As mentioned above, many recent spammers hawking online betting come from a specific source(s). These sites have been reported to blogger for inappropriate comments. When a spammer is reported, blogger will send this reply:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hi,
Thanks for flagging potential policy or legal violations on Google.
We’ve received your report under the following abuse category: spam or unwanted content.
The Google Team

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whether or not this will limit or prohibit future spam is yet to be determined.

Here's are several sites recently spewing spam comments. If you find any in your post comments, the best advice would be to delete immediately.

Laser247
ReddyAnna Book
Online CricketID
Arman
Bet bbhi
Online Cricket ID

In addition to spam containing links to online betting, spammers will use flattery and offer positive comments on how well the post was presented, etc. It's all smoke and mirrors (something that seems good but is not real or effective). It's best to delete these too.

Many bloggers moderate comments in an attempt to control spam, possibly for other reasons. If you do this, does it work?

Your turn — If any blogger has other solutions that work, please leave a comment.

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Clearing the Air

As some readers of this blog already know, our current residence is an apartment in a former Nashua, NH, textile mill. Did you know that over the decades, factories have become the top most popular building type to be redeveloped into rentals, now known as apartment homes?

One thing about living in an older repurposed building is the amount of dust that's everywhere. This post is about how we've been recently trying to keep it under control in our place.

Clocktower Place, Nashua, NH, formerly Nashua Manufacturing Company

In the 18th and 19th centuries, merchants built hundreds of mills throughout New England which produced paper to textiles. The region became a center of the American Industrial Revolution. As in Nashua, cities in many of these states were established as manufacturing centers. The mills used rivers and canals for energy. There were few environmental regulations and many production processes released toxic industrial chemicals into the air, waterways and ground.

By the mid-1900s, the manufacturing sector around New England fell apart. Labor was cheaper elsewhere. Companies moved operations to the South and overseas abandoning operations at the large mills. Cities struggled to address contaminants at the abandoned mills and find a new use for the buildings as environmental regulations started taking effect.

Redevelopment from factories to housing took hold due to changes in local zoning codes that permitted residential development in formerly industrial areas. Old buildings come with historic preservation rules. To defray the cost of cleaning up and renovating these large buildings, developers relied on expanded state and federal tax credits which rewarded them for preserving historical structures and creating affordable housing.

The Nashua Millyard is known as the center of Nashua’s historic industrial economy. It hosts three former historic mills converted to housing — Clocktower Place, the Apartments at Cotton Mill, and Lofts 34. All are adjacent to the Nashua River and within walking distance of downtown. Mills were built in the time when people walked to work.

Our apartment home is in the former Nashua Manufacturing Company, now Clocktower Place, which consists of 5 mill buildings. While living in a repurposed mill is very unique, and a great conversation topic, there are issues, not the least of which is dust which seems everywhere.

Dust magnets in our living room, black cabinets and TV

Dust is unavoidable, especially in older buildings. The black cabinets in our living room and the black TV are really dust magnets. That's why, last year, we (finally) bought an air purifier as these units can be effective in limiting indoor dust and improving allergy symptoms, which Patrick deals with seasonally. Among the various filter types, studies have shown that HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filters can remove many airborne particles, including pollen, mold, and bacteria, so we shopped for one which met that criteria, as so many do now.

More dust magnets in another room, black computer desk and laptop PC

Of course, we also had a number of questions since an air purifier is a simple unit, a little more than a fan with a filter or several. Here were a few of our concerns:

Do air purifiers work? While air purifiers may not directly or immediately improve your health, studies indicate that such devices can help reduce exposure to harmful pollutants, which may have long-term health benefits. We are pet less, but air purifiers are reported to effectively filter dander from the air. According to many sources, a well-designed purifier can capture airborne allergens, like pollen, mold spores, bacteria, viruses and smoke.

Do air purifiers stay on all the time? The simple answer is yes, the advantages are significant. Running the air purifier all the time, you benefit from the best air quality possible, and the cleaner the air, the better for your health. Both our units are set to auto mode which automatically adjusts the fan speed needed to maintain a comfortable environment. Leaving the units on ensures they are continuously be exchanging indoor air and filtering impurities. That said, we will turn them off for extended periods when we are not at home.

Do they increase the electric bill? Of course, according to online sources, an air purifier roughly equates to a cost of about $120 annually if the unit runs continuously which it's safe to do. While the amount of energy consumed is small, we turn off most devices when away for longer times.

How does a HEPA filter work? A fan draws polluted air into the air purifier. The air drawn in passes through the HEPA filter and air-borne pollutants get trapped into the fine meshes of the filter. The purified air is then pumped back to the room as the cycle of air purification continues. HEPA air filters can be costly to maintain. They don’t last forever and require replacement. In heavily polluted areas this can be more often. Also, they don’t eliminate smells from the air.

Winix 45500 air purifier

After reading far too many online reviews, our purchase decision was this Winix 5500, which was rated for 360 square feet room size, suitable for medium and large rooms.

Placement of this larger floor unit was in a central location, between the living room and dining areas. In general, an air purifier takes 30 minutes to 2 hours to purify a room as there are aspects including room size, filter, speed to consider.

Realistically, it's impossible to eliminate dust entirely, but the combination of cleaning and an air purifier has reduced some dust in our apartment.

Which led to us wondering, better to have one larger unit or several small ones? Many articles indicated that getting a larger air purifier could be most efficient. But, that to determine how many air purifiers were needed, you should consider where and how it would be used, whether for one room or multiple rooms.

The larger unit was performing well in the area where it had been placed. That's why, a couple of weeks ago, we bought a second air purifier. Once again, this was after researching and comparing various brands, models and sizes. We opted to buy another Winix. This unit was larger than many other models, and the buying decision was partially based on our sartisfaction with the previous model.

Winix A230 air purifier

We bought this Winix A230 tower, rated for a room size of 230 square feet, perfect for our second BR and now computer room. This room has black desks and our computers, including a recent addition, a black laptop computer that replaced an older and now recycled desktop.

In case you didn't know, you can take older Apple products, especially ones that no longer have any trade-in value, to an Apple store for recycling. Remember to first completely erase the hard drive.

Both Winix units have a fine mesh pre-filter, a charcoal filter and HEPA filter and feature what the manufacturer calls, PlasmaWave.

Smart sensors gauge the air quality and auto mode adjusts the fan speed. Filters, aside from the HEPA filter can be vacuumed and/or washed and should be completely dry before reinstalling. The charcoal and HEPA filters are rated for one year of use before replacement is needed and we recently replaced the one in the floor unit even though the replacement light had not alerted us, yet.

Just to be clear, specifying the brand of air purifier which we purchased is by not means as a purchase recommendation or endorsement, as everyone's needs and preferences differ.

Since I'm on the topic of clearing the air, here's a few topics related to blogging. All of these choices are strictly my own preferences. You rightly have your own choices.

Avoid hot topic posts. This blog steers clear of many current issues, especially politics, as blog administrator, that's my decision. This exclusion applies not only to not posting about such issues, but also to comments which stray into this arena, thankfully there have only been a few. Going forward, I reserve the right to delete comments that I consider off topic, again a personal decision.

Avoid centered text. My career was in the editorial field, perhaps that's why my dislike of centered text is remains intact. When text is centered, the starting place of each line changes. This forces readers to work harder as without a straight left edge, there's no consistent place they can move their eyes when they complete each line. Left justified text has a standard starting place where all lines of text start, so reading is easier for other bloggers.

Yes, as with everything, there's exceptions, for example, if text fits on a single line in headlines, titles, captions, quotes, short lines of text or poetry. Readers can follow these easily when lines are short, scannable and don’t require repeated eye movements. If there's not a good reason to center text, it's best to skip it.

Avoid small images. As a blogger, I want to share imagery, my own and those from Internet finds. When there's something for others to see, why not upsize it? Small photos often can be quite annoying at times. If something is important enough to include, why not make it larger?

Please recognize that I do not expect agreement on these items. We all have our opinions, beliefs, dislikes, hang-ups, fears and prejudices. The above only applies to my hangups and dislikes. Your decisions are your own, which is as it should be, your blog, your choices.

Wednesday, June 21, 2023

Wait & See . . .

Seems to have been the prevailing consensus among the fellow bloggers who received the email from the Google Album Archive Team that was cited in my previous post.

From comments received as this post, that opinion was evenly split among bloggers who received the email and those who didn't get it.

A couple of bloggers said they were unaffected due to being on another platform or not using photos. Another commented about having downloaded blog photos into a zip file and that it worked.

One blogger commented that she had gone back to early blog posts and found there were now broken links in place of photos.

It's also happened to me on blogs from years back. While, I could possibly go back and remedy this situation by adding back photos saved on external drives (many, but not all, have been saved) that task would be very time consuming. In truth, I'm not sure it would really matter. So, it's not something to be done. Going backwards is never as productive as moving forward. There are so many other things to do with that time.

And so, as noted in that earlier post, my position is also a wait & see one. Perhaps, this move will prove to have been unwise if ALL photos have broken links. While that would be unfortunate, it would, by no means, be a tragedy because there are far more important things in life as we all know. This blog is nothing more than a spot to share road trip adventures, family photos, fun things seen. It is not anything timeless.

Also, many thanks to those who left a comment and said they hoped I would not shut down the blog. Your support is very much appreciated.

As fellow blogger Sue said: I would dearly hate to loose this format and all the friends I have made over the years. The same is true for myself and surely for many of you as well. The blog community consists of many friendships over many years.

Thanks, as always, for sharing what action you will or will not take. As for those bloggers who said they had not received a Google email, perhaps yours went into a trash folder as so many of my legit emails do. It's worth a check. The email was From: Album Archive and the subject: An Update to Album Archive.

Monday, June 19, 2023

Blogger Changes Coming?

Just wondering, how many other bloggers also received this email from Google in recent days?

Hi XX
You’re receiving this email because you’ve viewed Album Archive recently or you may have some content that is visible in Album Archive. Starting on July 19, 2023, Album Archive will no longer be available. We recommend that you use Google Takeout to download a copy of your Album Archive data before then.

Today, Album Archive lets you view and manage album content from some Google products within Album Archive. However, some content that’s only available in Album Archive will be deleted starting July 19 including

1. Rare cases like small thumbnail photos and album comments or likes
2. Some Google Hangouts data from Album Archive
3. Background images uploaded in the Gmail theme picker prior to 2018

If you would like to access this data, please make a copy of this data using Google Takeout. After Album Archive is no longer available, you can still use those Google products to view and manage some content directly – learn more.

Thank you, Your Album Archive team

________________________________________

So — Does receipt of this email mean images in blog posts need to be exported very soon . . . so many ?s

This concern led to an hour or so of online sleuthing this weekend and then to the Blogger Help Community. The first post below by User 5777573509985063752 was labeled as a trending issue, as expected, it resulted in numerous comments from other Google users and replies from Adam, a Diamond Product Expert. (The user IDs are exactly as posted in the Help community.) Some of the longer comments have been shortened.

Blogger and Google Album Archive closing, where are Blogger photos stored?

Google Album Archive is closing in a few weeks. Just looked in there and it seems that’s where all Blogger pictures are stored. Does that mean on the 19th we won’t have any pictures on any of our blogger blogs? Or is that just a backup and the blog photos the blogs use are stored elsewhere?

Adam, Diamond Product Expert:

There are, understandably, a number of questions about this today, so I have merged them into this rollup thread. A new storage scheme is in the works. This transition is supposed to happen automatically; we'll see how that goes. Some images may need to be moved "manually," which means downloading them (if you need to) and uploading them again.

Google will notify you of any images that need manual action. Google clearly expects to be able to do this automatically for most images and has done that once before, when it moved Blogger images from Picasaweb into the Album Archive.

If you only need to download a small number of images, your browser probably has a "save image as" option. Otherwise, you can use Google Takeout. Beware of images uploaded from old accounts you may have forgotten about. Especially if the email of record for an old account is out of date (so that you will not see Google's notification).

We do not know today how clear the documentation from Google will be about describing affected images. It will probably be easier to replace things manually before the original image is deleted and it can be used as a marker and guide.

It may be too early to say "your blog isn't impacted by the changes." I just mean that I read that as "your blog isn't impacted by the changes" yet. Apparently, a new storage scheme is in the works: https://support.google.com/blogger/answer/13656070

That said, a month's notice seems short for something like this.

User 9087340934809438:

Once archive is gone, and as Adam mentioned, mostly no manual intervention by a blogger user is necessary (hopefully that is true as I also have thousands of photos embedded in the blog), where are the photos stored after that and against which storage quota does it count?

Adam, Diamond Product Expert:

Re: against which storage quota does it count?
That's an awfully good question, because the help page is silent on that issue. I am going to cross my fingers and hope that the images won't count at all against storage, which is, after all, the status quo.

User 9353:

We should have an idea of what amount of broken links we have to expect. I have uploaded over 5,000 photos on my blog since 2013. Even if a small percentage of these pictures need manual intervention, that will take a lot of time to fix it.

User 12992456061150136430:

Similarly to 9353 I have thousands of photos that are ostensibly in the Album Archive and are linked in blog entries dating back to 2004. I have over 11,00 blog entries and any requirement for manual intervention is a non-starter.

Adam, Diamond Product Expert:

@9353, my suggestion is not to buy trouble in advance. I think Google expects to convert everything automatically and that failures will be rare.

We don't have information about what factors might be problematic for Google, and I suspect they do not know either, that they are preparing for the possibility that issues will emerge during implementation.

I suppose, and this is just my speculation, that it would be a good idea to "future proof" your blog, especially if it is very old. What I mean is that if you started your blog before 2007 and never converted it to a Google account, it might be wise to do that.

Google says: Where possible, old image URLs on your blog are now converted to the new format. There may be some images where we can’t move to the new format automatically.

I assume the tense this is written in may not yet be correct, that the conversion has not happened yet for many people. It hasn't for me.

There's no mention of any of that in the email that Google sent out to everybody with images in the Album Archive. The Archive includes images from many other sources besides Blogger, and the generic email did not enumerate every case.

User 1891572831468108221:

This would be great if Google were mentioning that blogger photos will be migrated automatically before asking the users to archive the images.

User JP1234567890;

Thanks for this summary, Adam. The blog I'm most concerned about is 17 years old with thousands of photos. For now I'm trying to decide if I have a huge job ahead. The thing I don't understand is in the document you linked to, "a new storage scheme is in the works: https://support.google.com/blogger/answer/13656070

It ends by saying: "Tip: If the link isn’t visible, your blog isn’t impacted by the changes."

My question is which link. Does this mean that, in Step 4: Navigate to Manage blog > Manage unsupported image URLs.

If there is no "Manage unsupported image URLs" link underneath Manage blog, does it mean my blog isn't impacted by the changes?

As shown in the above exchanges, this is an issue concerning many Google users and bloggers, myself included. It seems that not even a product expert can anticipate what will happen.

Mt situation (and maybe yours) is like the users above who commented about long-running blogs with lots of images. Our blog has been going for just over a dozen years with most likely thousands of images.

That said, I am not planning to export any images, but will adopt a wait and see what happens next position. If that means that images are deleted from the blog by mid-July, perhaps that could be the time to shut it down. Should that happen, know that meeting blogger friends online (and some in person) has been wonderful. Meanwhile, I will be just waiting to see what happens.

Your turn — if you've received this email — What action, if any, do you plan to take?

Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Say More, Please

Has anyone else noticed in the past few days that Blogger has flagged very short comments (even older ones) as Spam?

Like many bloggers, I check comments daily and usually have anywhere from 2 or more on any given morning. Most of these Spam comments are at least a sentence or more long. Maybe you've received similar ones like this: Your blog is so interesting, please present more of this material . . . and so on. Of course, it's all complete nonsense, and there is always a link to a site that is definitely not that of a fellow blogger's. You can tell false flattery

My next step is to select the ! exclamation point, then the trashcan icon and deletion is done. Now, you would think that blogger would recognize future comments as Spam, but it doesn't quite seem to work that way. I've had repeat Spammers, maybe you have too.

There was a different pattern this weekend when I did my usual Spam comments check. Blogger indicated there were 40 Spam comments, that's way more than before in a single day. After checking, I found out that these all comments were legitimate from fellow bloggers (including bloggers no longer posting). Amazingly, Blogger had flagged these as Spam comments going back to the start of this blog! The one thing all had in common was their brevity.

That's why the post title is a request to, whenever possible, include a few more words in a comment. This may (or may not) prevent Blogger from incorrectly flagging them as Spam.

Of course, leaving a longer comment can be difficult, especially if you follow and read many blogs posts of those bloggers who post often. Personally, I've been posting less often, reading blogs on a semi-weekly basis, and not commenting on every post. Blog reading and commenting takes time which is something we all would like more of every day, month, year.

In checking these newly marked-as-Spam comments, I said that what all had in common was that they were very short, usually 2 to 3 words. Here's some examples of actual comments from legitimate fellow bloggers that were suddenly marked as Spam:

Looks good, Looks delicious
Very nice, Very pretty
Great!, Nice views
Beautiful flowers, how cute or how sad

Amazing, Oh my gosh!
Sweet photos, Excellent photos, Love the photos

Too cute, Good ones, Sounds good

Merry Christmas, Happy Easter or Happy (whatever holiday)

Happy anniversary or Happy birthday

Why did this happen now?

No clue because despite several online searches, I couldn't find information to indicate whether Blogger had changed some sort of Spam algorithm. (This is defined as a process or set of rules to be followed in calculations or other problem-solving operations, especially by a computer.)

But, there were a number of online complaints about whether or not Blogger does anything about comments marked as Spam. Here's two examples of actual online complaints:

We have been getting a sudden influx of trolls posting comments on our site trying to get their links in there, even though our comments section doesn't work with hyperlinks. I mark them as spam every time, but it doesn't stop them from being able to continue commenting. I'm just curious what the benefit is of having the "Mark as spam" option vs. just deleting. Is there something I can do to ban them from commenting? There is a certain satisfaction I get from marking them as spam every time, but I also have better things to do.

And another complained: For over a month now regular readers and commenters' comments get marked as spam. At least one comment a day, but often all of them! I do my best to set all comments free as fast as possible, by marking them as not-spam and posting them.

And EVERY.SINGLE.TIME I notify Blogger via in-blog support / help button. This is deeply frustrating as I'm freeing the same commenters' comments from spam limbo several times a week. What more can I do?

Here's a Blogger response

A Platinum Product Expert stated: Blogger does not share information about how they determine a comment is spam or not. I think the best you can do is continue to mark them as not spam. Suggestions included: Manage your blog's comments, Set your Blogger comment settings, Moderate comments, Delete or mark comments as spam

Why do Spam comments exist?

Spammers leave comments on blog posts looking to get backlinks pointing to their sites in order to rank higher in search engines.Many spammers can be using bots to comment. Short for robot this software application is programmed to execute specific tasks as part of another computer program. Bots are designed to automate tasks without human intervention.

So, my blogger friends, it appears that no matter how often Spam comments are marked, spammers/scammers will continue to leave their annoying comments on blogs. Hopefully, the weekend occurrence was a one-off and won't happen again. While time consuming to mark each one as not spam—it was done for all.

Thank you all, very much, your comments are read and always appreciated, no matter how short or long. Blogger has become very frustrating lately.

Your turn — Has this happened recently to anyone else?

Tuesday, April 18, 2023

Anonymous Lately

But it's not by choice.

Internet source

Recently, if I posted a comment on your blog, my comment name might have displayed as Anonymous instead of my regular (alias) name of Beatrice.

It's annoying, but at least has only been happening when using the iPad to comment. It's not my favorite device to blog read and comment. My fingers go faster than my brain resulting in typos. Some are corrected before posting, others missed and escape to a comment, my past and future apologies.

Back to the anonymity issue, which as stated doesn't happen when using other devices, like the desktop Mac or notebook PC. This sudden turn of events was the result of trying something new and, not finding it useful, reversing the action taken— but not with total success on the iPad.

Blogger NavBar normally displays at top left of a blog

While I'm signed into my blog, the blogger Navbar (see above) no longer displays. Yet, I can access blogs, delete spam comments, and even leave comments on some blogs—not all.

My comment name, Beatrice, shows up on some blogs. On others, it now displays as Anonymous. Some blogs don't accept Anonymous comments, so I'm directed to sign into Blogger. This doesn't work as I'm already signed into Google (only when using the iPad).

Recently, I tried what's called Private browsing (Safari and Firefox browsers), more commonly known as Incognito mode (Chrome browser)—different names, same function.

Internet source

In these modes, the browser doesn't keep a log of sites visited, cached pages, or saved information such as credit card numbers and addresses. It also prevents information from sessions from being stored in the cloud.

As you probably know, when you're browsing online, companies and websites use tracking devices, cookies, to keep up with digital activity from site to site for the purpose of targeted advertising. Depending on the browser and personal choices, private or incognito mode is said to reduce cross-site information and tracking across websites.

Going private/incognito lets you use a shared computer or someone else's device and prevents your passwords, search records, and browsing history being saved on that device. Private browsing can also hide your searches and browsing activity from others who use your computer, but doesn't mean your activity can't be tracked.

Private browsing doesn't completely hide your internet activity from third-parties—websites you visit, advertisers, internet service provider (ISPs), the government, or even hackers. An ISP provider can record a user’s online activity regardless of browser privacy setting. Your IP address, identity, and browsing activity are still visible to third parties. So, it's not a good choice when trying to avoid being tracked online. Private browsing won’t protect you from viruses or malware.

There's another problem. Since websites can’t modify information stored on your device, services normally available on some sites may work differently. You may have to re-enter passwords or sign-ins. That's what happened to me and why I didn't keep using it.

Even after I ditched Private mode, some sign-ins had to be re-entered and Blogger has been problematic only on the iPad. When I returned to non-Private mode on the desktop, everything, including Blogger, came back OK.

Private/incognito mode can keep your browser history private, that’s about all it does. For real privacy, experts suggest Tracking Protection or browse with a Virtual Private Network (VPN) service.

Anyone else who has used Private/Incognito mode—your thoughts ?

In another annoying, and recent blogger issue, which may or not be connected—has anyone else received this message when trying to post a comment?

An error occurred while trying to publish your comment

While not consistent, it's shown up on several blog sites. My workaround is to repeatedly click Publish which finally results in the comment being published or awaiting moderation (if that feature has been set).

Here's another message received when trying to post a comment on a couple of blogs. Despite backing out and then returning to the page, a comment wouldn't post. I'm unsure if this is related to the privacy mode issue.

So, my apologies, in advance, to those bloggers whose blogs I've read, but have been unable to post a comment. If anyone has a work around to this one, please share and thanks.

YIKES—it's U.S. Tax Day, instead of Saturday, April 15. When the deadline is on a weekend, followed by a holiday, the Internal Revenue Service pushes the due date to Monday. But, Monday, April 17, was a Washington, DC holiday celebrating Emancipation Day (anniversary of the district ending slavery in 1862) taxpayers had more time. Tax Day began in 1913, with ratification of the 16th Amendment which gave Congress the authority to tax citizens' income. It was first date, then March 15 in 1918, and became April 15 when the IRS restructured in 1954.

Double 😳 YIKES—State income taxes are due too. It's nice to be free of that tax paid when we lived in NJ and VA. As of 2022, nine states don't have a state income tax: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Wyoming.

Anyone planning on a future move?

Tuesday, July 26, 2022

Birthday Gift Cards

Spoiler Alert: This post is about a birthday, but more so an accounting of what happened to a birthday gift sent to the celebrant. This incident was a first for us, but is now a case of Buyer Beware. It's a gift we won't be repeating in future as alternate gift plans will be made.

Family celebrations continued this month. After Grenville's mid-July birthday, the next birthday was for the oldest granddaughter who celebrated her 11th birthday last week.

This year, we did not visit on her actual birthday as she and her brother would be away on a camping trip. Our visit will follow soon.

Her mom told us that she didn't specify any specific gifts, with a suggestion to send gift cards. Gift cards were purchased, then mailed with some gifts.

Not sure about anyone else, but every time I purchase a gift card, there's always been the concern — what if it doesn't arrive or work for the recipient?

Be careful about such thoughts . . .

The package arrived safely, but after the gift cards were tried, she let us know that the claim code on the back of the Amazon gift card would not work. Her mother confirmed this issue as well.

What to do next?

Still had the CVS receipt which showed that both gift card purchases had been activated, plus a notice that no refunds were given, once activated. A call to CVS and talk with a store manager confirmed the store had no responsibility for a non-working gift card activated there.

I was told to contact Amazon. Yes, you can find a number to call if you poke around online. In some cases, you may have to enter your phone number for a call back, as in my case.

An Amazon representative called me and the process began. Many questions followed, too many to repeat, including what credit card was used to buy the gift card.

No, that info was not provided as the issue was not with my card, but the gift card. Questions included where it was bought and the activation number, which her mom had provided via a text message. That info was given to Amazon and surprisingly, the claim code would not activate for the Amazon rep as well.

The first Amazon representative (yes, there were a couple) told me an email requesting much of the same information would be sent to my email and provided an email to return the responses. The email came, questions were answered, email sent, message received that the provided email did not accept emails!

That's right, another call to Amazon, another representative, more questions, more answers and FINALLY a request to give the Amazon account number. An explanation that she did not have an account, but used her mom's account and access permission would need to come from her. After providing an email address, Amazon sent her a direct email to request account access.

More checking by the Amazon rep, most likely to verify that no gift card had been activated in the account.

Eureka ! the Amazon rep said that a gift card credit would be issued for the granddaughter's in her mom's account. We received confirmation from granddaughter and mom that this worked.

Total time for calls to CVS and Amazon — 2 hours, which wasn't how I'd planned to spend my evening, who would?

Lesson learned was not to buy gift cards in future, especially when sending to someone. That's because no matter where a gift card is bought and activated, that store, most likely, won't issue a refund if there's a problem. The responsibility to resolve any issues will go to the card purchaser or recipient to contact and follow-up with the card issuer.

In some cases, like on the Amazon card, there wasn't a phone number to call, only an email contact in case of gift card scams.

Now, you know, and so do we.

Thursday, June 30, 2022

Still Waiting . . .

Yesterday, we found out that after 15 months, there could be another 12 weeks of waiting.

Not for Christmas, but it may as well be till then.

We're waiting a refund on our 2020 US federal tax return, not the 2021 filing.

In a mid-April post, I noted that many other 2020 on-time taxpayers (like ourselves) were also still waiting. IRS officials blamed the pandemic as offices shut down and employees worked from home.

Of course, that's the way bureaucracy works.

A delayed tax refund can be taking longer for the IRS to process because it requires additional review. Reasons include incomplete filing status or missing information.

Refund delays were among the top 10 serious taxpayer complaints in 2020 and the IRS flagged 5.2 million tax refunds for fraud, a nearly 50% increase over 2019, according to the Taxpayer Advocate Service. Of those, about 1.9 million were tagged for identity screening. In 2019, 63% of the refunds vetted for identity theft turned out to be legit, according to the organization.

The IRS scans returns for possible fraud. If a return is flagged suspicious, the agency will pull it for more review. A taxpayer is sent a letter (5071C or 6331C letter, Potential Identity Theft During Original Processing with Online Option) if it suspects ID theft or foul play. The IRS doesn't process a tax return or issue a refund until there's a response.

At times, the IRS sends ID verification letters to taxpayers after receiving an e-filed/paper-filed tax return, before processing a refund. This is to randomly verify identification as a measure to prevent identity theft and to test and strengthen IRS internal controls.

That's the way it's supposed to work.

Here's how it didn't work. We never received any letter requesting ID verification or an alert of possible fraud with our return.

What we received last summer was an IRS letter requesting additional information. It was referred to the CPA firm that prepared our return. We received assurances it would be addressed and had no reason to doubt that. Later, we were informed of a data breach and a ransomware demand and a letter noted this could affect IRS information. There's no way of knowing if or not this was a contributing factor to the red flag, but now we're wondering ???

The IRS has a website and under Where's My Refund, taxpayers can supposedly answer question to track their refund. Grenville tried it and, at first, received a message, that the return was still processing. As months went on, re-trys produced a message that his ID info was not recognized. The process was difficult — phone lines were clogged and online authentication was unavailable. He wasn't able to verify his identity online and couldn’t reach a phone representative due to a high volume of calls into the agency.

How Grenville describes me, at times

Enough is enough, this refund was no small change ($3,300). We could use it much better then the IRS — and it was ours. Months had gone by with nothing happening — no info was forthcoming anywhere, certainly not from the IRS.

The term dog with a bone applies here. By definition it applies to someone who's stubborn, tenacious, persistent, relentless and dogged.

In this case, that would be me.

Holding on and on

I called every IRS number possible with the same result. After a series of questions and keypad responses, the line went to a busy signal or was disconnected, every time, no matter what time of day a call was made.

After finding there was an IRS office here in Nashua, NH, where appointments could be made and there was a listed phone number — that number was called too — same results

Until late Tuesday afternoon when, after going through the keypad queries, a recorded message came on and announced: your wait time is between 15 and 30 minutes, please continue to hold.

You bet I held on, despite that we were meeting friends to attend an outdoor concert. This was at 4 pm and we were scheduled to meet-up with friends at 5:30 pm in a local park. (Yes, we made it for the Neil Diamond tribute band show, not nearly as good as the prior week's Beatles Tribute band show. Both were part of the city of Nashua's SummerFun.)

It wasn't until 4:45 pm that a human voice came on and proceeded to ask us a series of questions, such as social security numbers, date of birth, filing status, address. Other questions pertained to our filed 2020 return. We had all the answers (and more if needed).

Our admission ticket for the local IRS

Then, came a final question—would we like wanted to make an appointment at the Nashua IRS office?

Hmmm, let us think a second (or less).

Duh, of course, we wanted to do that!

Not only that but we could get one for the next day as early as 8:30 a.m., we opted for 10 a.m. which gave us time to stop into the CPA's office to advise them of the meeting. We were given copies of info previously sent to the IRS in July.

As well prepared as possible, It was onto our Wed appointment and the chance to speak to an IRS agent in person. We brought assorted documentation: social security cards, drivers licenses for ID purposes, and out 2020 return.

What did we find out?

According to the IRS agent when the additional information was requested and sent in July, it apparently did not get connected with the previously filed return. The agent explained that the information took separate paths and our filed return was marked as potential fraud. Again, no notification was sent to us, which he found puzzling as well. Thankfully, the agent was helpful, more than informative and even apologetic for the long delay.

And, never the twain shall meet, which, in our case, meant the return was in limbo. If we not doggedly pursued a follow-up, the agent could not predict how long it would have remained there without intervention. He suspected it could have been indefinitely—just saying, YIKES!

What happens next?

More waiting — up to 12 weeks, as the agent explained he had reset the process so it could be sooner. However, we were cautioned not to contact IRS shy of the 12 week waiting time.

Up to 12 possible weeks

Good news is that if the IRS doesn't issue a due refund within 45 days after receiving a return, it's required to start paying interest on the refund amount. The 45-days starts on either the day that the return was due, or when a processible tax return was received by the IRS, whichever is later. While the IRS ultimately issues the refund (with interest), taxpayers can wait months. About 18% of refunds flagged for ID verification took longer than 120 days.

Bad news is that any IRS interest you receive with your refund will be taxable income, much like interest earned from a checking or savings account.

It's back to the waiting game, but at least now, we're back in the game.

If something happens sooner, you all will be the second to know, after ourselves.

This was a longer-than-expected post, but helpful to vent our frustration. While we are a fairly patient couple, not being able to reach someone to speak with had become more than extremely frustrating. Finding out that the 2020 return had been flagged as possible fraud with no notification was really unsettling, especially as there are countless numbers of US taxpayers still awaiting refunds, perhaps for similar reasons.

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