RL Anger

[scar]

@aria there are too many hills there

@surreality inherited and sold a different property elsewhere

[surreality]

@scar @aria 'Inherited money' was a good guess then.

I mean, unless my father marries some 18 year old and everything goes to her if my mom passes first, or my mother donates everything to the church if my dad passes first (neither is outside the realm of possibility), this is the only way I'm going to end up a property owner. (And even then, I will more than likely become a 'mortgage owner', inheriting the one on their house. The one I'm in they leave in the clear since it's the less important property.) So I'm not slinging alllllllllll the shade here; I know what it is to be a flake with few income prospects and too many health concerns for the average job.

I'm just, uh, not such a dumb flake as to do that. Even selling both places here, I'm smart enough to know I could afford a crappy condo at best in that area, and the current home and property values (if the mortgages were in the clear... ) are not huge, but... -.- ...I'd stick with the devils I know, damn.

[Sockmonkey]

FUCKING ADOBE!!!!

So. Buckle in. I need to vent like whoa.

Back in October 2017, I got an email saying that my student pricing for Creative Cloud ($29.99/mo) was coming to an end and that if I didn't have student credentials to submit to renew the discount (I didn't), I would transition to full price ($50/mo). I hate Creative Cloud's pricing structure with a fiery passion because you can either sign up for one program at a lower rate or everything for the full price -- there is no in-between. And you can't just buy the programs you need and live off them for for years. No. You HAVE to subscribe. They do not recognize that there are different kind of users and basically force everyone to be treated as powered professionals.

So I'm like 'Fuck this shit, I'm not paying $600/year for this crap' and I decide to cancel. I go to my account and .. no cancel button. I search for how to cancel and it saying that there should be a link on my account. No link. I'm getting pretty salty at this point so I jump onto their live chat and tell their customer service person that I want to cancel. That I think $50/mo is a rip off. She is very apologetic and offers me two months free and then an extension of my student pricing for another year if I don't cancel. I still think $29.99/mo is kind of a rip-off but .. whatever. Okay. I agree.

She very explicitly states: two months free, student pricing resumes in January 2018 and will continue until January 26, 2019 at which point I will need to renew.

Got it.

Fast forward to today.

I get an email saying that my student pricing is coming to an end and that if I don't submit student credentials, I will be transitioned to full price. W. T. F. So I jump on their online chat again to find out what is up. The guy goes over my case file and tells me that the previous rep only offered me two months free. No. That was not the deal. We go back and forth. I ask him to send me the transcript. He sends it to me. I COPY PASTE THE EXACT LINE WHERE SHE SAID THAT I WOULD HAVE STUDENT PRICING THROUGH JANUARY 26, 2019 BACK TO HIM. He claims that she meant it was contingent on me supplying credentials which makes zero sense because if I had credentials, I wouldn't need them to extend pricing because I WOULD JUST BE ABLE TO CONTINUE THE PRICING MY DAMN SELF. Nope. He will not budge. I complain that I have been lied to. No, I have not been lied to. Yes I have. You just misunderstood, ma'am.

I want to cancel.

He can't cancel my account, that has to be someone else. So he transfers me to another chat representative.

So I go back and forth with this person for a while. At this point, I have missed lunch. Do you want to cancel? YES.

Actually, I can't cancel your account.

Why not?

I can't cancel your account without canceling your license first.

So cancel my license.

If I cancel your license, you will incur an early termination fee. I suggest that you just stick with the subscription until the end of your term.

.........are you fucking kidding me? So let me get this straight. I wanted to cancel back in October but you offered me two months free and an extension of my student pricing until January 2019 to keep me as a customer. After the two months were up, you changed your mind and rescinded the deal, bumping me up to the full price I told you that I was unwilling to pay. Now that I want to cancel, I have to PAY YOU MONEY TO DO SO because your BAIT AND SWITCH has left me TWO MONTHS INTO MY SUBSCRIPTION?! DID I GET THAT RIGHT?!

So do you want me to cancel your subscription or not?

How much will it cost me to cancel? I need to decide if the money I will need to pay will be worth it just to be rid of you guys.

At this point, there was a few minutes pause in the chat before he came back to say that he had talked with his colleague and they had decided to waive the early cancelation fee.

I think he was waiting for me to say thank you but it was, like, almost two hours of dealing with them at this point and what was there to thank? I told him that I would not be recommending their product to any of my peers but I was sure that didn't matter to them since they have such a strangle hold on the industry.

He promptly terminated the chat and I bitched on Twitter to my 200 followers which is probably my mom and 199 bots.

FUCKING ADOBE.

tl;dr - Creative Cloud is a scam

[surreality]

@sockmonkey I am having to look at this lately myself, after kludging along on Photoshop 5.5 for....ever. (My iMac is a 2010, it's a miracle it's still running, let alone running well.)

Am not looking forward to this in even the smallest way.

FWIW: You should be able to deduct it as a business expense if you are using it for work stuff. This isn't a huge help, I know, but our tax lady insisted that this would be legit when I have to do it. (She asked why I hadn't had any software expenses for the first time in years a couple years back, and all I had to say was 'Adobe chang-' and she rattled off the info. Clearly, not the first time this came up that week!)

[Sockmonkey]

@surreality Will we still be able to do that after Trump's glorious tax cuts? I know a lot of things that used to be deductible aren't anymore.

Anyway, I can just log into CC using my work account. It will just get tricky if/when I leave my job. But honestly? I don't even really use the programs that much anymore. I'm a UX designer professionally so I mostly use Sketch and Invision.

[surreality]

@sockmonkey Let's hope the tax cuts won't totally fuck us like that. I know I'm putting off the actual computer replacement until after tax day this year -- and verifying that if I have to replace the computer, well... at least it's the year they finally put out a non-darth-trashbucket pro? (So much sigh, so much "HOW MUCH?!" O.O O.o o.o -.-)

[Sockmonkey]

@surreality I bought a new MacBook when the ones with the touchbar first came out and I am juuuuuust about to pay it off now.

[Sunny]

Have been in acute pain since November (think kidney stones, if anyone's ever had them). Saw research hospital doctor today. This was supposed to be the light at the end of the tunnel. Instead, I have been run over by the train.

[Tyche]

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@sockmonkey Let's hope the tax cuts won't totally fuck us like that. I know I'm putting off the actual computer replacement until after tax day this year -- and verifying that if I have to replace the computer, well... at least it's the year they finally put out a non-darth-trashbucket pro? (So much sigh, so much "HOW MUCH?!" O.O O.o o.o -.-)

Yes, those deductions are eliminated.

[surreality]

@tyche So small businesses can't have operating expenses now? That seems a bit unsmart.

[Tyche]

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@tyche So small businesses can't have operating expenses now? That seems a bit unsmart.

No, as personal deductions. It doesn't affect me (or perhaps you) because I have an S corporation and pay job expenses (travel, books, computers, software, education etc.) through that.

[surreality]

@tyche I'm listed as/have a sole proprietorship business, and have always filed as such. I don't work for somebody else, haven't for years.

[TNP]

@surreality Might want to look into forming a corporation and paying yourself a salary. It also limits personal liability.

[Tyche]

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@tyche I'm listed as/have a sole proprietorship business, and have always filed as such. I don't work for somebody else, haven't for years.

If you use Schedule C then I think you're okay. The changes are to Schedule A.

[surreality]

@tnp We keep talking about it, just haven't yet. I mean, I live in fucking Delaware, it'd almost be a joke at this point. (We are like, the corporate HQ of the world... at post office boxes and switchboards, more or less. One of the 'every big corp ever has a dinky office there' office parks is practically across the street from our development. To be fair, some places have actual facilities here, too.)

The one issue with it is that my work is seasonal, so I get paid a big lump around one time of the year with the way things are now, more or less. That is apparently a big complication we're (since the husband is helping figure this shit out at least) hoping to resolve over the next two years. When I was doing online sales year round, it would have been feasible; doing a block of in person shows in a 2 month period... not as feasible, even if we're adding more shows each year. (My mother mismanaged things so much when she was in charge and I was just 'a contractor' for the family business I inherited responsibility for in full a couple years back, she screwed up a lot I'm having to correct for since it got folded into mine.)

@tyche Yeah, I'm on Schedule C. Have been for ages now. (ETA: What we jokingly refer to as 'The misplaced decimal point taxes', since the year the place we go to advertised everything as '$49.99' -- and my poor sainted parents didn't realize that meant just for individuals, not businesses, and my mother and I each got whalloped for $499/each that year. Which is funny in hindsight... )

[Tyche]

@surreality I'm an independent contractor which worked for several years. But then the IRS started claiming we were employees of the companies we were contracting for, so I had to incorporate as many companies would only sign contracts with LLCs or S-corps.

[surreality]

@tyche Yeah, it gets seriously ridiculous. It's like 'OK, so how do I set this up so I don't get all of the penalties and none of the benefits?' after a while.

We actually had the communal talk about replacing the computer -- since, uh, highish-end iMac Pro, not a small expense, I think the one we specced was $11200 before required peripherals? -- and all decided 'we will do that after we figure out what all of our taxes are going to look like and we can double-check with the accountant re: what will be different for the coming year'. (My usual budget for the year is about $7k for materials, show fees, etc. combined, so that's a fair bit over. I'm good on materials at the moment thanks to some well-placed bulk orders the last two years, but still have about $1k in show fees. We were going to do display replacements this year -- super needed -- but we got halfway there last year and the other half can wait until next so we can start addressing the 'year round income/this computer is from 2010 and sounds like it wants to explode' issues first.)

We all go in together so we can go get dinner afterward, and force my husband, who doesn't drink, to drive us home, because it's the one night a year we ever do.

[Ganymede]

@sockmonkey said in RL Anger:

Will we still be able to do that after Trump's glorious tax cuts? I know a lot of things that used to be deductible aren't anymore.

Yeah. Like spousal support.

I can't wait to hear the collective outcry from middle-class white male America.

[JinShei]

NHS budget cuts. I can't find 4% of my budget without cutting patient facing things, like home visits (costs fuel, less economic in time). Bring on the revolution.

[faraday]

@ganymede said in RL Anger:

Yeah. Like spousal support.
I can't wait to hear the collective outcry from middle-class white male America.

Well I'll join them there. Having to pay taxes on money you never received is complete BS.