Scott's Pet Peeve #6470

Scott Hardie | March 27, 2022
How awesome is it when organizations require documentation that they already have?

I manage my mother's affairs now that she has advanced Alzheimer's. Sometime around a decade ago, she owned stock in a company that was discovered to have misbehaved in financial-crimes ways that don't interest me enough to learn about the specifics. I received a postcard from lawyers alerting me to the fact that she was a candidate to participate in a class-action lawsuit based on this ownership, so I marked the box indicating that she wanted to participate and returned it.

A judge ruled in favor of the class, with a big nine-figure payout for who knows how many participants and the lawyers. Now I have received a 30-page form to fill out, to provide detailed information about how many of each stock she owned and on what dates she bought and sold it, with supporting documentation. I have absolutely none of that information, because I don't know where her money was invested way back then, and she certainly doesn't remember it. Do you know who I think does have that information? The lawyers themselves, who sent the postcard in the first place because they knew that she was eligible, because they'd already obtained that information in discovery. I have to prove to them the information that they already know in order for them to right a wrong for me. Gee, thanks. I don't know what my mother's share of the payout would have been; probably not much, but more than the $0 she'll get now.

It reminds me of the IRS. They know exactly how much we taxpayers owe each year, but they still require us to report it ourselves, for bullshit reasons.

Evie Totty | March 28, 2022
LOL yup, I was just thinking of taxes as I was reading that and then you mentioned it. Ridiculous.

Matthew Preston | March 28, 2022
I gave up on responding to class action decades ago. The only people they benefit are the lawyers that are allowed to file them.

Evie Totty | March 28, 2022
Saaaaaame

Scott Hardie | March 29, 2022
If I can do it in five minutes or less, I respond. I've made $25 here, $100 there, nothing huge but certainly worth a few minutes' time. Once in a while the result is truly paltry, like a $5 Walmart gift card.

In this case, it's for someone else and not for me, so I felt an obligation to step up. I'd even fill out the 30-page form if I had the data. Maybe I'd be in better financial shape if I treated my own finances as soberly as I treat my mother's. :-P

Samir Mehta | March 29, 2022
[hidden by request]

Matthew Preston | March 29, 2022
Samir, that's awesome! What was the song tune? I'm hearing the alphabet song or pop goes the weasel in my head.

Scott Hardie | March 29, 2022
Yes, Samir! I get that too, except it's occasionally worse since my legal name is Sean and yet I introduce myself as Scott out of habit sometimes. That makes them doubt that it's really me even after I explain, and so they ask twice as many questions to make me prove that I really am the Sean in their paperwork. I try to get "prefers Scott" onto my record at every doctor's office, but many don't support that.