51–60 of 92 posts
Isn't this abuse of the chargeback system? I was under the impression that chargebacks were for resolving otherwise unresolvable conflicts between the buyer and seller. Here the buyer didn't even attempt to get a refund from the seller before the chargeback.
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In Germany there is also a strange zone where people bring sanity to government processes that have no business being this complicated.
I've never experienced any government process where paying a third party would have simplified things. I've also never heard of any third party offerings for that purpose. Could you share some examples?
In other cases, you pay people to save yourself the hassle of fighting for an appointment slot, and to save a trip across town in the middle of a work day. These fixers become the somewhat digital layer to a famously analog bureaucracy.
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In Germany there is also a strange zone where people bring sanity to government processes that have no business being this complicated.
Very true, if only more sanity was brought.
Or if spun around, it's incredible what can be done by a single motivated person, and sad that the entire bureaucratic apparatus is incapable of doing it.
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I don't want them to be the police. I want them to give me the thing that I'm searching for first, not whoever outspent everyone else on SEO this year. If I'm searching for "Canadian visa application" then the first result must be the official government website for this. No policing involved - just good old accurate search, like Google used to be known for.
You're in luck! If you search for "canadian visa application" the first two results are "Visit Canada" and "How to apply for a visitor visa" on https://www.canada.ca/
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In Germany there is also a strange zone where people bring sanity to government processes that have no business being this complicated.
In Greece, traditionally, we tend to consider Germany as the almost ultimate place in regards to reliability, efficiency, etc. It's a bit soothing to discover that almost everywhere everybody has the same issues (the difference in magnitude matters, of course)
As a result, German bureaucracy tends to rely solely on paper and in-person appointments. With every state, every city, every office and every employee having their own interpretation of a procesd, you get an unpredictable, opaque, drawn out process that drives people mad.
There is a famous Asterix and Obelix scene about an office that drives people mad with bureaucracy. The protagonists are hunting for the Pass A38. This scene is better known in German than in its original French for a reason.
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In Germany there is also a strange zone where people bring sanity to government processes that have no business being this complicated.
I've never experienced any government process where paying a third party would have simplified things. I've also never heard of any third party offerings for that purpose. Could you share some examples?
Austrian ASFINAG would only sell you one that is valid in ~2 week at the earliest, since that’s the time you are guaranteed by law to return it. Not very handy if you are already on the road, and don’t want to stop to buy a physical vignette.
You think this is bad? Try getting visa for Europe within the UK as a citizen of a 3rd world country. The official process is through a service such as VFS, which is the most painful experience I've had with any sort of service. There are very few appointments, all of which are blocked out by 3rd party bots, which means you need to pay a 3rd party twice as much to get any appointment. The VFS website is riddled with…
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You're in luck! If you search for "canadian visa application" the first two results are "Visit Canada" and "How to apply for a visitor visa" on https://www.canada.ca/
On my phone I get several screenheights of sponsored links, with oh so helpful sitelinks and summaries of each scam site. The fourth result is the legit one.
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I'm not sure how Google can't be held responsible for this. They're literally advertising scams. They're taking money for putting up an ad for a scam site. I don't know how there is an excuse for this that's acceptable to any authority. It's their own platform that they seem unable to control. Take some responsibility Google, you are profiting by facilitating evil (even moreso than by regular advertising).
> I'm not sure how Google can't be held responsible for this. They're literally advertising scams. They're taking money for putting up an ad for a scam site. The thing I don't understand is why people keep expecting them to. Who even wants Google to be the police? To actually act as a deterrent you need the ability to impose penalties, and for that you need the actual police. All Google can do is close their account,…
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Although it wouldn't have helped in that situation, as the Polish don't need IDPs in Ireland.
The point is that if the Polish did need IDPs in Ireland then it would. Very few things help when you don't use them.
But anyway, IDPs will never be required in the EU.