Dispute to resolve grievances - Bedbugs

As you all know, I have bedbugs.

March 23 I made a verbal complaint to the superintendent.
March 23 HE booked an appointment to have my apt sprayed March 27.
March 24 I'm informed by letter only, that the owner says I'm 100% responsible for the cost of the exterminator. After the superintendent said they would take care of it.

So here is the update. I called the tenancy branch today and spoke with a TB officer.

I’ve been advised not to file the grievance against the property owner til AFTER the spraying has been completed.

Trying to resolve the dispute myself has gone unacknowledged by the property owner which gives me the right to file the complaint for repairs/covering costs of the exterminator. As he refuses to try and resolve this with me.

The fact they booked the appointment then told me BY LETTER that I would be responsible for the full cost, is not looking good for him according to the officer.

They told me to file for refund of filing fee’s and reduction in rent until all repairs are done and refuse to pay the cost of the exterminator. Regardless for his reasoning why he'd like me to pay.. He's in the wrong already.
(I could easily not have it done and let the whole building become infested.)

At which time they can not try to evict me,increase my rent as penalty, or to cover any of the costs of the repairs at any time. :)

I have most copies of requests/rejections for repairs, however the officer mentioned, just one or two requests for reasonable repairs that were denied would suffice. I have put in a request for the superintendent to forward me all copies of all requests, complaints, and rejections since 2002.

(I have most of them in the last 7 years)

Adding the lovely proof of the half ass job they do when rechauking the tub every year, instead of replacing all tiles and treating the mold….. ya that will fix the problem.

Asshole is going down!

And to think, all this could be avoided if he wasn’t such a jerk and thought he could slowly force me out…

As soon as I have all the pictures printed out, and copies of the requests etc.. I'll file the next day. The owner will be served a copy of my grievances and will be given a chance to do the repairs in a timely manner, or go to arbitration and have his name and company on file for negligence of maintenance. :)

Seriously picked on the wrong girl to try and push around and try to take advantage of.

He has a costly bitter fight on his hands now.

Please cross all your fingers for me.

Update on the BedBugs- short of crying

Today I was simply short of throwing myself on the floor when I learned how much goes into the prepping of having your house/apt professional sprayed for bed bugs.

Orkin Inc, is the company coming to my house on Friday while I'm at work then on the island.

Here is the list to prep for the spraying, dusting and gasing they will do on Friday.

PRE TREATMENT! ..yes Pre.
- must launder ALL CLOTHES,ALL LINEN, ALL JACKETS clean and/or dirty, put in bags and seal tight. (regardless of the room they were in. This will help more overall to eliminate re infestation - gross word)
- take everything out of dresser(s), book cases and anything that may have been on the floor and bag it, THEN post treatment, wash again.
- vacuum
- all pictures on walls must come down and same with any picture frames....
-pull everything a foot away from any wall
- all electrical outlets, phone jack covers and baseboards must be unscrewed and left open so they can "dust" behind it. aka poison the little buggers!
-Dismantle bed frames.

POST TREATMENT
-leave all sealed clothing that you are not using in bags for 10-14 days til
(or 100% repeat the above pretreatment)
-laundry the bed linen from that day and couch slip covers after treatment
-Vacuum again.

RE-TREATMENT is done.
- see pre/post treatments.

so according to our Gov't these BB are not a danger but only a "small nuisance".
umm ya okay... I'm spending $40-$70 CDN in laundering all my belongs TWICE and losing a days work for a "small nuisance"

I tried to keep this private at work, cos well, people gossip and if you don't do your research, you'd think I was dirty or something.

My boss was great about it as I sat in her office this morning with my second REGULAR coffee (I only drink decaf) and holding back the tears of this "small nuisance"

I'm decided I'm just going to throw a lot of stuff out.
I mean I live alone, what do I need with 20 complete sets of bed sheet sets
and 40 plus towels. (this includes kitchen towels, hand towels, face clothes, regular towels for hair and bath sheets for the body) yes I'm that girlie.

Well the towels and sheets I'm going to give to someone at work who will benefit from them as he and his wife have a small litter growing (I think they have 4 kids now), and simply could use it in these hard financial times.

I'm going to buy some beer and cry.

The landlord is unable to rig the laundry machines for me to do a small fortune of laundry for free. However, he will put a note on two of the four machines for "his use only" from 9-5, so I'll have access to two washers/dryers full time, but can use all 4 if no one is using them.

Its like moving. I swear to gawd.

You have my permission to kick anyone who ever may cross your path and say bedbugs are ONLY a "small nuicance"

BED BUGS!!! grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

I HAVE BedBugs

First of all I’m a clean person. My apt is clean, well tidy and gets cleaned often.
I went to the island a month ago and upon my return I have been bitten 14 different times in 4 weeks.
ENOUGH ALREADY!

I’ve researched the hell out of this and have done everything so far I can, aside from using sprays in my apt.

There is nothing in my bed, box spring; I’ve taped up any holes (the one in the spare room where the ferret entered)

I slept on the couch last night and woke to 3 new areas of my body being eaten.
So it’s in the couch. I’m heading out at lunch to pick up some ecofriendly sprays that came suggested from Bedbuggers.com
I’ve read forums etc, and it turns out bedbugs is an issue in Vancouver… WTF

They don’t cause or carry diseases, but 1% have been reported to have carried a type of hepitis.
GREAT! Although they can live in their hiding spots up to 92 days without feeding… and we thought cockroaches would be the longest living thing on the planet!

So this weekend is a bust, I’m going to being doing laundry, laundry, and oh wait, MORE FRIGGIN LAUNDRY! Spraying down all baseboards, cracks, couches, bed, and the underside of anything that is fabric in my apt.

They don’t hurt, until you actually start scratching, and they are just unsightly to see on your body.
I’ve been fortunate enough that anywhere they have bit me; I can cover up with clothing and reach myself with a lot of calamine lotion.

Update to follow on this topic after my visit back to the island.

General Update - Men - Work

WORK
As I wrote last week or so, we let a production company film a movie in our office. I mentioned that while setting up/tearing down how unprofessional and unorganized *I* thought they were.
3 days passed. A few crew members and cast got into it with our staff and a staff member who left in charge while the owners were away (big mistake)

Here is the run down of things that occurred:
~ They would argue in the office loudly if not yelling at each other.
~ Crew members swearing out loud while talking to each other.
(Must remember this is during our business hours)
~ Used our clothing samples from the showrooms after being strictly told NOT TO TOUCH OUR SAMPLES!
~Brought food/drinks into our showrooms. HUGE NO NO..
We’re not even allowed to have food/drinks in the showrooms.

The samples…. The deal was, they were allowed to use their own clothes on their hangers with their tags and place them IN FRONT of our clothes… we came in Thursday morning to find, OUR Clothes, on their hangers with their tags!!!! This is an issue cos when crews pack them up, they’ll end up with our summer/fall 09 collection. HELL NO!!

Anytime I had an issue with them, I politely asked them to pipe down and reminded them this is an active office and I answer the main switchboard and if any one of our clients were to complain in regards to any profanity they heard at the other end. I’d have no choice but to hold them (persons involved) responsible. They always apologized.
But I’m sure 90% of the staff had really serious ADHA.

Ok ready for the kicker?
The crew manager came in the other day to let us know that some of the cast and his staff were filing grievances with their unions against us.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH big breath HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

There is nothing we can do about that. They are entitled to that right.
However, this is not the first time we’ve allowed filming crews in our offices.
We have our own standing reputation and I’m sure that will come in handy for us.





~Being Samiantha.