I don’t hate anyone. I really try hard to “love my neighbor as myself,” although I am pretty much a miserable failure at it, but I don’t actually hate anyone. There is at least one thing I do hate, though: the pathetic business practices of the newspaper The Tennessean. 

Many years ago, I subscribed to The Tennessean. When I signed up, I only purchased a Sunday subscription. One day, someone called from the newspaper and offered to give us a full subscription for the price of the Sunday-only subscription. “Sure, why not?” I thought. When that subscription was about to expire, they sent a bill for renewal. I called them and told them to cancel the newspaper altogether. We never read it, anyway.  But a strange thing happened. They just kept delivering it. They soon sent another bill for papers they had delivered. I called again and was told not to worry about the bill, and I was assured the delivery would stop. It didn’t. I would just throw the papers in the recycle bin when they arrived, and began ignoring the bills.

One day I received a notice from a collection agency demanding payment for all those newspapers I didn’t want. I wrote the collection agency and The Tennessean an angry letter. The papers stopped, but the collection agency kept sending me bills periodically. I finally wrote them and threatened to report them to the Federal Trade Commission if they persisted in trying to collect the bill. A few days later I received a letter from The Tennessean informing me the amount they said I owed had been credited to my account and apologizing for the problem. I vowed to never have anything to do with them again.

Fast forward to December 2009. A family member, not realizing my disdain for the newspaper, gave me a one-year subscription to The Tennessean for Sunday-only delivery. When the subscription was about to expire, the newspaper sent a bill. My wife called them this time and informed them we wanted delivery stopped, and eventually they stopped. 

Today we received a notice from a collection agency acting on behalf of The Tennessean requesting a $29 payment. My advice: never, ever subscribe to The Tennessean. Don’t agree to receive the newspaper for free if they call. If someone gives you a subscription as a gift, politely refuse it.