Bloody 'ell

First off... Thank God for home warranties.
Secondly... Home warranty companies, or at least the one my home is covered under are a major pain in the ass to deal with.

Tuesday night after getting home from work Toni & I noticce the floor outside the closet holding our laundry machine is damp. I open the door and check-- sure enough there's an ever growing puddle underneath the washer.

So I call the home warranty company. They set up a contractor who was supposed to have shown up at 5 pm on Wednesday night. So I left work early so I could be here when he got here. He called at 5:15 to reschedule for noon today.

Noon today comes... no sign of contractor... 12:15 he calls and says he's just finishing up a job downtown (Chicago) and will call as soon as he's done.

Finally at about 2:30pm he shows up. He looks at the washer, fixes the leak then proceeds to inform me the transmission is shot and that the gunk collecting underneath the tray my washer sits in is oil from said transmission. So we cleaned up the gunk and replaced the tray (I went to Home Depot and bought a new one last night for this very occassion). He said the cost of repair is greater than the cost of replacement and that the home warranty company would probably just opt for replacing or offering a check to replace it.

About an hour later I get a call from said contractor informing me that the replacement part is discontinued and that he's informed the warranty company that my washer needs replacing.

So I call the warranty company and I'm given 2 choices...

1) A Kenmore washer (which is listed on the Sears website for $569.99 retail).
OR
2) $455.21 Cash pay-out

On the surface replacement looks like the better deal... but then I start asking questions...

1) When will it be delivered?
"7-10 days"

2) Who will be installing it?
"The same contractor who looked at your old one."

3)What about disposal of the old washer?
"That's not covered."

After already having missed a day and a half of work thanks to this particular contractor, I wasn't about to miss any more work and the thought of having the old one removed by yours truly... well that didn't appeal much to me either.

So I consulted with "the boss" (No, not Bruce Springsteen-- incidentally he told me that the old washer was long past its "glory days" and that I should get a new one that's "born to run"-- but I'd only called him because I was bored after noticing that there were "57 channels and there was nothing on"). After asking for the replacement we called and ixnayed the order ASAP and requested the cash pay-out.

This evening we went to Lowe's found a washer on sale (10% off) and in addition to that Lowe's was offering 12 months free financing (not that it matters we're going to use the cash pay-out to pay the bill) and a mail-in rebate to cover delivery, installation, and removal of the existing unit. Even with taxes and even if we didn't have that mail in rebate, we barely went over the cash pay-out amount.

I'm just glad that it's over... for the past couple of days that POS washing machine has been the bane of my existence.