Blue cross blue shield of tn and baby linux (updated)

(updates are always at the bottom)

As you know, if you've been following along, I switched to linux at home. It's gone swimmingly. Really enjoying it. I decided to start looking at what I need to do to do the same at work.

One issue I have is in my current position, as well as in my last several jobs, I am the insurance administrator. So I'm the guy that you tell when you add a dependant, change coverage, whatever. Then I go online, fill out the appropriate form, and boom, you're covered or not covered. Currently we are using Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee ( http://www.bcbst.com )

Below is what you see if you access the employer's site (the part I use almost exclusively ) using firefox 2.0.0.7 using windows xp:

page ( https://ehealthservices.bcbst.com/common/brownotcompat.asp )

Incompatible Browser Type or Version

Your browser type or version is not currently supported by this application.

If you wish to gain access, please download a free supported browser from the following link.

Microsoft Internet Explorer

While that link up there is javascript and I'm not ganking their broken code, trust me when I tell you it goes to the wrong place. You might as well go to http://www.microsoft.com/givemeanerror to get the same page.

I started this fight a while ago. I asked them why I had to use ie only to access their pages. The tech support guy knew nothing of the details of it. I dropped it and used ie when I had to access the site.

Today I had an insurance related question (how do I terminate coverage and start elective state continuation coverage --which turned out to not be a seamless thing -- I have to terminate the employee's coverage and then completely reenroll them...) so I called them. After I got my most bizarre response I asked again about the ie issue. I told them I am going to switch to linux and he said I wouldn't be able to access the site at all.

Sorry, no dice.

We discussed this for quite some time, even with me bringing up the fact that we have the ability to look elsewhere for coverage. It's a corporation, he didn't care. He said almost as much. All he could tell me was his name was Chris. I'm sure he's the only Chris there. Good thing too because accountability in such a position is pretty important.

I finally asked to speak with his supervisor. I was put on hold.

I did not get to speak with his supervisor, she told him what to say. It didn't please me. It was the same thing he said.

I asked him who I need to talk to for resolution of this issue or at the very least a technical answer. He knew of two people. One was the head of web development is I believe what he said. He rang him. voicemail. He rang the other. Voicemail. He offered to take my information and have one of them call me back. I gave him the info and thanked him for his time. On a side note I did not and do not hope to give him a hard time. I just wanted to find out the answer.

Later, that same day...

I received a call from someone. He didn't properly identify himself when I answered the phone and he never took me off speakerphone. Have I ever mentioned how rude that is?

I answered the phone, "This is John"
He said something like, "This is [beats me, couldn't hear him]."
I knew who it was but I said, "How can I help you?"
He mumbled and finally said "Blue Cross Blue Shield"
I said, "Oh, the IE only people, right." then I explained that I was wanting to switch over to linux and wondered how I'd get my job done.

I'm just going to give the high points.

nope, there were none. Better start with the low points.

According to him they farm all their programming out and it costs them less (and yes, he even said "To keep our heath insurance costs down" I shit you not. ) and he mentioned that if they supported all the browsers it would cost more. he said that if supporting one browser cost X then two would be 2X and three would be 3X.

Now in addition to my duties as insurance administrator I'm a programmer. And I mostly program web pages. And I know that the only way that logic works is if you start with fucked up design.

He wasn't even aware that the web site didn't work with firefox. He thought Safari (mac) was the only major browser not supported (and he stated that it would never ever be supported), but he said that most of his users used ie on windows so they support that one mainly but they do also support netscape. I asked why on the error page it only pointed to Microsoft's ie. He didn't know of the error page in question so I brought it up and read it to him. Clicked the link and lauged. "Your link to ie is broken as well. You might want to look into that."

I think he was aggravated at this point and wanted to end the call and call me back after he "gathered more information." I said that would be fine.

So the problem is I won't be able to access the web page using IE if I switch my work machine to linux.

The solution is I try netscape and if that works, cool.
The problem is I can't get netscape to run on linux at home. To further complicate this subproblem is while trying to figure out how to get it to run it seems (only by heresay) netscape tells web servers it is firefox, not netscape.

So what to do what to do? Well I installed a user-agent spoofer in firefox and as long as I tell it I'm running netscape 4 the site works. This fixes _my_ problem but not _the_ problem.

See, there's more to it.

We also do medical billing. And sometimes that is through blue cross blue shield of tennessee. And guess what? IE only. So what do we do there, just not bill bcbs of tn when they owe us money? Well, no, that's not a workable option. Do I teach everyone how to spoof their user agent? Isn't that a bit rediculous to have to do?

No, just code the site properly and quit with the "pay to play" game of forcing Microsoft down everyone's throats. People think linux users are overzealous. Where do linux programmers force anyone to use anything? I've yet to see it.

In other news, I have cancelled all of my own personal insurance through BCBS of TN and will never go back until they get their heads out of their asses.

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==Update==
Trevor called me today and informed me that they are working on Firefox compatibility and should be done by the end of the month. He noted they would call me back and let me know about the progress.

So I take it back, Blue Cross Blue Shield of TN isn't the devil. They are working to correct the issue but the first lines of support indicated otherwise.

So I say hats off to BCBS of TN, and a great big thanks for going the extra mile to support open source software and its users!

Let's see how long it takes them to lock the forum

It would seem that either my support ticket has stalled or the tf2 beta has consumed the support resources. I've not heard back on my support request since this past Friday, which was itself a week since I had submitted it.

I'm not going to follow through on this nonsense. I'm going to try to restore the windows vista machine to a mostly usable state. As it is there isn't even an iota of software on there that isn't vista, steam, or drivers.

So they win this slow-speed battle of stare down and wait. But my business they haven't won: There will be no Orange box or for that matter any further purchases through steam or for any valve games in the future. Yeah, it won't hurt them, I know the logic. You know, that logic that dictates that we can't do anything about the system... Well I tend to disagree with that logic.

So....

Much like the "How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop" owl I have come up short in my quest to find out how long a support ticket takes. Maybe the answer is, "Until you get fed up with waiting."

...At least that's how long it was for me.

STOP THE PRESSES! This just in from the "I shit you not" department

I swear I'm not making this up. I opened another support request with steam asking if they would change their support infrastructure for when their new product which includes several highly anticipated games. Transcript follows.

Customer

09/09/2007 03:47 PM

Since you're experiencing a high volume of calls now, what will the support system be like when the orange box comes out? I plan on buying 2 copies if I buy it, one for me, one for my son. But if I have to wait 2 weeks to get a support question answered if I have a problem I'll go mental. quite honestly the current support lag time is quite nearly a deal breaker. I've been waiting 8 years for tf2. But if there isn't some announcement of some sort of reasonable support I'll not be plopping down my money for it. You are a service industry. You chose that when you went to a content delivery system. It's a service. and you aren't servicing the people that have problems in a timely manner. check your own forums, you'll see the disgruntled members. What is the solution? You're the ones providing the product, I'm the one paying the money. So you tell me.

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Response (Ricky)

09/14/2007 11:07 AM

Hello, Thank you for contacting Steam Support. We answer tickets in the order that they are received. We have been experiencing higher ticket volumes recently, but we are doing our best to work through it so that we can answer tickets faster when the Orange Box is released. Ideally we would like to answer tickets within a couple of days, but recently some users have had to wait close to a week for a response. For non account related issues, the FAQs that we have setup can resolve the majority of errors that users encounter with Steam.

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Customer	09/14/2007 11:23 AM
So that is to say that there is no change in the support infrastructure planned for the Orange Box release, is that correct? As my purchase of your upcoming product depends on this I feel I have a right to know.

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Response (Ricky)

09/14/2007 04:11 PM

Thor, Changing the infrastructure of the support system during a time that we are anticipating higher ticket volume could lead to increased response times instead of lower ones. Our goal is to be able to answer tickets within a couple of days by the time the Orange Box is released. This is about the same response time that we have had in the past. Only recently has the response time jumped. Currently, the majority of tickets that we have been working on are 3-5 days old.

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Yes folks, the good people in the "I shit you not department" brought you this story and they want you to know that it does not make more sense to add more support personnel in a time when they expect more support calls.

To quote myself from their forums:

Here's an example:
Let's say you open your own isp. You get customers signing up and the money is rolling in. As it turns out you have, we'll say, 100 gigabits per second available as an aggregate. But you've signed up so many people that nobody can get over 1kb / second. People are complaining. What do you do? Tell them tough luck, maybe they'll get better speed at night? no, you get a bigger pipe. Or people look for another isp.

and yet another example of my ability to make corollaries:

The county fairground might only have one groundskeeper for most of the year. Along comes the week of the fair and guess what? They hire more groundskeepers or sub the work out to the company that is coming in with the attractions.


I know, I know, this isn't a "planned event" as a county fair would be but that's the business they are in. There are going to be unexpected spikes in activity and it's their business to plan for such things.

Sigh. I mentioned idiocracy, right?