New things

As new parents we're doing everything for the first time. Last night was city swimming lesson registrations. The online site and phone lines open at 10pm. After having seen other parents in previous years complain about the system on Facebook and Twitter I thought we were prepared.

We stayed up until 10 (I was ready for bed last night by 9). We had my laptop, iPad and two iPhones ready. We had the pages ready to load and at 9:58 we started refreshing the sites and redialing the phone number.

It took at least 30 minutes for us to get through online the first time. I didn't want to rush but the process creates this panic of "have to do this quick". There is red scrolling script at the top of the page saying you'll be logged off after 3 minutes of inactivity, so I'm not slowing down to read details!

I created an account, I found the swimming lesson time/date/location we wanted, and then I tried to register (it's a babies lesson where a parent is required to go too). When I tried to sign up it old me I was too old, I had to be between the ages of 4 months to 10 months. Argh!

So I tried to add my daughter to the account. No such luck. There is nowhere to add or edit your information. WHAT?!? And now the system was going to log me out and there wasn't anything I could do.

We kept refreshing again while we came up with a plan. About 10 minutes later we got in again. We decided to create an account for my husband and daughter. It wouldn't let us use the same address so we used my mother's since I think my husband still has one bill that is sent there (yes we should change that after 4 years!), it worked and I figured I could fix it all later.

Then I tried to register for the lesson again. It wouldn't let me again, she is 4 days too young! ARGH!!!!

I was in a panic, these lessons are filling up fast. There is only one week day, daytime, indoor lesson in our neighbourhood.

So I tried calling 3-1-1 as the website suggests you do if you are having problems. I got through to a person fairly quickly but was informed that he was unable to do anything and that my request would have to wait until 7 am.

After one final try around 11:30pm (!!!!) I got through. I created a THIRD account, using my maiden name, my sister's address, my mother's phone number and my secondary email account, I didn't care at this point. I changed my daughter's date of birth to the day before the first lesson (I figured we'll skip the first lesson iif they're sticklers about it, she'll be 4 months old at the second lesson), and FINALLY got registered.

Yes, I realize I broke the rules and lied about my information, but this whole system caused me panic and stress. I was getting my child registered for swimming lessons come hell or high water!

To add insult to injury, I tried to call 3-1-1 this morning to delete the two first accounts and then change my info on the account where we're registered. There was a 43 minute wait on hold. Seeing as I only get 100 free daytime minutes, I'll wait to do it later!

So although next year we'll have to go through the same constant refreshing websites system, at least we know how the whole thing works! :)

With love
~sarah~