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skype credit deactivated

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

I don't know why Microsoft does this, but they periodically notify me that they're going to deactivate my credit on Skype. It's never a lot of money, maybe ¥2,000. I can imagine that some MBA convinced them that it was a good idea because they can then transfer all of the deactivated funds to an interest-bearing account and rake in some more bucks. They only have $3 trillion so that's perfectly understandable.

What I have learned in my dealings with them on this is to let them deactivate it. You can then immediately sign in and reactivate it, which happens all but immediately. This is certainly an improvement over their proposed solution, which is that we should sign in and use their service for some unnecessary call at your own expense.

Something tells me that this wouldn't happen if I had a more than a once-in-a-blue-moon need for their service. There are plenty of alternatives to Skype, maybe it's time I started looking into that. It's not like anyone, anywhere thinks, "I need to reach Michael. Better use Skype!"