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Offline Spacecase544

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PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« on: December 28, 2015, 12:18:22 PM »
Gents,

Figured I would post up a list of comapnies that I worked with over the last month, and go over the good and bad ones that I had to work with.  I will try to keep some sort of logical order, but no promises.

Good ones:

Penske
-Military rates, well maintained trucks, modern equipment, no outrageous or hidden fees, and they price match their competitors.

Fuller Towing, Canton, TX:
-Even when they were super busy doing heavy CL8 hauls, they were able to get my truck off I-20 and to the shop I requested in less than 3 hours, while keeping us in the loop and taking my trailer with them.  Handled my equipment safely and professionally with very reasonable rates. More to follow on that chaos.

Wills Point Automotive and Wills Point Chevrolet (separate businesses), Wills Point, TX:
-So here's the story.  Driving along on I-20 the left rear tire decided to fall off the truck.  Complete separation.  Yes, through PCIs were conducted prior to movement.  Looks like the shop that installed the tires stripped the studs.  Anyway, truck and trailer (somewhere around 16,800 GVW) come to a stop on the side of the interstate, and Fuller got the call.  Meanwhile, I start calling dealerships to try and get us back rolling.  Call Wills Point Chevrolet, they refer me to the shop next door.  The guys at Wills Point Automotive dropped everything they were working on (and they had a full shop) to work on my rig.  They ended up putting on a new rotor and 8 new studs on it.  Parking brake is still on the 026 (military deadline report), but it rolls.  The dealership gave them the studs, even though the only ones they had were marked for another truck in their shop.  All said and done, they got me back on the road 6 hours from point of failure to back rolling without playing funny business with the accounting.  They really saved my ass in a tight spot.

Stack-On
-Once I got to GA, my electronic keypad on my gun safe wouldn't unlock the box anymore.  Manual override still worked, so I called Stack-On, and spent less than 10 minutes on the phone total and a new solenoid was on its way.

Bads:

Comcast...goes without much explaination.  They suck.

GA water utilities
- We rolled in late afternoon, father in law made it to the new place first.  He discovered we didn't have water and the meter was locked.  We called the water people, and were told there was nothing anyone could do, even with a 3 month old in the house they could not turn on the water until we came down in person and filled out all their paperwork, and they might be able to get someone out that day.  If it wasnt done by 1700, sorry.  Too bad, so sad.  We were still 2 hours outside of their offices, and it was 1600.  Oh well.  Went over at 0830 the next day and started the account, their guy did not show until 1650 to turn on the meter.

AT&T corporate customer service
-Phone dies, they tell me to go to the store.  Once at the store, the store can't see the same system they can, call back corporate.  They then tell me that they don't know why I was told to go to the store, since I can't get a new phone til March.  Local manager saved the day after an hour on the phone and overrides their system.

I don't wanna PCS again in June.  Dammit.
« Last Edit: December 28, 2015, 01:18:06 PM by nmeyer414 »

Offline KensAuto

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #1 on: December 28, 2015, 12:52:59 PM »
Man, that sounds like a tough trip. Glad it finally worked out.

For the civies here, what's PCS...I assume a relocate or reassignment of some sorts?
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Offline Nate

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #2 on: December 28, 2015, 01:20:56 PM »
PCS means (Permanent Change of Station).  being stationed anywhere for more than 9 or 10 months is considered a permanent move/station.

rich, sounds like you had your hands full. 

did you do a DITY move?
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Offline KensAuto

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #3 on: December 28, 2015, 02:03:22 PM »
Thanks Nate.
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Offline Flyin6

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #4 on: December 28, 2015, 02:16:53 PM »
A Glimpse Into Military Life

Folks, right here is a glimpse into military life: Right in the middle of what has become your life, big change is always just around the corner for the military family. You are making friends, you like your church and pastor. You’ve just figured out where the best local camping spot is which has a great bass hole nearby. You've made friends throughout the area, Life is just great, then you get a letter.

It has a copy of a set of orders. You are being transferred to Fairbanks Alaska from your assignment in Savannah, Georgia. But first you will need to go to some school for three months to learn something the higher-ups think is career enhancing. So you uproot your wife who absolutely hates the cold and flip her life on its head as well. She just got a spot she worked for in the choir and finally enjoys decent pay and position at the job she has. That special girlfriend she made last year is no more and she goes into limbo for 5-6 months. You go off to Ft. Where-in-the-heck to learn this thing you will need for your Alaskan adventure.

You go to school, and the wife moves back with her folks with your two babies. They somehow sort all of that out with the loving help of her folks and some old friends. Meanwhile you have to show up every day at some class and try hard to learn just like nothing's wrong.

Then you pack up again and load up your 100,000 Plus mile Ford truck and drive three thousand miles by yourself to "Report" to your next duty station. You have to work hard to fit in and try to find out what's going on. Dividing your attention makes things difficult because along with all the new you constantly wonder how "They" are doing so far away. Maybe your new job is a hostile environment. The Colonel is a jerk and all about himself and his next promotion, a phenomena you are finding more and more common in this “New Army.” You start to really dislike being forced in the name of fitting in to become something you were never meant to be, a yes man.

Places to live are scarce up there, and the base housing people tell you then can probably get you into on base housing maybe 4 months. Off post you can't afford much and your home search is really more cost driven than location oriented. You make compromises to live in a crowded neighborhood because with your meager salary stretched to breaking by having to maintain two households, you can’t afford all that much. You nervously sign a lease agreement and give the "Good" news to your wife. Your youngest baby started walking two months ago but you missed all that because, since you were the "New guy," you were tagged for something no one else wanted to do. The Commander sent you on a month long field training exercise that you have yet to really recover from. Cell phones weren’t allowed or didn’t work out there.

Finally you arrange to get her up with you. She is happy to see you but the look on her face when she looks around her new home is not one of joy. So your new life begins. She gets the kids registered in day care or school or whatever and tries to find a job. It bugs her that she is smart and has a communications degree, but employers up there are not keen on hiring military spouses because they know she really is only temporary help. The best she can do is a part time secretarial job which may lead to a management position later on.

Somehow you manage to get along, but it's a hollow life. Devoid of real long term friends and always with a sense that "all this will end shortly." You know down deep inside thatl this will pass along with the memories of Savannah and every other place you have ever been. This is not your chosen home, just another place to work and serve for a time, then all too soon, to put in the rear view mirror just like every other duty station.

All the normal things of life continue to happen whether you are there as a couple to experience and work through, or not. Wives and kids still get sick, parents pass away, diseases come and go and car accidents happen at all the wrong times. I took a call once in Baghdad from my wife. While trying to hold it all together she explained that my step daughter was in the middle of a mangled car being cut out by rescue people. The helicopter was already there, and the paramedic had just told my wife, he is not sure... And with hearing that, I had to get in a helicopter 20 minutes later and fly an escort mission to protect a convoy crossing through that war torn city.

So our hypothetical soldier presses on, now a respected member of this Infantry brigade he comes home one night with a solemn expression. She senses something is wrong, but he waits until the kids go to bed to explain. His unit was notified today that they will be shipping out to Afghanistan in 6 months. It's a short straw thing, the unit slated to do the deployment had fudged the readiness reports and the truth is that they were really nowhere near ready to deploy. Their commander has been fired and some general somewhere tagged your outfit to do the heavy lifting.

The news is actually worse. You won't be leaving in six months, but in a month and a half. You have to go to Ft. Erwin in California to get some last minute desert warfare training and you will be there a couple months all total.

Folks, this stuff really happens...Been there and did that a few times.

Well she doesn't know what to think. She is scared both for you and for herself and the not-so baby girls. She barely has a job, is 3,000 miles away from her parents and this is all coming on pretty fast.

Those months pass like a whirlwind. The Army is gracious enough to allow her to stay up in the frozen north of Fairbanks while you go off to war. He tries to memorize everything about her and the kids and finally turns to walk away and board the contract 747 on the day he leaves.

That's tough to do folks! So hard, that I'll bet a lot of you couldn't do it. He doesn't have to do this either, you know. He could do something outlandish and get out of the combat assignment. But he is a man of his word, a man of honor, so rare today... No, he walks up the steps, catches one last look of her and goes inside the plane.

She doesn't know she will never see him alive again. Not many months later she gets startled by the knock on the front door. The TV set in the back ground switched to Fox news is going on about some attack overseas against an Army convoy, names being withheld until notification of next of kin. A young Captain and a Major is standing outside the doorway. She recognizes the ranking one as the base chaplain. They scarcely say a word and she can't hear it anyway because deep down inside she knows already and for a while she just checks out, this is beyond anything she can handle.

It was a roadside bomb in a place without a name. All four in the HMMV were killed, and the Army is very sorry. But in that moment and the several million that always follow, that "Sorry" doesn't do much to fill the void. She has no husband. The girls grow up without their dad. He is eternally young to them, the picture mom has out on the dresser, of a young twenty something captain with crossed rifles on his uniform is somewhat yellowed now. It calls from the past ever whispering of a promise of a life that was not kept.

This is the life for some of those who serve in the military and of those who love them. This is a reality for an ever increasing number of good people. Men and women and children who try to make create a "Normal existence" out of all that craziness. The whirlwind of military life.

God watch over and bless them all. Keep them in grace and the protection of angels. They are much better than those who lead them!
« Last Edit: December 29, 2015, 10:58:44 AM by Flyin6 »
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Offline JR

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #5 on: December 28, 2015, 11:37:48 PM »
My outlook was from being a dependant. I moved so many times I don't remember, coast to coast, north to south but at least all on US soil. Didn't see dad much until I was around 10-11 years old, then he started to teach

I will not try to say I had a hard time like my parents did. Pay was lousy, I learned later my mom actually washed coffee filters for reuse. Base housing sucked.

My mother says my childhood was like the movie, "The Great Santini". I don't think it was all that bad but there were times,,,,,,,,

Never leave the kids out, they don't know.

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Offline TexasRedNeck

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #6 on: December 29, 2015, 09:08:52 AM »
Glad you had a good experience inTexas. You were a little North of me (300 miles). Hope you get settled soon and thanks for your service.


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Offline Spacecase544

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Re: PCS AAR/Lessons Learned
« Reply #7 on: December 31, 2015, 09:23:58 PM »
Nate, we did a full PPM/DITY/whatever they call it this week.  Never again.  Partial next time, with my garage and critical equipment (bed, TV, game consoles, etc. in the trailer and let the GOV move the rest.

 

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