UC Merced finally reimbursed me!

Last March, I interviewed with UC Merced (the new UC campus). Because of various issues --- they are understaffed, they experienced multiple staff changes, they lost my receipts, the fact that they apparently have to deal with all reimbursements through one of UCLA's financial departments, and a couple of the people there didn't return my e-mails or calls (the older staff members) --- it took a long time for them to reimburse me for my travel expenses. I actually am short about $20 because the only receipt to which I still had access was the one for my airfare. (They paid for the hotel and there were no ground transportation charges, but I'm losing a bit for my airport food. The reason that reached $20 is because a flight delay caused me to be stranded overnight in the Las Vegas airport, which some of you may remember.) I think I had copies of my food bills, but (if so) I lost them when I moved from Atlanta to Pasadena.

I should remark as well that this set a record. Reimbursements typically take around 6-8 weeks (kind of like typical DL stints in Major League Baseball after successful surgery), and the previous record for me was 3.5 months. In a record that will hopefully never be broken (or even approached!), Merced is weighing in at a full 10 months. (Technically, it's 10 months minus a little less than a week.)

I could have tried to get the $20, but the extra time waiting with minimal chance of success just wasn't worth it. Eating that paltry amount to get my several hundred $ ("Where's my 2 dollars?!?!") and be done with this mess was a far better option.