It seems like it’s impossible to carry out any kind of transaction without triggering some kind of “survey” asking you many questions about how their service was. I get them in e-mail, I get them in regular mail, I practically get them shoved down my fireplace flue like Hogwarts acceptance letters.

Look, people, if I pay money and get what I wanted for it, I’m happy. That was the point of the transaction. This happens almost all of the time. If I had a problem, you’d hear from me without a questionaire being involved.

Most of these surveys I toss out. Vendors, don’t take it personally.

If I buy something from a third-party vendor on Amazon, I’m supposed to do “feedback.” This is not a product review, which is something completely separate.

In “feedback,” there are five stars to check. If I check all five, that should be all there is to it. I’m happy.

But I have to write something, too. What exactly? “Didn’t screw up?” “Nice packaging, arrived on time?” “Mailed me the thing I paid them for?” A couple of times when I did have a problem, I didn’t bitch on the public site about it, I took care of it offline in private e-mails. This works. Most of them are very eager to fix things. In such cases, on the feedback later, I might write something about “corrected minor problem promptly and courteously.” That’s real information that someone can use.

Don’t even get me started on phone surveys. Always remember that every poll you’ve ever read was from the universe of people who, because they had no lives to get back to, did not hang up on the pollster.