I don't think I complain enough about stuff in public. I should get on that.

Okay, so I knew when I first started doing web work for Georgia State University (five years ago) that a state-run university system would be loaded with bureaucracy. So it should come as no surprise. Here's one fun example.

With all of my other clients, I do work, I send them an invoice, they send me a check. Sometimes it takes longer than others, but it (usually) gets done.

With State, though, there's an extra step. Oh, no, sending the invoice isn't enough. You see, the department has to file a Payment Request Form to the Budget Office for said invoice to get it processed and paid. That they have to file the form is not the problem. The problem: said form requires my signature.

Here's the trick: the department can't fill out the form until after they receive my invoice. So I can't pre-sign the form. And the department has to print out the form - I can't do it myself, send it with my invoice, and have them look it over, sign it, and submit it.

Basically, they want me to authorize their authorization of my invoice. At least, that's how it looks to me.

So, every time I submit an invoice, I have to make a two-hour trip to State to sign a form. Were it not for that, I would almost never set foot on campus. All of my regular correspondence with the departments I do work for takes place via email. In "emergencies", they call me. The last five trips I made to State involved walking into an office and signing a form.

Technically, I could bill the departments for the hours I blow making the trip, but I haven't been able to bring myself to do it. Honestly, it's not the departments' fault that I have to do it - it's the Budget Office. I would bill them, but I have a feeling I know where that invoice would end up.

It did make me wonder, though: what happens if State has work done by a vendor in, say, California. Do they have to fly in for a special trip to sign the form? I can already imagine the guy getting off the plane, shrugging: "Well, you gotta do what you gotta do to get paid."

Oh, and I chuckled recently when State sent me a letter telling me that they no longer had my social security number on file. I can only imagine that they must have purged their five-year-old records. Nice to know that my SSN is safe and secure.

Alas, they do pay me for work, so I have to at least be happy for that.

Okay, end of complaint bin. For now.