I’d heard Metro-North reimburses the poor suckers who’ve had their pants ripped on those ill-tempered M7 armrests, so I figured I’d look into it.

armrest.jpg

Mind you, as I mentioned, it’s a 10-year-old pair of chinos–hardly my good suit or even my pretty good suit.

I called the general information number on the MTA Website and things start off encouragingly enough. A cheery woman with an accent answered and I told her what happened.

“Uh oh, so sorry,” she said, with an actual note of sincerity to her tone. “I hope it didn’t expose you too much!”

It’s actually not a bad line, all things considered.

She then connected me to community relations. “Jeff” heard my sad tale and asked a few perfunctory questions: Was it an M7 car? Was it the armrest? He told me Metro-North was looking into redesigning the cars for that reason, and then gave me the number for the claims department.

On I went to the claims department, where a lady told me I had to send a letter to a claims agent, along with a note from my tailor saying how much the damage set me back. I told her the pants were old and probably weren’t worth tailoring, and asked if that meant I was out of luck. She said to put it all in the letter to the claims agent, a gentleman named Dean LoGiudice, and then someone would get back to me in 2-3 weeks.

So, after three phone calls–one cheerful, two indifferent–I have to put pen to paper and describe my situation, whereupon Mr. LoGiudice will decide if I’m worthy of compensation for my humiliation (OK, it wasn’t really that bad) on the 8:16 this morning.

I’ll let you know what happens with the letter.

[image: NY Times]