Sorting out the world, one person at a time

I am married to a man who has an outstanding talent for sorting people out, logically, methodically, and infuriatingly politely. (Please note: This does not work with me or our offspring.) Here's the latest example:

My year-old BMW stationwagon has been smelling musty. So yesterday my husband, The Sorter, called the service department at the dealer, and asked about when the air filter is typically changed. The initial answer was at the oil change. (New cars need less frequent oil changes; my wagon needs it once a year.)

So he calls back after talking to me, and asks if he can drop in yesterday to have it replaced. Well, he's told, the service manager says it's only supposed to be changed every third oil change, part of the warranty.

That didn't sound right -- change an air system filter every three years?

The Sorter called back, and, no, they were sure about that. But they would be glad to sell him a filter. This sounded suspiciously weasely to us, like they had forgotten to do it at the right time and wouldn't get paid so they wanted to avoid getting stuck with the cost of correcting their own mistake.

So The Sorter went to work researching. After about an hour on line, he found the answer on the BMW website, where they keep the service manuals up to date. Not surprisingly, the air filter is supposed to be changed every year with the oil.

This morning he took the car and dropped by on the way to work with a printed copy of the page from BMW. A little while later, he got a call -- yes, they will be happy to change the filter! There was apparently some confusion because they couldn't find the information (in spite of having a copy of the manual page right in front of them), but eventually they found it and corrected their information.

To think that we could have just accepted them at their word and paid for a new filter. (note: parts for overpriced cars are overpriced, too.)

So they replaced the air filter (the car now smells good! and there is better air flow!). And as The Sorter drove away, they called after him, "Thank you! Thank you for sorting out our mistake!"