[mattkrause]

In fact, writing to your Congressional rep is probably the way to solve this.

They usually offer "casework" services where a staffer will facilitate their constituent's interactions with federal agencies. This would probably help get the OP's specific issue solved AND make the legislators aware of the problem more generally. My impression is that agencies are often pretty responsive to these things: nobody wants to be on a senator's bad side.

[cucumber3732842]

>They usually offer "casework" services where a staffer will facilitate their constituent's interactions with federal agencies. This would probably help get the OP's specific issue solved

That's almost worse because what it creates is a system that abuses everyone by default and only when someone cries to their politician does it shape up.

[mattkrause]

I guess this depends on whether you think the system was deliberately designed to be “abusive” or has evolved some blind spots/legacy issues.

In this case, I’d guess “fax in your documents” was, long ago, meant to be an improvement over having to mail them in. It wasn’t chosen to be intentionally inconvenient. The system—or perhaps the laws it operates under—could certainly be modernized and your rep is well-positioned to nudge that along.

Likewise, I doubt the rudeness was a matter of policy. At a business, you’d ask to speak with the manager. Here, YOU via your rep are the manager and this is how you get your say.