Tales From the Helpdesk

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

As some of you may know (and the rest of you probably don’t care) I recently took a new job at a call center. My job is to help people who call in while trying to install the necessary hardware and software for SBC Yahoo DSL.

Now either the stuff is easy to install and we just get the bottom of the human IQ barrel calling in or the average American is waaaaay dumber than I had originally thought.

Feel free to join in with your own tales of the idiot masses. Here’s some of mine so far:

I answer the phone and do my usual opening speil, thanking the caller for calling and offering my assistance. The first thing out of the lady’s mouth is, “My modem’s broken, so I’ve disconnected it from the computer and ordered a new one. It’s supposed to be here in about 3 days.” So I’m wondering what she needs me for if already knows her modem is broken. I ask as much, in the most polite terms I can think of, and her reply is: “Well now I suddenly can’t browse.”
This is where I fight the urge to answer, “Ya know, lady, I’m no rocket scientist, in fact the only job I’d get at NASA is as janitor, but off the top of my head I can think of two reasons you’re having trouble, and only one of them is the broken modem.”
It seems our dear customer, upon realizing she had a broken modem, simply bypassed the DSL modem and plugged her phone cord directly to the jack in her PC. I guess she didn’t realize we send out that equipment for a reason.

There was the guy it took me 15 minutes of dealing with before he finally grasped the concept of right clicking.
(“I’ll need you to right click on the icon sir.”
“I did and your installation disk is trying to run again.”
(hit mute to let out a long, annoyed sigh) “Ok, sir, did you double click?”
“Yes”
“Then what I need you to do is wait until the installation disk runs and gives you the option to cancel. Then cancel and right click on the disk icon.”
wait 5 minutes until he can cancel out of the program, only to hear: “The disk is running again.”
“Did you double left click again?”
“Oh darn, that’s right, I forgot.”)

And then there’s my all time favorite:
Me: “Ok, sir, we have you up and running, now we just need to get you to the registration site. In the address bar I’ll need you to type H-T-T-P-S, colon, slash, slash.”
Him: “H-T-T-P-S, colon, slash, slash.”
Me: “S-B-C”
Him: “How do you spell that?”
:smack: :smack: :smack:

2

So, you can’t plug the jack into the thingy over there? :smiley:

Welcome back, Crunchy

3

You know Crunchy Frog, I’m trying to get back into the tech support field and you are making me remember the bad experiences I had before!! :frowning: :wink:

Nah, I will suppress the memory of those bad moments! Bring them on! We tech guys are fighting ignorance too you know!

And, welcome back too!

4

I had someone yesterday that took over a minute to type his password. He got it wrong anyway. I had it changed for him; logged in as him (I was at his desk), and set up the “change password” thing. He kept using his old password, non-matching passwords (Win2K makes you confirm your new password), and after ten minutes of new passwords got it right eventually (he wrote it down and checked several times). Otherwise he’s a bright guy, but the typing issue has him stumped, or something.

5

I have a friend who used to work tech support. He once had a caller who couldn’t get any programs to run on her computer. He went through his usual rigamarole: power on, keyboard & mouse plugged in, etc. and nothing worked. He asked her to click on any icon on the desktop. On the other end of the line he heard, faintly, a “clink, clink” sound. She said that it still didn’t work. He asked her to try clicking on another icon. Again, the “clink, clink.” And it still didn’t work. He finally figured out that she was tapping her mouse – not the cursor, the mouse – on the monitor, double-clicking and trying to open the programs. :rolleyes:

6

I’ve been doing tech support for 8 years now. I can’t even remember some of my “best” worst calls, but here’s one.

I used to support Microsoft Word. Now, no one calls Microsoft to say “Hey! I love Bill Gates and your product rocks!” But… this woman called, in a screaming blind rage:

“Do you know what happens when I hit the Enter key on my keyboard??”

“It should move your cursor to a new line… what happens?”

“IT MOVES THE CURSOR TO A NEW LINE.”

::pause::

“Ma’am, that’s what it’s supposed to do. Enter is like… a carriage return on a typewriter. What would you like it to do?”

“Well, God, don’t you think you could WARN people it does that??”

I never did find out what she wanted the Enter key to do.

Oh, and another fun call from that same job was dealing with Word macro viruses. Some had great “payloads”… our personal favorite was the one that, on a specific date each month on the infected computer, would pop up a dialogue box saying “<username> is a big stupid jerk!” when you used the SpellCheck feature. Every month that day would be full of calls from irate customers who were pissed off that “your software just called me a big stupid jerk!”

Fun stuff. My job has made me loathe humanity at large most of the time, but I can’t imagine doing anything else, if only for the amusement.

7

For those of you who don’t read this already, check out User Friendly (I recommend going through the whole archive).

If you work at an ISP, sooner or later you’ll get a lot of these calls. :smiley:

8

I’ve been working helpdesk at a college for quite a while, and get to deal with a few gems.

A few years ago, just as classes were starting in September, I got two calls within an hour of each other from irate instructors who had just returned from a summer off. The PC in the first guy’s office had been upgraded from an old junker to a pretty decent one, but he was angry that his copy of a DOS version of WordPerfect had disappeared and only MS Word was left. The second call was from a guy whose office hadn’t had a PC at all, but he had to rant about the one he got: “Mine at home is a lot better! This is a piece of crap and I’m not going to use it until I get a better one!” I passed them both to my boss, but I still think the best solution would have been to put them both in the same office and let them fight it out…

And then there’s the woman (call her ‘L’) who runs a computer lab for testing trades students. On a really good day, she still hasn’t got a clue, and calls us about it. One of the techs, ‘H’, a sweet and gentle lady who thinks well of everyone, had to go over and set up some equipment in that lab. When the question of training came up, we all agreed that H should do it, because we had spent more time than enough dealing with L. H said “You guys are so mean!” Little did she know. When she got back, we asked for her reaction to L, and H said “I want to kill her!” Welcome to the club, H!

9

I totally didn’t see this thread, or I’d have posted here instead of starting a new one!

10

Ahh, the good old days.

I did tech support at 2 major compaines and have so many stories that it is hard to find a place to start. I’ll just start with the funnier ones.

One guy called up to cancel his online account. We were trained to try and keep the members on and offered to help them find ways to use the service etc.

So anyway I ask the man if there is anything he didn’t like about the service.

Him: “No, I love the service”
Me: “Ok, did you find everything you were looking for?”
Him: “Yes, got everything I needed”
Me: “Ok, well I can give you two months free service so you can think about it. All you would have to do is call and canel before the two months are up if you decide you still don’t want the service”
Him: “I’d like that but it won’t help”
ME: “Why is that sir?”
Him: “Well, my computer isn’t working anymore”
Me: “Well, sir, I am a tech and pretty good. I’d be happy to help”
Him: “I don’t think you can fix this”
Me: “Why is that sir?”
Him: “My wife got mad because I was online too much and threw the computer out the second floor window”
Me: (Blink) “Ok sir, your account has been canceled”

(Why didn’t he just say that to begin with? Actually all he had to say was his computer was beyond repair.)

I was second level support for a while and we had to deal with escalated calls. Irate calls could be very entertaining. Here’s one.

Me: “Hi sir, I understand you wanted to speak to a supervisor.”
Him: “Yes, and your name is?”
Me: “Sleestak, which is spelled …What can I do for you sir?”
Him: “I am outraged. I talked to one of your techs and he laughed at me” (Note this guy would not tell the first person he talked to what the problem was so I had no idea of what had happened)
Me: “Well, sir, can you tell me exactly what happened?”
Him: "Yeah, I called in because I couldn’t connect. The tech, his name was Mike though he wouldn’t give me his last name just an emyployee number, walked me through some stuff then told me to reboot the computer. While we were waiting for the computer to start Mike asked me what kind of computer I had. I told him I just bought a new Packard Bell and Mike started laughing. (Note, at that time PB’s were the biggest pieces of crap you could buy. They just sucked)
Me: “Well, sir, I am not sure why he would laugh. Packard Bell makes mighty fine computers” I had to hit the mute button as the two people sitting next to me heard what I said and started giggling.
Him: “I spent alot of money on this computer and blah blah blah…”
Me: “Well, sir, I doubt that the tech was laughing at your choice in computers. As I said Packard Bell makes great computers. In fact I just bought one myself” A huge lie on my part. I had to go on praising PB’s for at least 10 minutes to calm the man down. By this tme my two teammates were just about bursting with laughter. “Sir, what happened next?”
Him: “He hung up”
Me: “Ok, sir. You said you have his employee number? If you give it to me I will contact the persons supervisor and report what you have just told me”
Him: “Ok, the number is ********. Also, I still cannot get online”
Me: “Ok, sir. I am going to transfer you over to my best tech and he will find the problem. Would that be ok?”
Him: “Yes”

So I transfer the call to a good tech. He later told me that the modem on the brand spanking new Packard Bell was broken.

One of the funniest involved a clueless about computers but very bright single Mom. Her son who was 14 and used the computer for the most part but she signed on from time to time. She was having a problem with a download and to fix the problem I had her open up the download directory so we could delete the partially downloaded file and have her try it again. When she opened the directory there were about 250 files and

She asked: "What are all these files?
Me: “Well Maam, I don’t know. What are the file names?”
Her: “Well, there is ynglove!!!.gif and BJgirls!!.gif and…do you know what those are?”
Me: (Knowing exacly what the files were, porn, but being discreet)“Well, files that end in .gif are pictures. Otherwise I can’t tell you what they are pictures of”
Her: : “How would I find out?”
Me: “If you double click on the file name it should open”
Her: “Gasp…Oh My GOD!”
Me: “What is it Maam?”
Her: “It’s PORN! Oh, he is so dead. He is sooo busted and he doesn’t even know it! Are all these files porn?”
Me: “Well, you would have to open them all to find out”
Her: “Hang on, ok? …Damn…Jeez…He is dead” (Said as she opens more files)
Me: “Ok Maam, can we delete the file you were trying to download?”
Her: “Yeah, but I have another question for you”
Me: “Shoot”
Her: “My son is dead meat. He is going to be grounded for the rest of his life but I want to make him sweat before I land on him. Is there a way to let him know I found these files?”
Me: “Well, let me think…You could set one of the files as the desktop wallpaper”
Her: “What does that mean?”
Me: “Well, when you turn on the computer and it boots up the first thing you see is the desktop. You can have a picture on the desktop…”
Her: “Ok, yeah there is a picture of a car on it now”
Me: “Well, you could change that picture with one of those that he downloaded”
Her: “Really? How do I do that?”
Me: “Well, first you…” (I walk her through it)
Her: “That is perfect. He is going have a heart attack when he comes home”
Me: “Is there anything else I can do for you?”
Her: “No, thanks…wait, can I have your and your bosses email address?”
Me: “I can only give you mine, its …”
Her: “Thanks for the help”

She sent me two emails. The first was a thank you aimed for my boss stating that I was really helpful and nice etc. The second described her sons reaction when he came home and started up the computer. I wish I had kept the second email as it was truely funny. The Mom acted though nothing had happened for a while and she described her sons behaviour knowing that he was busted. It was a classic.

Slee

11

Having been a son whose mother has found a hidden bit o’ porn in his room, I just gotta say that last one is evil. And sleestak, when you’re in line at the karmic cash register, may you not have enough cash in your wallet. :stuck_out_tongue:

12

Up until a couple of years ago I worked level II support for 700 of my company’s field service technicians but my best customer yet has been dear old dad, God bless him. He oftentimes says he never thought he’d own or operate a pc and sometimes I wish he never had. He means well but “knows just enough to be dangerous.”

Now he’s got a screamer new pc with a DSL modem. I really wish he knew how to use it. Lementably, I know less than nothing about Win XP, so it’s always a challenge whenever he has a problem. I usually wind up calling technical support because he doesn’t know enough to ask a question.

However, sometimes when I’m unavailable he’ll call tech support on his own. I really feel sorry for anyone who would be unlucky enough to take his call. When he tells me he called tech support I ask him how it went; usually he says either the tech gave up or the tech asked him to have someone who understands something about pc’s call back a special number for level II support.

You know you’re in trouble when you boot my dad’s pc and see 15 copies of the recycle bin and 12 copies of my computer on the desktop. I don’t even ask.

He took an intro to Win 95 class at a junior college during summer school a few years ago. I have to try to encourage him to take some more classes because I have neither the time nor the patience to teach him, nor the time to undo all his damage, either.

13

When hubby was working tech support some years ago, a woman called and said that there was note on her computer that said “Press any key to continue”,
“OK” says hubby
Pause
“Well, where’s the ‘any’ key?”

14

Rasa, if you took away my WordPerfect and expected me to use Word, I’d come right over and re-arrange your diodes. Note that the user chooses what software to use, not you. Your first example is therefore one of bad tech support.

15

Excuse me?

Yes. The user chose to use Word. Where did I somehow imply that I had forced her to use Word? I was but a lowly tech support agent at a call center, she’d purchased the product I supoprted. I simply pointed out that what she was experiencing was how the program worked.

My informing the woman that this is the way the program works is bad tech support? I was merely having a laugh at the fact that what is a pretty standard convention: Enter = new line that dates back to manual typewriters somehow managed to enrage this woman to the point of screaming idiocy.

16

Aah. Perhaps ftg meant to address rjk, as he referred to WordPerfect. Anyway, carry on.

17

ftg, I think you ment to type rjk, not Rasa…

:wink:

18

Yay! Simupost, Rasa, we rock! :smiley:

19

Not where I work. The company (and at previous jobs the University) decides what software we use, based on what the company has licenses for, and woe betide any of us who install unapproved software.

20

One of my favorite calls…
Caller: My program started blowing up last night. There must be a bug in XYZ. (XYZ being the product I support.)
Me: It looks like you made a change to your program right before it started blowing up. Could that possibly be related to the problem?
Caller: No way. That would be too much of a coincidence.