(1) Your S.O., friend or pet tried to install it first.
(2) You called him to fix the PC and went to lunch without telling him what was wrong.
(3) You installed a second OS.
(4) You opened the lid.
(5) Your virus files were undated in 1997. (This happened today.)
We also charge more if:
1)When we ask what you were doing, and you say “Nothing!”
2)When you insist nothing has changed on your system,“Oh, that. But that wouldn’t hurt anything, would it?”
3)Hi Opal!
For a complete price list, see here.
Tisiphone
The joke sign at all service stations at one time was:
Hourly rate: $6
If you wait: $7
If you watch:$8
If you help: $9
If you do it yourself with our tools $20
That was some time back, as you can tell 
We don’t actually bill back our service call time, since we’re an internal tech support line, but we do charge people if they’ve installed AOL, or any of the Instant Messanger or chat softwares, since they completely hose a machine’s ability to connect to or work correctly on our network. We reimage (reconfigure) the machine back to a pristine state and then bill back the time spent on that to the user’s department.
Never tell the tech what you think it is. Always say what you want the computer to be doing. If he does what you think it is, & then it don’t do what you want it to be doing, you still have to pay.
My husband is a computer tech and this is his biggest pet peeve. People are always doing this to him, leaving a very vague trouble ticket and then taking a three hour martini lunch/going home for the day/leaving on vacation for a week. When they finally do return his phone message, they are like “why isn’t it fixed yet?”. The urge to reach through the phone line and throttle that person is something he has to fight on a daily basis.
Keeping me on a cell phone for an hour while I’m three hundred miles away, in the office of another client, because you can’t remember where you saved an all-important document and lost the originals? Priceless.
We also charge more if we are talking to you on the phone and you do EVERYTHING except what we tell you to do. We also charge more if you call us on Christmas and expect us to help you solve a problem, instead of waiting until we are open. (this happened last year)
Keith
My favorite is when the user says “I wasn’t doing anything!!!”
But you havn’t asked yet…
Then you -know- they were messing around.
I would like to add a note about the guy who called me at Christmas. He didn’t buy the equipment from us, he bought it at another store.
Keith
This has become rather bitter…what the hell, charge them triple.
My neighbor asked me to put in her new Micron PC & fax printer that were still in UPS boxes yesterday. I did it in 1.45 hours. It liked to restart itself a few times but seemed to smooth out later. No charge of course
List Add-on
User keeps a well watered potted plant in a window directly above the monitor. User is clumsy.
User calls because UPS is beeping.
Tell user to reset alarm switch. UPS still beeps.
Ask user if there is power in the room. Yes, everything else works.
Ask user to trace the UPS power cable and tell me if it’s plugged in.
Yes, says user, the UPS is plugged in. To itself. :rolleyes:
User person, you are so lucky you’ve got a maintenance contract.