Why I sigh...

**Niclo Iste** · September 28th, 2009, 03:30 PM

Originally Posted by El_Squid

A: That, and my previous job was as an aide, for twenty years, at the one of Oklahoma's State Mental Facilities. (Niclo probably knows it: Central State Hospital)

So, I have a tendency to want to throw loud mouth jerks into the floor and tie them up. Fortunately I am level-headed, old and fat now, so I don't follow through.

B:Got tired of wrecking my back and knees, so I turned my hobby into my profession!

Noone has tried to clock me in the head with a chair for over a decade now!

Hmm Central State Hospital, nope haven't been to that one yet

though I'm sure I've known a few who have been.

As far as someone not trying to clock you in the head with a chair. Clearly you haven't been in a situation where someone just lost 4 months of work that is due in a few hours and all you can tell them is "If they had chosen to back up the info instead of let the HDD crash things might be ok."

**slgrieb** · September 28th, 2009, 04:05 PM

Originally Posted by El_Squid

Fortunately I am level-headed, old and fat now, so I don't follow through.

Noone has tried to clock me in the head with a chair for over a decade now!

Unfortunately, I'm just old and fat. As for the chair thing, see previous remark.

**slgrieb** · September 28th, 2009, 04:24 PM

But, hey, it isn't just customers that can make you nuts! How about those swell folk in Tech Support?

I requested an RMA for a dead RAID controller thursday last, and according to the support site, I would be issued an RMA within 48 hours. Alright, first off, that is about 47 hours and 59 minutes too damn slow, but when you're stuck you're stuck. As of this morning, I still had no RMA available either in my email or online, so I emailed Support with an explanation of the problem.

Here's the brilliant response: "Didn't you get our email with your RMA?" Yes, there you are; the support staff who couldn't cut it as janitors because they couldn't remember which end of the mop went on the floor.

On how many levels is this truly moronic? 1. Yes, I got my RMA but just thought I'd waste another day of your time and mine; plus I hoped to piss off my customer some more by delaying replacement of his defective product. I love the deep maroon his face turns when he's mad. 2. Why, why, WHY, didn't they just re-send the RMA?

**El_Squid** · September 29th, 2009, 01:38 PM

Originally Posted by Niclo Iste

Hmm Central State Hospital, nope haven't been to that one yet

though I'm sure I've known a few who have been.

I seem to recall you spent some time in the Land of the Red Man, Okmulgee if memory serves. So, I thought it was a good bet you had heard of good old Central State Hospital, which was inspirational to the classic movie, Snake Pit.

And, yes, you probably have known a few who spent time on the dorms. One of my earliest experiences was having to admit one of my college friends and drinking buddy to the Maximum Security Ward, in the middle of the night. A real wake up call, there!

Law Enforcement Officers had the little known power to have someone temporarily admitted to our lovely facility for a 3 day evaluation (weekends and Holidays not included). Can you say, "a danger to self, or others"?

I don't know if they can still do that.

**El_Squid** · September 29th, 2009, 01:42 PM

Originally Posted by slgrieb

Unfortunately, I'm just old and fat. As for the chair thing, see previous remark.

Yep! That's why I don't like dealing with the General Public. I manage a small section of In House Programmers and our only difficulties come from the Management types, particularly the Upper Management types. It is very easy to lay the blame on the IT staff, or the network, or the software, etc.... But, I haven't seen anyone get physical,... yet.

**Guts3d** · January 22nd, 2010, 03:32 PM

Ring! Hello? Hey, this $#@! computer still won't boot up, it asks for a password.
Me: Well, once again, ask your family, I didn't put a boot password on it, someone there did.
User: Look, this is the third time I have called, and you keep giving me the same %$#!@ answer!!!
Me, baffled: Well, what answer would you like?
User, swearing: Click!

**Niclo Iste** · January 22nd, 2010, 09:48 PM

Sounds like a case of "I didn't do it". I love those ones.

Me: I found out what got the virus on your pc. Seems the "Your charming child" account was downloading pr0n and a fake video depicting some graphic hobbies dealing with midgets was the culprit.
Them: Oh no my child is a saint it must have come in some other way. I refuse to pay for the removal as it wasn't my saintly childs fault.
Me: Sorry to hear that, I'll promptly undo what I've done and have it ready for you

.
Them: Oh no we'll pay! We'll have to find out who the real culprit was I supposed.
Me: Good to hear, hope you catch them! By the way I have times and logs of when the files were accessed and acquired.

Of course the other favorite is.

Them: I don't know but our keyboard just stopped working.
Me: Was anything spilled on it recently?
Them: No, we never drink or eat near the pc.
Me: Well now that I have the keyboard apart it seems there is coffee and even some pop still sloshing around in here as the pad is still wet and sticky.
Them: It wasn't any of us! We never eat or drink around the pc!
Me: Well either it was someone at the house or a moron who broke in and stole a coffee and pop and figured the best place to hide his ill gotten loot was to stash it in the keyboard. Either way it' still going to cost you to replace it since warranties don't cover moisture damage regardless if you don't eat at the keyboard.

**Platypus** · January 22nd, 2010, 11:40 PM

Same with remote controls.

"We found a liquid spill inside"

"Ooh no, that couldn't be right. We never have it near any liquid."

"Well, the coffee/beer/wine/coke is there all right. It'll be OK with a cleanup (or sometimes; the coke has dissolved things. Sorry, its a goner...)"

**Niclo Iste** · January 24th, 2010, 10:43 AM

Here's one of the reasons I sigh. I still do subcontracting once in a while for the unethical guy. The situation is he has 2 billing types for onsite visits. The first one is for normal service. The other being emergency service for a higher fee. Emergency would as we all assume be immediate visit because it was demanded and it shifted our schedule out of order.

Employer: Hi, I need you to go to this client right now.
Me: I can't I'm enroute to a client who's been scheduled in advance by a week.
Employer: Tell them you can't make it.
Me: So this is emergency service and i get to charge more and get paid more then correct?
Employer: No this is normal just you have to be there right now because they said it's important.
Me: So by definition AN EMERGENCY, with it being as such I am going to charge it as an emergency.
Employer: No no we're not going to do that today. (never does it at all but expects emergency visits all the time)
Me: Then if I'm going to blow off this client that's planned in advance can you do me a favor and explain to them why someone else got their time slot as I'm going to be busy taking care of a non-emergency-emergency.

This goes on for 15 or more minutes until I say fine and call the emergency up and tell them they aren't that important and I'll get to them later on in the day unless they are interested in expedited service rates. I also suggest if they have a problem with me not coming immediately to call who I contract to.

**Guts3d** · March 15th, 2010, 09:31 AM

Latest phone call:

Ring! Hello? Hi, this is XXX and you fixed my desktop computer 2 or 3 years ago, and it has been working fine up until now. I always log in with a saved password, but I forgot the password and I need it to get in and read my E-mail.

Me: Geez, Lady! I have no idea what it could be. I don't remember what car I was driving 2 or 3 years ago, much less a password from someone else's computer.

XXX: Well, like I said, I NEED IT!

Me: Again, I don't remember, I probably fixed a hundred computers or more since then.

XXX: Well, what am I going to do? ( Angrily spoken, as if I really do remember this mystic password but am secretly part of a planet wide conspiracy to make her life miserable. )

Me: Well, bring it to me and I can get into it and change it for you, but I will have to charge you for my time. I can come to your home, but that will be an additional charge for travel.

XXX: ^%$#@! "CLICK"

Me: Hello? Hello? I wonder why she hung up?

**Niclo Iste** · March 15th, 2010, 02:16 PM

Something about missing passwords from friday to today that is in the air. The most noticeable issue of that I had sunday with a client asking me what the power on password is to their pc. Turns out that their room mates in frustration of trying to get into their pc after I was told to manage passwords on the login accounts they went into the bios and typed in all sorts of craziness then borked the ability to get into windows all together. Naturally I must know any passwords ever attempted by a novice to bypass windows that would be typed into the bios. It took the better part of 30 minutes explaining to them what had most likely happened. Luckily they said they'll figure it out on their own rather than blame me for the mishap.

**Guts3d** · March 16th, 2010, 07:16 PM

30 minutes of your life that you will never get back. Sad.

**slgrieb** · March 16th, 2010, 07:38 PM

Aw, generally, you can at least get paid for the time. You just add it to the customer's PITA time and defer collection to the next service call.

**Guts3d** · July 7th, 2010, 02:15 PM

Latest fun time;

Customer: I bought this cd with Program X on it, and tried loading it and it says it is a used serial number.
Me: You opened the software and it was sealed at the store, correct? It wasn't opened in any way?
User: Nope, I unsealed it and typed the number in very carefully, both times.
Me: Both times? What do you mean by both times?
User: once at home, it worked fine. But when I tried loading it at work, it says the serial number is used and...
Me: Sigh...