Jerko Mondo

[mzcpu]

Yesterday a customer call and rudely states that his modem is not functioning, and everytime he uses aol 5.0 his mouse completely freezes on him. I tell him bring it in and we'll have a look. No he say I have to wait for the system. I nicely explain that he may end up waiting 5-6 hours before we van get to it. So he drops it off and leaves.
Later after I look at the computer I find 3 problems:
1. 1 gig hard drive with 27.2 mb free; I also explain again that he could really use a new hard drive.
2. The serial mouse he is using (which I told him months ago to get rid of) is not supported and has no drivers for win 98. It was designed for dos/3.11 win.
3.AOL 5.0 sucks.

I call him to explain all of this, he says remove these 3 programs for more HD space. I kindly explain that I will do this but he really needs another HD. (this is a business computer!) I tell him after doing so he now has 77.7 mb free.So I reinstall AOL 4.0 and get it working without freezzing. Call the guy up and he comes in.

Sees the bill and says I don't understand what this is for. You did my upgrade. I kindly explain that I did not put aol on there, I did not use up all of his hard drive space, and I spent 4 hours screwing around with it til it ran right. In front of other customers this moron gets nasty, swears and yells. I got him to leave called his boss and explained that he shouldn't come back anymore. I didn't give him the pc as he wouldn't pay the bill.

[oldman]

typical day in this new society where people have no patience or courtesy and no accountabilty for themselves. they do no wrong and everyone else can't do anything right. we have a list of "problem customers" and when one of those people come in, heaven forbid, we add to the bill, because we know that it will be back and they will not want to pay for it, so we just get them first.

[STB Magic]

Good idea Oldman. A bad customer surcharge. My question is, do they pay even more if they are carrying a Packard Bell or Compaq?

[MuscleMan]

At my shop we don't keep an actual list of trouble customers but if a customer does give us a hard time we will be stricter on the bill (we are pretty lax on charging labor). For example, I had a customer in the other day who brought it in for some 'small' problems. After I worked on it for 3 hours it was working (got the ok from cust before putting that time in). They understood that we are 65 an hour but when it came to the bill the person started bitching about it saying that we didn't do anything that he couldn't do blindfolded. GRRRRRR. I just held the PC until the person gave in and paid. I hope I don't see that one again.

[Renée]

Oldman...amen! I'm all for top-notch customer service, but where is the merit in letting people get away with purposeful rudeness and completely unreasonable, asinine behavior? Seems nowadays that anyone spending a buck and a half with you wants you to lick their boots and chant, "The customer is always right, the customer is always right." My problem is with people who KNOW they're being unreasonable and they don't care. A severe lack of 'home training' is what I call it. I've only been on this earth 31 years and probably should be less cynical, but that's long enough to get really crotchety in this business.

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GeekGirl

[oldman]

yes we do charge more on other makes pb and compaq leading the way, geek girl, been her 46 have work in 2 service industries, have seen most of the bad sides, but have seen a lot of good to.

[Renée]

Oldman...you're right. There's a lot of good, and I have to say overall that I love my job. It's just the occasional bad apple that stinks up the place...

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GeekGirl

[Frostbite]

In the shop I work in, it's a first come first serve basis for repairs and diagnostics unless in extreme cases. But most of the time I'm quite strict to the rules. I must at least get 5 people a week asking me to put theirs ahead of others in line so they can get their homework or business crap done at home. And when I tell them sorry they can get quite rude. I can sort of see their point when they say they've spent a few grand on a system and it broke down that it sucks to not always get immediate service but then they should realize that those ahead of them probably paid as much if not more for theirs and to bud them ahead of line so to speak would be quite outrageous.
Also what else is fun is when trying to get someone to pay for installing something that only took me 5 minutes and they spent hours trying to get working.

Frostbite

[Frostbite]

In the shop I work in, it's a first come first serve basis for repairs and diagnostics unless in extreme cases. But most of the time I'm quite strict to the rules. I must at least get 5 people a week asking me to put theirs ahead of others in line so they can get their homework or business crap done at home. And when I tell them sorry they can get quite rude. I can sort of see their point when they say they've spent a few grand on a system and it broke down that it sucks to not always get immediate service but then they should realize that those ahead of them probably paid as much if not more for theirs and to bud them ahead of line so to speak would be quite outrageous.
Also what else is fun is when trying to get someone to pay for installing something that only took me 5 minutes and they spent hours trying to get working.

Frostbite