How many of us do T.S. and think our customers are imbecilesFollow

I don't think so, Tyr. No one is raging out here. Just trying to get you see the flip side of the coin. Yeah, I have to call my T.S. sometimes and they ***** and moan at me for not being able to fix my own stupid computer problems. If that makes me an idiot, well bring me my bedazzled and jewelled dunce cap.

I can understand their frustrations but they should try to understand mine too. That's all I'm sayin'.

Well, I consider myself pretty computer savy and I helped a lot of "idiotic" people with their computer problems. I have had people call me at all hours of the day asking me questions about some mundane things on their computer. I don't really mind since I figure they are not really tech friendly.

One thing that bugs me is tech support people who know nothing about their product or how to fix problems on it. I only call when I know for a fact the items is dead or can not be fixed easily over the phone. I usually have to deal with first level techs who has script of things they want me to try before they will even consider having second level techs give me a call. Usually at hours when I am not near the problem computer or away from desk. My patience grows pretty thin by the time.

By now, I know most of the scripted questions by heart and I start off rattling off all the things I have tried, like checking the cable, checking power switch, reinstalling the program, OS, etc. etc. Yet, they still insist that I try it again just to make sure, then I should call them back after I have done them all in the exact order they prescribed. Why is that? Why can't they just hook me up to the second level tech if they realize that I know more about their product then they do? Whey do they have to make me go through the hoops to get an RMA number or connect me to someone who REALLY knows the stuff?

Anyways, that is my rant for the day.

Taushar

My favorites from the diskette days:
1) Diskette drive broken, won't open, making grinding noise when you try to read it. Arrive at scene to find the little floppies have been pried from their protective plastic covering, and jammed into the drive. They were REALLY hard to open customer said.

2) Do you have backups of all your data diskettes? Yes, proudly waving a stack of photo copies of the diskettes. With the original diskette safely STAPLED to each sheet (not being lucky enough to have chosen the corner to staple, can't imagine why neither the originals or the "copies" were any good...)

My favorites from now:
Customer says something is wrong with the desktop, the icons move all over the place. Asked her four year old child if she liked playing with the computer. Yes, she likes moving the little pictures around with the mouse, and mommy gets all crazy.

Customer says that if he doesn't touch his keyboard or mouse for a while, "things happen on the screen", he has carefully timed it, several times, making sure not to touch the mouse or keyboad, and it is 15 minutes exactly. It is not too big a problem because it goes away if he does touch the mouse or keyboard, but he really does not like the fact that this is happening, maybe all that activity is hurting his monitor, and wasting his memory. Hmmm, fixed fairly easily.

Computer no longer works, customer opened it up to clean (WTF?), noticed it looked all "messy" inside, rearranged the cards neatly from largest to smallest, and connected the cables neatly back (sort of).

Ah, Kazaa. Cause of more headaches to me than someone repeatedly bashing me in the head with a baseball bat.

99% of the software-related problems people check in computers for were caused by that damned program. It specifically says during the install that it puts adware and spyware on your system...so why are you surprised to find it?

As for A(rseholes)OL, they are evil on a CD. Do NOT use them unless you enjoy gratiutous popups and slow service.

I dunno, maybe my sentiments on this are kind of moot, seeing as I'm not REALLY in Tech Support but I still have to deal with the frequent morons trying to get free service from a repair center.

The most aggravating argument when people are complaining is that "I bought it from you and I don't know how to use it." Ok, when you buy a car does the dealer teach you to drive it? When your oil needs changing, does the dealer do it for free? If you can honestly name one that does, I'll work on your machine for free if you give me the name of said dealer, 'cause I want one of their cars!

What REALLY gets me is people complaining about how long a machine takes to fix when we have to send it out for repair. Many maufacturers force us to send out their machines, rather than having us fix it in house, especially laptops. At that point, there's really bugger all we can do. Call FedEx and complain to them, or Toshiba's repair place and moan to them. Not much I can do to speed it along. Also, as we TOLD you when you gave us your machine, you will have to wait for us to fix the 15 machines people checked in before you. You're not any more important than them, no matter what you may think.

I swear, most of these people think we have some kind of magic want we wave to fix computers.

Problem with me is noone else in the building is allowed to do what I do to fix the issues. Like running a sys config on a computer with a software controlled modem. Or even regedit. Sadly I seem to be the only person who knows the power of msconfig on a connect no browse!

I actually like it when a customer tells me they know nothing about computers. I get to tell them "Thats okay I will walk you through what I need you to do step by step" It's the people playing button mash while Im trying to fix their problem that kinda get me angry.

And the guess ahead people...

Tell them to do one thing, and you hear click, click, clickity, click. And you say what are you doing and they are three steps ahead (not bad if they know where you are going, but they so often get it wrong, and you have to wait for them to start over, again, or worse).

Highlight such and such file.
OK it's gone.
What do you mean gone?
Well weren't you going to have me delete it?
No.
Oh, well I did, how do I get it back?
Double click on your recycle bin icon.
OK I emptied it.
WTF?
Oh, wasn't that what you were going to have me do?
Yes, yes it was, now delete the rest of the contents of your drive, and empty it again (this last one is only wishful thinking, sigh).

Now I have to say, some of the T.S. people I have run into are bigger a$$holes, and dumber than the customers.

System Restore is my tool of choice.

that goes both ways.

as someone who has done TS for the IT deparments for several large companies i can tell you that loads of the EU are just ****** in the head and stupid as hell.

on the other hand as someone who knows a lot about computers and IT hardware i find it very insulting when i call in for tech support and get some nut case who knows less about computers or their product then my 8yr daughter does.

typical example was the last printer i picked up for my office.

nice little all in one HP psc 2210xi. on the box it is listed to work speciifcaly with

win98/win98SE/winME/win2000,winXP
will not work with win95 or winNT4.0

ok fine, i want to install and configure this to run off my win2k server. as is typical with a lot of bloated drivers for all in one products there are 130M of compressed drivers to be installed with this product. no big deal, but the problem is they will only stay loaded for about 1-3 days.

after fighting with them and getting frustrated i hit HP site and download the win2k driver bundle, again 129M ziped file, to install and configure so i have the most current driver set.

i have already double checked my OS, MB, and BIOS drivers to verify i am 100% current there. wow go to install and 'poof' your OS is not supported by this prodect, please remove this device..... now wait a minute. see above what OS are 100% supported with this device and you will see win2k.

so i call and get ahold of some nut case who can not speak english, yeah you guessed it i found India, hung up on them. called again and after several more tries i finnaly got someone who could speak english enough to comunicate with me to ONLY be told that win2k and win2k server are different OS and thus not supported.

STOP right there. win2k pro, server, advanced server and data center are all 100% the exact same kernal and OS with a different registry. in fact if you hack the registry on your win2k pro CD you can install any and all of the above OS with that very same CD.

so i tell the lady in a not so polite voice at this time that HP has 2 choices. A. pay me back for this junk hardware due to false advertising, B. make it work.

she had to go 3 levels up to get me to someone who knew what they were talking about just to get the drivers to install. now since then, knocks on wood, i have yet to have an issue with my printer.

but come on ppl, why higher someone with that little knowledge about OSs that they support in the first place, and why bother 'saving money' by shipping support offshore to someone you can not talk with. all it does is cost you more money when i call your 800 toll free ph# again and again and again until i get someone who can speak my language.

i find CSR goes both ways. stupid customers and stupid CSR and rules that govern the CSR.

I just wish people would read the bloody tech support faq first. Them: "how do I fix this..." me: "did you read the "how to fix this..." document?" them: "ummmm no? why, was that important?"

One of my favorite TS stories is the tech who was kept on the line for an hour by a customer trying to figure out why their computer wouldn't power on - before the moron told them that there was a blackout. Said tech told the customer to box up their computer with everything that came with it and return it to the store. When the customer asked why, the tech told them that it was becuase they were too stupid to own a computer.

That guy got fired. Shame.