'True' Tech Illiteracy Stories #4 


Cust: I formatted my drive which had Win95 on it and installed OS/2.
 Now I can't figure out how to get back to Win95.
Me: You formatted the partition that Win95 was on?
Cust: Yes.
Me: (SLAP!)


Once I was supporting a programming language. A caller asked,
"Do the lines in the program execute forwards or backwards?"


"The keyboard doesn't work anymore. The screen saver fell off and hit
the setup key; now nothing works." Turns out the polarized filter stuck
to the monitor fell off.


Cust: Does my email go directly to my answering machine when I'm not
online? Can I just check my email from another phone on my machine?


Man: My account was supposed to be reactivated yesterday and it
 wasn't.
Tech: Well, sir, we are showing that your account was reactivated
 yesterday at 12:30.
Man: Well, it wasn't because I re-installed the program and I keep
 checking, but my old screen names are not showing up on my computer.
Tech: Have you tried to sign on yet?
Man: No, I was waiting for my screen names to show up.


Why is it that customers, and I mean a lot of them, don't understand
 why you need a modem to get on the internet?
Cust: Do you really need a modem?
Tech: Yes, you do.
Cust: Do you really, really need one?
Tech: Yes, I am afraid that you do.
Cust: WELL, THAT'S DUMB! (hangs up)


I got _two_ calls in my first two weeks as a service rep from prospective
users who had lost their registration certificates. Not knowing what the
heck the computer was asking for, they'd typed in something at random, and
happened to hit on actual screen name/password combination of an active
account. (The 'stupid customer' story here, I think, is the active members
who used their screen name for their password.)
They thought their 'free trial' was great...


Don't you love those customers who throw away their passwords and
registration numbers...Who think that customer service reps. are
responsible for there stu....I mean honest mistake :)


An elderly woman asked, "Do I need to call my phone company each time to let
them know that I am going online?" I am sure that the phone company would
appreciate her calling so that they could hold all her calls. Yeah, right!


Tech: Thank you for calling. Are you currently a member?
Timid Voice: I just got your disk today.
Tech: (obviously a little girl) How can I help you?
Girl: It won't fit my computer.
Tech: What kind of computer do you have?
Girl: A Talking Whiz Kid.


Cust: How much is it for a modem at 14.4?
Tech: We don't sell modems here, sir.
Cust: It says right here on this software pack '14.4 at no extra cost to you.'
Tech: It means it doesn't cost you extra to connect to a high speed modem.


Customer: I just got your software in the mail, and what I wanted
to know was, will I be charged if I just look at the software?
I mean, I don't even have a modem yet.


Cust: You canceled my account yesterday. Was that the reason my C:\ crashed?
Tech: No, your hard drive would not crash because of your account being
 canceled.
Cust: Are you sure?
Tech: Yes.
Cust: Ok...I knew that.


Tech: Yes, we require a credit card or checking account in order
 to sign up on our service.
Cust: Well, I saw on the news that I should NEVER give out my credit
 card info!
Tech: Well, we have to have a way to bill you.
Cust: No OTHER service does this!
Tech: No, the others don't allow you to use a checking account.
Cust: No honest company would ask me for my credit card info!
Tech: (I sure hope she doesn't catalog shop!)


Tech: (Asks for phone number)
Cust: I don't give out my phone number!
Tech: Alright. How may I help you, sir?
Cust: How much for your internet service?
Tech: (Gave out prices)
Cust: If I own the software why do you keep charging for it?
Tech: Well, sir, the software is free, but you are charged for being online.
Cust: YOU CONNECT YOUR COMPUTER TO THE PHONE LINE?!
Tech: Well, sir, you do use a modem to dial online.
Cust: I WILL NEVER HOOK MY COMPUTER TO MY PHONE! ::CLICK::
Tech: (Feeling a little paranoid, are we?)


Cust: You sent me a Mac software disk in the mail; I need one for DOS.
Tech: I'll be glad to send one to you, ma'am...should that be a 3-1/2
 or 5-1/4 inch disk?
Cust: Uh...how are they different?


TOP TEN IDIOTIC QUESTIONS FREQUENTLY ASKED BY AOL CUSTOMERS
10) Which is the registration number and which is the password?
9) Can I speak with Ricki Lake?
8) Why do I need a modem if this is just a ten-hour free trial?
7) Why do I need to enter my credit card number if this is just a
 ten-hour free trial?
6) My screen name? What is a screen name?
5) I've been billed for the last six months?! But I thought my
 first ten hours were free!
4) How did I become a member when I never signed anything?
3) I gave my friend your 800 number, so why can't I have ten free
 hours credited to my account?
2) Why isn't there a local access number here? There's almost a
 thousand people living in my town!
1) HOW'S THAT WORK?


I sold an external Apple CD drive along with an Iomega Zip to a customer who
was fairly new at computers. She was going to connect both external SCSI
devices to her desktop Mac. I made sure that she would have the proper SCSI
cables for these two devices. I tried to describe the process over the phone
before she received the hardware, but I realized that it is difficult to
picture how to create the SCSI daisy chain. I waited until her hardware
arrived and I called to see if she was having any difficulty getting them
connected. She said "No, everything is fine. My husband just went out to the
local computer store to buy a daisy chain." And after he returned:
"Salesman said they only have the PC version available right now but would be
happy to special order a Mac version."


In my house, my parents want me to put a sticker on the phone when I'm
online. So, one day, right after I get off, the phone rings. From her
bedroom, my mom asks, "Are you still online?"


One of our techs got a call from the archetypal clueless customer - no matter
how detailed her explanation was, it just wasn't detailed enough for this
guy. Every time she asked him to open or close a file, she had to describe
the process. After 40 minutes (half of which was spent describing how to use
the Mac operating system), she decided to just give up and let someone else
step up to bat. "I'm going to refer this to a senior tech," she said.
"He'll be calling you right back." "But that won't work," the customer
protested. "There's a three-hour time difference, and I won't be here in three
hours." Later, when she was telling this story to the rest of us, someone
suggested that she should have responded: "Oh, but he already called you three
hours ago - the call should be coming through any minute now!"


A very irate customer called the Apple support line for problem demanding on
site service. It was an obvious software problem. When I explained how to
fix the problem, he started yelling and screaming at me: Don't you tell me
this is a software problem! I've been using Macs for over 15 years and I
know what I'm talking about. (Macs came out in '84. This call was in '94.)


Cust: I just purchased a PowerMac 8500/120 and an external gigabyte
drive. Can I put all my files programs and folders on the external drive?
Me: Certainly. You can keep anything you want on the external drive.
Cust: Good, because I don't want to keep anything on the internal one.
Me: Why not?
Cust: I don't really know, it just looks better that way.
Me: Don't you feel like you're wasting a gigabyte drive by doing that?
Cust: Hmmm. You have a point there. I never thought of that.


It works fine until I take the CD out of the machine and then I can't get
it to run. Does the CD have to be in the machine?


One man called because he was concerned with the warnings he had read about
installing his printer. So, I asked him to do was to restart his Mac and hold
down the "shift" key, until he sees, "Welcome to Macintosh...Extensions off".
After the second time of the message failing to say, "Extensions off", I
said, "Sir, are you holding down the key that says 'shift' on it (I had
mentioned 'shift' several dozen times by now)?" His reply was, "No, I'm
holding down the long one in the middle...the space bar". After two more
tries, we finally got the extensions off, so I asked him what disks had
come with his printer. I figured out which he needed to insert, and asked
him to insert it in his disk drive.
"Where would I find that?"
"OK, sir, what kind of PowerBook do you have?"
"It's a 310."
"Sir, that's your printer, what kind of PowerBook do you have?"
"It's a 530." (at this point I gave up and assumed he meant one of the 500's.)
"Ok, the drive would be on the right hand side."
"There's no place on the 310 that this disk seems to fit."
"Sir, that's because you need to insert the disk in your Mac."
(It took several minutes to get the disk in right and everything).
"Sir, when you bought this, did they tell you that you would need to get a
software update from HP before this printer would work with your computer?"
"Yes." "Did you?" "No." It was downhill from there.


When I started working here, I got myself all the computer accounts I
needed, including an e-mail account. I was given my passwords for all
systems except e-mail. After about a week, I called up the appropriate
person to find out what the problem was, and was told that my password
had been e-mailed to me.


 ___  __  __  ___    __    _  _  _  _  ____
/ __)(  )(  )(_  )  /__\  ( \( )( \( )( ___) Suzanne Cook
\__ \ )(__)(  / /  /(__)\  )  (  )  (  )__)  
(___/(______)(___)(__)(__)(_)\_)(_)\_)(____) http://www.cs.utah.edu/~scook/