Suckerfish on the Side of Your Whale

I'm in love with the idea of karmic-themed businesses. It started with a restaurant idea: what if your service depended on how well you treated the staff? It seems so perfect! The staff get to enjoy the truly nice customers, and that in turn makes the service much better. The jerks get filtered out like so much chaff, and if they stick around in spite of the service, then the staff gets to take out frustrations on them. Compare:

Nice Customer: "Oh, waiter, I think there's a fly in my soup."
Waiter: "Oh, I'm terribly sorry about that! Let me fetch another soup for you, and I'll take this off your bill."

...

Rude Customer: "Waiter! There's a f***ing fly in my soup! What is this, a third world restaurant? Are you all incompetent?"
Waiter: "Die in a fire. You and everything you hold dear are meaningless. Here is a life-sized cardboard picture of Julia Roberts which I will seat at your table across from you. You will look at her and smile for the remainder of your time here, and you will be served Leprosy Surprise for dessert."

I can't see any downside.

Working in any service job carries the risk of seeing you become terminally cynical. Every sensible, rational person you've ever dealt with is obscured by the haze of a thousand moronic questions, unnecessary obfuscations, and ludicrous displays of pompousness. Stephane's comment about email reminds me that I'd love to be able to reply to every email in a manner similar to the sender's.

Incoming messages

1) how do i get rid of it

2) Your service has reached new levels of incompetence and I should be entitled to a rebate for having to put up with all of this nonsense.

3) I'm wondering why my wireless service doesn't work at night?

1) try applying a cream nightly

2) I should be entitled to a bonus every time I reply to one of your emails. Bluster and indignant declarations do not mean you know what you're talking about.

3) Beanfields.

Labels: delusional

A customer included the following in an e-mail:

"You people must think that I am the STUPIDEST PERSON ON EARTH?????"

Is it considered bad taste to reply with "Well, yeah!" ?

Me - "Hold in the power button on your computer for 5 seconds please."
Caller - "What do you mean by power?!"


Caller - "I didn't get my three-way."
Me - "Your WHAT?!" [mind obviously already in the gutter]
Caller - "I didn't get the three way."
Me - "Uh what EXACTLY do you mean by 'you didn't get your three-way'?"
Caller - "Well I didn't get my three-way calling.
Me - "Ahhhh. Well it's already enabled on your account sir."
Caller - "Oh."

Various calls from today...

Me - "Okay, so we're going to unplug your modem and wait 30 seconds and then plug it back in."
Caller - [a second after saying that] "Okay, it's plugged back in."
Me - [Inaudible sigh]

What I wanted to say: "Please die and go to hell."


Me - "Okay, we're going to need to install the Ethernet 500 software because you're using Win2000 and DSL won't work on our system without this software. Can you please put the CD into the CD tray?"
Caller - "Okay, I've done so."
Me - "Alright, we're going to RIGHT click on 'start' and go to 'explore'."
Caller - [left clicking on start] "I don't see explore."
Me - "No RIGHT click."
Caller - "Oh, sorry."
Me - Now do you see the CD icon on the left side? Please click on that."
Caller - "Okay. It says insert a CD."
Me - "I thought you did that already?"
Caller - "I did. Which side does the CD face?"
Me - "The label should point upwards towards the sky."
Caller - [very hesitant] "Oh dear. I can't find the CD."
Me - "Where'd you put it?"
Caller - "I'm not sure!?!"
Me - "Didn't you put it in the CD tray?"
Caller - "I don't know. Oh dear. I'm going to get my son to come in and help me."
Me - "Maybe that won't be a bad idea." [trying to contain my laughter]

What I really wanted to say - "I don't think you have the mental capacity to be using a computer. How in the hell do you operate in this modern world?"


Me - "Go to _____" [pick anywhere to go on a PC]
Caller - [complete silence]
Me - "Are you there?"
Caller - "Yes."
Me - "Go to _____" [pick anywhere to go on a PC]
Caller - [complete silence]
Me - "Hello?"
Caller - "Yes?"
Me - "Okay, to move this problem solving more in your favour, I'm just going to need you to reply to me and let me know you've done what I've told you to do."
Caller - [complete silence]

What I really wanted to say - "Do you understand the words 'speak the fuck up?'!"

Labels: futility

In an email:

"Our friends keep to email us some tube like something to open pictures but not work to open. I wonder if you know what is wrong."

Beanfields?

No, seriously, I have absolutely no idea.

Labels: communication

...People who can't read.

I had a caller who had upgraded from Win98 to WinXP. She was all freaked out saying that it's so different (which it's not). She had already called and had someone set it up for her so that she had a connection on her desktop with our ISP name and she'd just need to press connect. Now keep in mind, this person was able to connect on Win98 to dial up and the icon is nearly identical. Anyway, that's not the point. The point is she was so freaked out over this 'new' system (instead of just using common sense) that she thought she didn't know how to use it. These people get so stressed out that you can't help but laugh and make them laugh to calm them down. Her phone call quickly made her feel like an idiot because she didn't use common sense before phoning. She was even writing down, 'Click on 'our ISP' icon, press connect.' I mean, how can you not remember that (and she wasn't elderly)?! I had to hit mute and laugh.

Anyway, that's not the fun part. The fun part was her complete lack of any reading comprehension/program name knowledge and totally bungling the names. It made for great entertainment!

Caller: "So I go to my Mogdazilla Foxfire?"
Me: [immediate laughter] "I'm sorry. I'm not making fun of you. It's just kind of funny. It's Mozilla Firefox."
Caller: [she was cool, just freaked out] "It's okay. So I go to Godzilla Foxfire to see my webpages?"
Me: "Yes, but the program is called Mozilla Firefox. [chuckling] I'm really sorry. Every time you're saying that it's making me chuckle. I guess it's IT humour."

Despite my correcting her at least three times (politely) she kept on insisting on calling it Mogdazilla/Godzilla Foxfire.

I wish people could read/listen. Haha.

I think I should start a fair with Terry and we can just drive town-to-town and have an amusement park of sorts - except we just replay all of the amusing stuff we hear out of callers out of the back of a van for $10 a pop. Here is one I just had today:

Me: "Helpdesk."
Caller - [No hi, no 'I am such and such', just...] "I forgot to ask the other guy how to check my messages."
Me - "Do you mean your email?" (keep in mind we have about 3 different services whereby you could check for 'messages')
Caller - "No, my M-E-S-S-A-G-E-S."
Me - "Yes, I understand that, but what type of messages? Do you mean email?"
Caller - [ever frustrated] "No, no. I mean my messages."
Me - "Okay, sir please forgive me but I'm not sure what you're talking about."
Caller - "Oh. I meant how do I check my voice mail?"
Me - "Okay, now I understand! [why is it we're always the ones who are supposedly the idiot?] What's your phone number?"
Caller - "Oh shit, I can't remember." [I hear him fumbling around looking for his phone number]
Me - "Okay, do you have Internet service through us?"
Caller - "Yes I do."
Me - "Alright, what's your email address then?"
Caller - [He spells it out and it doesn't return a result] "Oh shit. I can't remember that either. Well it doesn't matter anyway. It's @ourispname.com."
Me - [trying my best not to laugh] "Yes, of course it's going to be. That's our company. I just need something to bring up your account."

In the end it was a really simple answer and he just needed to know how to press *98, but it was an exercise in futility. If he'd just been clear and concise in what he wanted, it would have made our lives easier, but no - customers ALWAYS take the road less travelled-by.

I like these people. They seem to think that they can just start randomly telling us their problem and somehow we're going to magically have all of their info up on our computer screen and have psychic powers and understand that the 'thingamajiggy' is their modem. I also like how they use generic terms to describe something and get frustrated when we try to dig (and I really do mean dig!) to get the answers out of them to figure what in the hell it is they're trying to describe! Good times.

Caller: "I just have a light on my bottom, that's all."

Caller: "Oh s***, my router started smoking! I'll call back later!"

Supervisor: "You know what else causes problems with wireless internet?"
Me: "No, what?"
Supervisor: "Bean fields."
Me: "So this guy probably can't get on the internet at night because of random nearby agriculture?"
Supervisor: "Yeah."
Me: "... are you serious?"
(He was.)

Caller: "If my monitor is smoking, should I turn it off?"
Me: "Yes, definitely."
Caller: "Oh. So if it's been smoking all weekend... I should turn it off?"
Me: "Absolutely."
Caller: "Oh. OK, thanks!"

Caller: "Do you really think this is my only problem?"

Agent: "Well, I'll ask you to try something else here, I'm not sure if you've tried this--"
Caller: "No."

Labels: quotes

Caller: "I moved my desk and knocked the cable out, and now the internet doesn't work. Can you help me?"
Me: "Sure. Have you plugged the cable back in?"
Caller: "Oh. No. That would probably help, huh?"
Me: "I'd imagine so."

If you call into support and wonder why agents often ask you very basic, obvious-seeming questions...

Labels: pebkac, plugged