Suckerfish on the Side of Your Whale

New Tech: "Does anyone know what it means when Vista says ?"

When tech agents are new, they ask a lot of questions. This makes sense, as no one is likely to have run into all of the bizarre stuff that can come up on computers, let alone all the bizarre stuff that people will say to you. However, whenever I'm training or supervising (and hence fielding more questions than usual), I'm occasionally struck by the silliness of some of the questions I'm asked.

When New Tech asked the room the question above, I typed into Google. The third result on the page showed the exact message in a context that seemed likely to help, so I clicked the link and discovered what it meant and how to get around it.

Me: "It means you have to run that command as an administrator. Tell the customer to right click on it and he'll see that option, and then it'll work just like in XP."
New Tech: "Thanks!"
Me: "Wait a sec before you talk to him again... why didn't you just google that?"
New Tech: "I did. I didn't find anything."
Me: "Well, what did you google? Because I googled , which is exactly what you said out loud, and I found the answer very quickly."

That's sometimes frustrating.

Labels: futility

# posted by Terry @ 8:49 AM 1 comments

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

Me: "Well then, the next step that we'd want to try would be to unplug all of your phones and filters so that we can give the modem a chance to try connecting without any devices on the line to potentially interfere."
Caller: "So you want me to unplug every single phone in the house?"
Me: "Exactly. That will let us rule out almost everything inside that might be a problem."
Caller: "No."
Me: "... OK then, I guess that leaves us at an impasse."

I mean, really, what do you say to someone who's called up for help and then just refuses to take a troubleshooting step?

Caller: "What else can we do?"
Me: "Well, there are a bunch of steps that we could try after unplugging the phones, but the thing is that if we try them without this step, we won't know if they're working or not."
Caller: "So you want me to unplug the millions* of phones in this house?"
Me: "Exactly. Once we've gone past that step, we'll have either found the problem or we can move on to other sorts of troubleshooting."
Caller: "I'm not doing that."
Me: "OK then. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

She hung up on me at that point.

*I'm guessing that this was an example of "hyperbole", a linguistic and rhetorical device of which I'm vaguely aware.

Labels: futility, stubborn

To further expand upon Terry's post about the 'know-it-all' customer, I'm going to share a recent encounter I had with a customer. One of THE MOST frustrating things as a technical support person is dealing with a person who's calling you for help but claims to know what they're doing or they second guess everything you do. It's obvious that more than often, these people are totally clueless but feel the need to be in control of the situation so they try and make themselves some sort of faux authority on the issue when it's clear they're clueless. Quite often, they're easily given away when they say things computer educated/literate people just would not say, like 'my server' instead of 'my ISP/provider'. They're two separate things and any semi-computer geek would know this.

Anyway, the call went something like this...

An elderly woman called me up saying her email wasn't working. Usually this is pretty easy to solve, but she didn't want to make it easy for me. After I told her what to do, I'd invariably get the 'Are you sure?! I don't think that will work.'-type comments. Clearly she's calling me for help, so why the fuck are you asking ME if I know what I'm doing?! I'll never understand people like this. The only thing I can think of is that these people need to be in control the whole time and just can't accept that they may not know anything about the issue.

Me: "So please click 'remove' on your email account in Outlook Express."
Caller: "Are you sure? We don't need to do that, do we?"
Me: "Well, actually Outlook Express sometimes messes up settings and more often than not, this is and easy fix. We'll just recreate the account and it should work."
Caller: "Are you sure? I don't think that's necessary."
Me: [wanting to say] "Well than I can't help you and you can fix it yourself!"
Me: "Well, if you want the issue fixed, we need to do this.

In previous versions of this type of call, I've actually given the caller shit for not allowing my job and asked them if they were calling for help. When they invariably answer 'yes', I then point out that I'm there to help them and that they need to trust me and let me do my job or nothing will get done. Usually, it shuts them up pretty quick because they know they've been called on their facade of being more knowledgeable than they really are. I don't know why, but I didn't really give this customer shit like I should have, so it carried on a little more than was needed for my sanity...

Caller: [long hesitant sigh like the world is about to end if we change a setting on her PC] "Ooookay, but I don't think this is going to make things better."

So we went through the malarky of recreating the account and it worked. I asked her if she was able to send and receive and I got this reply:
Caller: "Oh, it works!"

Of course it does. I know what I'm doing. You're calling me for help, right?! Now let me do my fucking job and let me help you. Why second guess me when it's clear you don't know what you're doing and that you do need help?! In fact, what's the point of me even sitting here *trying* to help you if you already know the fix to the problem?!

I wanted to ask her how her humble pie tasted, but I refrained.

Labels: futility

Caller: "So do I always use webmail first?"
Me: "First before what?"
Caller: "I dunno."
Me: "... then yes."

That exchange came at the end of the customer asking me if he should use webmail first, and me asking what he'd be doing next. He didn't understand other ways of checking email, and he didn't know what he'd be doing after webmail, so I just concluded that yes, he should always use webmail first.

Labels: communication, futility

My favourite type of caller is the one who thinks by some sort of magical fairy proxy they're exempt from the rules of the Internet. Typically, this happens when there's an outage of some sort just like there was today.

Caller: "So I heard your message about DSL being out, but I'm not able to download my email. I shouldn't be affected too, right?!"
Me: "No, you giant moron." Okay, so I didn't answer like that.... "That's not true. Email is a basic form of using the Internet and when you're trying to send or receive email, you're effectively using the Internet."
Caller: [in complete shock that they somehow don't defy the rules of technology] "Oh. But my DSL light is showing full sync on my modem."
Me: "Yes, but unfortunately the issue is on Bell's end and it doesn't really matter which lights your modem is showing."
Caller: "But I should still be able to get my email, right?"
Me: "No, you won't be able to connect to the Internet in order to do that - as I explained earlier."
Caller: "So you're saying that I won't be able to use my email?"
Me: "Yup."
Caller: "So can you guys call me when it comes back up?"....
Me: "Our systems are already heavily overloaded with people calling about this issue. As a result of that, we would be unable to do so. Just try your connection in a few hours. You'll know it's working when you can get onto the Internet."
Caller: "But what if it doesn't work?!"
Me: "Wait some more." (and never call us ever again)


I had a caller today who had a genuine issue. He was losing sync but due to our outage, we had no real way of judging the outcome of typical testing we do. Furthermore, when he called us last time he called us from work - which is always frustrating when they expect us to flip some sort of magical switch to solve their issue. Terry had dealt with him previously and promised him that the next time he called in we'd open up a ticket without issue. Terry no doubt did this to get this person off the phone and out of his life as well as the fact that he'd done a decent amount of troubleshooting already. He was the sort of dickheaded customer anyone in support of any kind (whether it be technical or customer) loathes due to them not recognising the futility in the situation.

I kept explaining to him that today was not an ideal time to be opening an ticket because we couldn't really see his line stats and where the issue may lie (which we can sometimes tell via line stats). As such, opening a ticket would be a waste of my time and his because his issue may not get solved promptly. He took this as me telling him I didn't want to open a ticket because I was being rude (although he was right in the sense I didn't want to open the ticket for the reasons I'd given him). We went around in circles and he finally demanded to be called back.

Now you see, I have learnt one thing over my years in working support - you put these people on hold they suddenly go away due to their own self-importance and impatience. Hold is the magical button of all customer support. We know it pisses people off. If you piss us off? You get a time out on hold - usually rather prolonged. So, I put him on hold under the premise that I was going to check out whether or not we could call him back about this issue (we sometimes do this) considering the circumstances. While I did genuinely ask for him, when I approached my boss I made sure we shot the shit about how drunk both of us got on Saturday night and pretty much everything other than his issue. You see, he pissed me off because he was just being a dick and wouldn't recogise the futility in his argument. So I put him on hold for longer than usual. Magically, when I got came back to the phone, my phone was ringing and customer x was nowhere to be found.

We have to be nice during our jobs, but trust me we find ways to be evil. Don't even get me started on some of the comments we'll put in your account... That's for another day.

Labels: futility

Oh good, another reason to post. And it's not even 11am as I start to type this!

One of the most important skills for a tech support agent to have is the ability to figure out what's actually happening based on what the caller is telling you. In ideal situations, the caller is telling you exactly what's happening and you can proceed accordingly. In most real life cases, the caller isn't familiar with the terminology or isn't sure what's actually happening, and so they try the best they can. From there, it's usually not too hard to mentally translate what they're saying into what they're actually seeing.

However, the outright omission of information can be a problem sometimes. For example, one caller earlier today told me that her computer was connected, but it wasn't behaving the way a connected computer normally does. She said that the computer was indicating that it was connected, and I'd been having her click the OurCompany icon each time to make sure that the computer was establishing its link.

The problem is that the caller was clicking the icon, and nothing was happening because the shortcut was broken, and then she was seeing that the local area connection was indicating that it was connected, so she assumed that she was. Since she didn't sound like she was doing anything wrong, I didn't bother checking the usage logs to see if she was successfully re-establishing the connection each time.

This was a case of the caller sounding like she was following my instructions but probably not realizing that what she was looking at and what was happening weren't actually what I was talking about. Consequently, an issue that should have taken 5-10 minutes to resolve took 41 minutes.

Oh well. At least we both learned something.

Labels: communication, futility

In general, I believe that after 60 minutes on the phone with someone, I should be able to say certain basic things with certainty. A recent caller provided a good example of a case where I couldn't, and this frightens me a little.

This customer was having a bit of trouble with her router, and after an hour, I couldn't get it going properly. It partially worked, but not quite like it should have. I had to get someone notified to replace her router.

The thing is, I'm still not 100% sure that she needs it replaced. She was actually using two routers in addition to her cable modem, and whenever I would ask her to try and change the configuration of the cords going from one box to another, she'd get a bit flustered. Initially she had trouble distinguishing between her modem and router, so I started referring to each one by its brand name, since they were all from different manufacturers.

Even so, she'd get flustered, even if I just asked her to move the network cable from port 1 on her router to port 2. After 30 minutes of trying to get the proper response from the problem router, I had to give up and order a new one on her behalf, but even so, after more than 30 minutes of work on it, I couldn't ascertain that she had the cables in correctly.

That's still not the worst experience of its type that I've had. Another time, I spent about 20 minutes trying to explain to a woman how the phone cord goes from her phone jack to her dialup modem. To this day I don't understand how she could fail to understand that. It's one cord with identical ends, and it pretty much just goes in where it fits. After 20 minutes I had to give up and suggest she get someone over to help her.

I don't generally expect much from the people I talk to in terms of computer skills, but I would hope that they can negotiate the cords that plug their computer into other things.

Labels: futility

Earlier today, I received a call from a customer who wanted to suspend her account while she gets her computer fixed. OK, no problem, I'll put you through to the right folks. Half an hour later, she called back. She wanted to troubleshoot a connection problem.

Well, here's the thing, ma'am, you can't connect to the internet now because you've just put your account on hold. "Oh... I put it on hold because I can't connect. Can we troubleshoot that?" Well, right now you'll be getting an error with the username and password because your account isn't active. If the problem is anything else, we won't really be able to look at it yet. "Oh... well can you go through all of the options in 'advanced' and we can see if they're right?" The particular section that she was looking at has more than 60 options. I'm not about about to go through all of those with someone unless it's actually necessary. I suggested she just hit the restore defaults button, as that won't hurt anything and will set all options to their Windows defaults. She said she'd already done that.

"Well then, I'm not sure what we can really do with this. If you were having a connection problem, you'd need to be able to connect for us to try to fix it, and if your account has been suspended, you won't be able to connect."

"Oh, that's ok, I'm pretty much on my way to take the computer to a technician anyway."

What?! ARGH.

Labels: futility

I used to believe that common sense was something that was ingrained into each and every one of us. Boy was I ever wrong. Every day brings a new counterexample.

A customer called in because his high speed wasn't connecting. Sounds like a typical description of a problem we'd get. There is, however, one catch. We don't offer a high speed service. After explaining to the customer that he no longer has service with us and that he should contact his high speed provider, I sent him on his way.

I can understand that when someone has just recently switched services, if any difficulties arise, they will just call the phone number on a post-it note nearby that says "Technical Support". Simple mistake. Now what makes this customer "special" is that he stopped using our service a year and a half ago to switch to high speed.

He called back the next day because his e-mail wasn't working...

Labels: futility, waste

When you have an account with OurCompany, it's assumed that you and your household are going to be the only ones using it. That's not always the case, and we don't really worry about it too much, but we do ensure that your account can only be logged in from one computer at a time; ergo if you're trying to log in while your sister/friend/boss is already logged in as you, you're not going to be able to.

I just talked to a customer whose last few calls have all been about the fact that she can't log in, and each time the reason is that someone else is already logged in with her account information. In fact, looking at the logs, I'm surprised she hasn't called in the last two weeks, because there are numerous connections being made from two distinct phone numbers, split roughly 50-50. The numbers are in two different cities, too. Obviously, someone has her username and password. The most likely reason for this, based on my experience, is that she's given it to them.

If she wants to log in, the best option is to change the password on the account. That way, it's only her and whoever she gives the password to who can access her account. However, she said she didn't want to do that. "I'm going to try logging in again and see what happens."

O... K... but if you try logging in again, while that other person is still logged in, you're going to get exactly the same result as before.

"That's ok. I'm going to try again anyway."

I wonder what that actually indicates: did she give out the info and expect that the other person could log in whenever he/she wanted to? Or does she actually think that things might change if she tries logging in again, despite the fact that the situation is still exactly the same?

The feeling I get is similar to all those times where someone calls in with a problem relating to their username and password, and when I check the logs, I see that they've tried connecting multiple times (sometimes more than 40 attempts are made) and each time the password line is blank. I mean... the error tells you exactly what the problem is! If you know your password (and many times, when I explain the problem, they do), why not just try typing it into the box that says "Password"? The futility of it all boggles the mind. Well, my mind, anyway.

UPDATE: For whatever it's worth, the lady I'd started this post about eventually changed her login information.

Labels: futility, login, sisyphus