Tech Support | Stillwater, OK, USA
Me: “Thank you for calling *** Direct Sales. How may I help you?”
Caller: “I need a power cord for my product.”
Me: “I would be happy to place your order. I just need you to read me the three numbers from the front of the product.”
Caller: “Talk to my wife, I can’t read…”
(In the background, I overhear the following…)
Caller: “Get on the phone!”
Caller’s wife: “You are Satan! When spiritual warfare happens, I will have more angels on my side because you are evil and no one loves you!”
(The wife then comes on the phone and very calmly gives me the number, her address, credit card info and then hangs up.)
Related:
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On-Site IT Service | Salt Lake City, UT, USA
(I get a service call to go out to a customer’s house to service a malfunctioning laptop. I was talking to my boss and he gave me the run down of the call.)
Me: “Alright, so what exactly does the customer want?”
Supervisor: “She says her laptop isn’t turning on, and there might be something wrong with her LCD screen.”
Me: “Ok, sounds like a hardware problem. Did she tell you why all this is going on?”
Supervisor: “Well…she was completely honest with me.”
Me: “?”
Supervisor: “She got angry and threw it against a concrete wall in a fit of rage.”
Me: “…I’ll take care of it.”
Tech Support | Ottawa, ON, Canada
(I was walking a customer through setting up a fairly complex product.)
Customer: “Next or back?”
Me: “Next.”
Customer: “Okay, now next or back?”
Me: “We do not need to change any of the default settings, so we will be hitting next on the next 7 or 8 screens in a row. Let me know when another option other then next or back appears.”
Customer: *obviously not getting it* “Okay, now do I hit next or back?”
Me: “Hit next, and also hit next on the following 5 or 6 pages until there is no more next button.”
Customer: “Okay, I clicked next. Now do I hit next or back?”
(At this point I am going insane and decide to have a little fun.)
Me: “Click back.”
Customer: “Okay, now next or back?”
Me: “Click next.”
Customer: “Okay, next or back?”
Me: “Click back.”
Customer: “Okay, next or back?”
Me: “Click next.”
Customer: “Okay, next or back?”
Me: “Click back.”
(This goes on for a few minutes until the customer realises what’s going on. Or so I thought…)
Customer: “I think it’s broken, it keeps looping through the same pages!”
Tech Support | United Kingdom
(I’m meeting a client’s boss face to face, after only contact via email thus far.)
Client’s Boss: “So you are the guy sending technical emails to one of my teams!”
Me: “Sorry, I don’t follow.”
Client’s Boss: “You sent a bunch of emails filled with technical jargon when all they wanted was some help with their system.”
Me: “It wasn’t technical, it was just a step by step guide on how to zip a file and send it via email. I checked it with my colleagues to make sure it was easy to understand.”
Client’s Boss: “But the team wanted to save space on their server, not do programming. You have to understand that many of them are older and don’t understand how to use computers!”
(So they don’t know how to use computers, and yet they use them everyday…scary.)
Tech Support | Idaho, USA
(I get a call for troubleshooting from a lady who says her remote doesn’t work.)
Me: “Ok ma’am, could you try changing the channel for me? Tell me if a light flashes on the remote.”
Lady: “Ok.”
(There are a few loud beeps from her phone in my ear and she comes back on the line.)
Lady: “Nope, no flashing.”
Me: “Ma’am you’re trying to change the channel with your phone, not the remote control.”
Lady: “I can’t find the clicker, and I know my neighbor changes channels with her phone.”
Me: “Ma’am, that’s just not possible.”
Lady: “Don’t accuse me of lying! I saw her do it with my own eyes.”
Me: “…”
(I try for 10 minutes to explain to her why she can’t use her phone, and even make a futile attempt to troubleshoot her phone.)
Me: “Ok, well it looks like your satellite receiver isn’t compatible with your phone.”
Lady: “Yes it is. My neighbor and I have the same phone and same receiver. NOW HELP ME, DUMBA**!”
Me: “Ma’am, do you have a cordless phone?”
Lady: “Yes!”
Me: “Ok ma’am, let’s try reprogramming your phone. What I need you to do is press and hold the ‘off’ button for five seconds. This will clear the old code, so we can put the new one in.”
Lady: “Ok—” *click*
(I hear my supervisor a few rows away from me bust out laughing.)
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Tech Support | Minneapolis, MN, USA
(Telephone technical support for a printer manufacturer.)
Customer: “First of all, I’m a Mac tech, so I know what the hell I’m doing; let’s get that straight right away!”
Me: “Ok.”
(It turned out he needed to reinstall some fonts, so we got the installer started.)
Customer: “It says, ‘Insert Disk One.’ What should I do?”
Me: “Um, insert disk one…”
Tech Support | Howell, MI, USA
(I received a trouble ticket for an HP 930c Printer at our Ohio warehouse.)
Me: “Hello, I hear you are having a problem with your printer.”
Customer: “Yes, I changed the cartridge and it says that it’s still out of ink.”
Me: “Ok, did you remove the blue tape before inserting the new print cartridge?”
Customer: “Yep! Sure did!”
(After literally two hours of model number and cartridge number verification and even installing new firmware on the printer among many other things…)
Me: “Ok ma’am, can you take the ink cartridge out for me?”
Customer: “Ok, it’s out.”
Me: “Is there blue tape over the copper on the bottom of the cartridge?”
Customer: “Yep.”
Me: “Could you remove it and re-install the cartridge?”
Customer: “Oh hey! It works!”
(I’ve never wished more that I could slap people via telephony.)
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Problem Exists Between Chair And Keyboard
tech support | Ontario, Canada
(I worked for a large Internet service provider; customers are set up with an email address of their choice, over the phone. Someone obviously misheard her.)
Me: “Thank you for calling high speed internet technical support. How can I help you?”
Customer: “I can’t get my email.”
Me: “I should be able to help with that … let me pull up your information and I will see what I can do for you.”
Customer: “My email address is SweetyPetty@***.***.”
(I pull up the customer’s info.)
Me: “I see here that your email address is … SweatyTitties@***.***.”
Customer: “WHAT! That’s not my email address! I demand it be changed now!”
Me: *having entirely too much fun with policy* “Oh I can do that for you, ma’am, but if I do the email address SweatyTitties will be unavailable for 30 days. Are you sure you don’t want SweatyTitties?”
Customer: “No, I don’t want SweatyTitties!”
Me: “Okay, so I will delete SweatyTitties off your account and replace it with SweetyPetty.”
(At this point, the other tech support people around me are laughing.)
Customer: “YES, YES please get rid of SweatyTitties!”
Tech Support | Ontario, Canada
Me: “Thank you for calling technical support. My name is ***, how can I help you?
Customer: *distinct southern accent* “Where am I calling?”
Me: “*** technical support. Are you having trouble with your internet, sir?”
Customer: “I know that. I mean, what part of the world?”
Me: “I’m in Canada, sir. Is there something I can help you with?”
Customer: “Canada?! You have internet up in Canada?”
Me, sarcastically: “Nope…just got radio, in fact I had to drive my dog sled into work. There was a horrible accident and I lost two dogs. It’s been a rough day.”
Customer: “Oh…well, I want technical support from a country who actually has it.” *click*
Supervisor monitoring calls: “You can’t be serious.”
Tech Support | London, ON, Canada
(I was working in warranties for a large computer manufacturer, mostly with businesses but a few individuals came through on the line here and there.)
Me: “Thank you for calling ***. How can I help you?”
Customer: “My computer don’t work.”
Me: “I’m sorry to hear that, ma’am. Can I get the serial number off of your CPU?”
Customer: “My what?”
Me: “The computer tower.”
Customer: “Huh?”
(I’ll spare you the agony but, I went on for about 3 more minutes trying to describe the CPU and getting nowhere.)
Me: “I’m sorry, I don’t seem to be expressing myself well today. Can you describe to me all the computer parts on your desk? I’ll tell you which one the number I need is on.”
Customer: “It’s just a keyboard and a screen, like any other computer.”
Me: “Oh, you have a laptop!”
Customer: “A what?”
Me: “A little computer you can take with you. The keyboard and screen fold together with a hinge in the middle, right?”
Customer: “No, I don’t! I don’t know what is wrong with you computer people today. First the sales guy tries to sell me a bunch of sh*t I don’t need in this big box package and now you don’t even know what a computer is! Brand new today and it don’t even work.”
Me: “So…you just bought a keyboard and a monitor?”
Customer: “What’d I need all the rest uh’ that sh*t in the box for? This was way cheaper! I ain’t stupid!”
Me: “…”
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