Locked Out Of Common Sense

I work for a small IT service provider. A customer sends an email that he can’t log in to a software he needs to work. Apparently, he mistyped his password one too many times and the system has now locked him out. To remedy this, I need to send a code to his phone which he then needs to enter to unlock his account. Normally, that is easy, so I call him.

Me: “This is [My Name] from [My Company]. I’m calling about your login problems. If you can spare a few moments, we can—”

Customer: “You’re disturbing me! I’m in a meeting!”

Me: “I’m very sorry. If you tell me when you will be free again, I’ll call you back.”

Customer: “No, don’t! I’ll be in meetings all day! I’ll call you back!”

Me: “Any time. I’ll be available all day.”

The day passes and nothing happens until the late afternoon when the customer calls.

Customer: “I haven’t been able to work all day because I couldn’t log in to [Software]! Why didn’t you call back?! What are we even paying you for if you can’t even do as you’re told?!”

Me: “I’m sorry, but you explicitly told me not to call you and that you’d call us instead. Besides, like I told you, I was available all day; you could have called anytime.”

Customer: “Well… you should have called back anyway!”

Me: “You said you’d be in meetings all day. I did not want to disturb you again.”

Customer: “Just unlock that thing!”

I did. He was able to log back in within less than five minutes — still plenty of time to complain about how he’d have to work late that day to catch up. Ah, well.