Customer: “Excuse me!”

Me: “Yes, ma’am?”

Customer: “I want to return this laptop I bought from you yesterday.”

Me: “Oh, really? Why? Is there a problem with it?”

Customer: “Yes there is! It has witchcraft in it!”

Me: “Witchcraft?”

Customer: “Yes! When I tried to install a program on it, it said it was starting a wizard. Wizards and witchcraft are evil! I don’t know why you would sell such things at a store like this!”

Me: “Ma’am, a ‘wizard’ on a computer is just the name of the program that helps the install process. It makes it quick so that it is like magic, hence the name ‘wizard’.”

Customer: “I don’t care about your make-believe hullabaloo religion! It goes against my beliefs to have anything to do with that type of thing! Now give me my refund so I can be out of this evil place!”

Me: “Sure, ma’am, this way.”

(I am the first person to arrive at work in the morning, and I answer a call as soon as I walk into the door.)

Caller: “Finally! I have been calling since 5 am! You people should be ashamed. I have an emergency!”

Me: “I’m sorry. No one gets here until 10 am most days. How can I help you?”

Caller: “I have a serious problem! My daughter has planned to have a date sometime today at your theater, and I told her she was not allowed to go! I need you to cancel her ticket!”

(I see no pre-sales for the day at all.)

Me: “No one has bought a ticket so far for today, so I can’t really help. Maybe you should just make her stay home?”

Caller: “Well, I can’t do that. She lives in her own place and I can’t get over there in time to stop her.”

Me: “Just how old is your daughter anyway?”

Caller: “She’s 28.”

Me: “Ma’am, she’s an adult and I cannot refuse her a ticket because you do not approve of her date.”

Caller: “You don’t understand! He’s a Democrat!”

This story is part of the Overprotective Parents roundup!

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Me: “Thank you for calling [Company]. How may I assist you?”

Caller: “Well, first of all, you can get a real-life person on the line.”

Me: “I’m sorry? Sir, I can assure you, I am an actual person.”

Caller: “No, no, no! Don’t play that crap with me. I know how advanced you machines are getting these days. You–”

Me: “Sir, I promise you, I am not a machine.”

Caller: “See! You couldn’t even tell the right place to start talking! That, and that pause before you responded is all I needed to hear to know for sure. Yeah, that’s right! I know how to read you things. What do you have to say to that, you worthless box of microchips?”

Me: *long pause* “Beep?”

This story is part of the Man-Vs-Machine-themed roundup!

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(I have a caller named Victor Krumm in the computer system. I’m a Harry Potter fan.)

Me: “Okay, sir, so you’re Victor Krumm?”

Caller: “Yep, that’s me.”

Me: “Sorry, this might sound funny, but did you know that there’s a book series called Harry Potter with a character with that name?”

(There’s a pause, as if he’s thinking, and suddenly he yells.)

Caller: “THE MUGGLES KNOW!”

(He hangs up. His wife calls a little while later to actually schedule.)

(I work at a call center in Canada dealing with American cell customers. This is a call from a customer in Seattle.)

Me: “Hello, thanks for calling [Company]. How may I help you?”

Caller: “Does your company outsource to India?”

Me: “I don’t know for sure, but I know it does hire companies out of the USA.”

Caller: “I’d like to cancel my service, then.”

Me: “I can do that for you. May I ask why you’d like to cancel?”

Caller: “I don’t support companies that don’t support America. If they’re hiring out of America, then I don’t want to support them.”

Me: “All right, I’ll process that cancellation for you.”

Caller: “Am I calling to India?!”

Me: “No. I’m actually in Canada.”

Caller: “Oh, I love Canada! I do all my shopping there. Everything is so much cheaper!”

This story is part of the Customers-Who-Can’t-Hear-Themselves roundup!

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