Terms Of Endearment

(I work for an Internet tech support center. Due to security and billing, once an account has been registered, it can’t be changed.)

Me: “Thank you for calling [Tech Support]. What can I do to assist you today?”

Customer: “I need to change the email address I registered on the account.”

Me: “I’m sorry, sir, but I do not have the ability to do that for you. You can, however, set up a sub-account to use instead.”

Customer: “You don’t understand. I really need to change the email address.”

Me: “Well, sir, I can give you to another department who might be able to help, but in order to change that, it will essentially disconnect and reconnect your service. This may result in a charge due to your contract. I can show you how to set up a sub-account though.”

Customer: *sighs* “I really have to change my account. My wife is going to kill me.”

Me: “Can I have the email address so I may access your account?”

(There’s a long pause before the customer speaks again.)

Customer: “Ourpaininthea**@***.com. I was really frustrated when I was registering.”

(At this point, I nearly have to mute my phone to keep the customer from hearing my laughter.)

Customer: “My wife uses this to talk to all of her bridge club friends. She will kill me if she has to give this out.”

Me: “Well, sir, you can set up a sub-account just for your wife and she can have whatever email address she wants. You get ten of them for free, so you would never even have to use the main account if you don’t want to.”

Customer: “Really? Can you show me? You may have just saved my marriage.”

Me: *still trying not to laugh* “No problem, sir…”