When An Operating System Is An Operation

I have an old couple come in with a broken computer. It turns out to be a bad hard drive, so the hard drive is replaced and installed.

Me: “Would you like us to install your operating system on the new drive?”

Customer: “No, we will do that ourselves; we’ve done it many times.”

We almost believe them for a second, until they ask our tech whether that is easy to do, in a pleading sort of “please let it be easy” way. I document their refusal very well.

I am working the counter again the day they come back: the OS is on there, but they can’t get Internet access, and their primary drive is I:\ instead of C:\ (bizarre).

Customer: “Our neighbor who is good with computers spent two hours trying to fix it! It’s not working!”

Read: who the f*** knows what has been done to this computer, at this point? Fine, no problem, we’ll take it back, wipe the drive, and redo the OS install for them. That’ll be a set price, just like we offered earlier.

Customer: “No. You’re going to do it for free.”

Our entire team has just been yelled at by our department head that under no circumstances are we to give away free labor, so there is no way that is going to happen. I’d lose my job.

There is no higher supervisor for me to foist this couple on because they are all in their weekly meeting. I spend an entire hour with the couple attempting to explain that we cannot warranty work that we did not do, nor work that the couple has expressly forbidden us from doing.

This old couple ends up trying to do good cop, bad cop. The wife keeps repeating:

Wife: “We just want to be happy. Why won’t you make us happy?”

I have to honestly reply:

Me: “I don’t think I can make you happy.”

This sixty-plus-year-old husband had a vein in his forehead that was doing the tango. He was red, and he was gripping the counter he was holding on to so tightly that I kept offering to find him a chair because I was very worried he was going to have a cardiac event.

They finally chose the hardware diagnostic option — literally the worst choice possible. I ended up writing over a page of notes to document the encounter in an attempt to cover my a**, and I talked to my manager as soon as she was out of the meeting.

Naturally, after having a conversation over the phone with that couple, my manager not only offered them free a free OS installation but also gave them a free copy and installation of security software, as well.

Note that I was exceedingly polite throughout the whole process with this couple.

I was forced, by policy, to endure an hour of being yelled at by customers — and pissing off other customers as well, I’m sure — in order to keep my job, only to have it instantly reversed by my manager, with extra free goodies.

Adding insult to injury, after all of this stuff we did for them, the couple still gave us a 0% survey, prompting our store manager to go headhunting for “the customer service representative who did this.” It was a great week in retail.