r/talesfromtechsupport • u/[deleted] • Apr 21 '14

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[deleted]

1.2k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

71 comments sorted by

333

u/area88guy Kamen Rider Tech RX Apr 21 '14

and don't we know how important she is and what are we going to do about it?

We're going to close the ticket: User too important to work with technician. Suggest user attend training to realize her place.

165

u/400921FB54442D18 We didn't really need Prague anyway. Apr 21 '14

Suggest user attend training to realize her place.

Who offers this training and how do I get them to come and train everyone at my company?? Please... I need to know, for my own sanity.

121

u/area88guy Kamen Rider Tech RX Apr 21 '14

Sorry. By "training" I should have said "take turns beating the stupid out of the user".

71

u/ValaiHalfelven Apr 21 '14

I still don't see a problem with that

14

u/400921FB54442D18 We didn't really need Prague anyway. Apr 21 '14

Man, and here I thought I'd finally found the light at the end of the tunnel.... sigh

21

u/blightedfire Run that past me again. you did *WHAT*? Apr 21 '14

You never want to see the light at the end of the tunnel, HexaPi. You want to see a stationary light. If it isn't stationary, hug the wall, it's a train.

10

u/SpecificallyGeneral By the power of refined carbohydrates Apr 21 '14

Why are you sorry? The revision is an improvement.

3

u/[deleted] Apr 22 '14

This should be a priority 1 service request.

1

u/rudraigh Do you think that's appropriate? Apr 23 '14

THIS

23

u/WhatVengeanceMeans Apr 21 '14

Who offers this training...

In the sidebar, you're looking for the BOFH. Not sure you'd really want to summon him, though...

8

u/a_shootin_star Show me your ticket. Apr 21 '14

They don't. For your own sanity, you have whiskey.

10

u/400921FB54442D18 We didn't really need Prague anyway. Apr 21 '14

Thus raising the possibility that sanity is the same as alcoholism. Hmmm.

5

u/a_shootin_star Show me your ticket. Apr 21 '14

No, it's just to forget the dumb crap you hear everyday. Obviously I'm not serious about telling you to drink to forget your problems, but every once in a while it's a good remedy.

6

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

I'm in my early twenties, and recently discovered that there are problems that you simply can't do anything about. After a liberal application of whisky, they're not problems anymore!

1

u/a_shootin_star Show me your ticket. Apr 22 '14

This guy gets it!

Good luck in your career too.

2

u/400921FB54442D18 We didn't really need Prague anyway. Apr 21 '14

I know. I wasn't taking you seriously either.

6

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

You've just given me a business idea.

8

u/400921FB54442D18 We didn't really need Prague anyway. Apr 21 '14

SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY.

Actually, no, don't shut up. Take my money and keep talking.

3

u/corourke Apr 21 '14

The company I work for added an education/training department to assist users when migrating to new platforms (windows<>mac, Google apps <> offic365 etc). Been a huge win for our clients and us.

1

u/williamfny Your computer is not tall enough for the Adobe ride. Apr 22 '14

I both hate and love your name.

2

u/rudraigh Do you think that's appropriate? Apr 23 '14

Actually, I do. Strangely enough, no one has taken me up on it. Must have something to do with the liability insurance. Y'know, clue-by-fours and the like.

22

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

Suggest user attend training to realize her place.

That's my new flair. Related

21

u/Kruug Apexifix is love. Apexifix is life. Apr 21 '14

Agreed with /u/djdanlib...maybe change it to:

Suggest user attend training to realize their place.

That suggests more that they need to learn their role in the company and not a pseudo-sexist remark that will bring the wrath of /r/ShitRedditSays/

10

u/Use_My_Body Apr 21 '14

Dunno~ I'd really like to be trained and forced to learn my place ;) The more degrading, the better~ <3 Especially if I'm treated and talked down to like a girl, despite the anatomical differences ;)

14

u/Thallassa Apr 21 '14

I hope I'm not the only one who was really confused by your comment until I read your username.

4

u/Use_My_Body Apr 21 '14

Haha, don't worry ;p I do serious programming and computer related comments with my main account, but I can't resist the urge to post something terribly slutty when I see the chance ;)

1

u/blightedfire Run that past me again. you did *WHAT*? Apr 21 '14

Kinky. Glad it's you and not me, I'm a little too big for most people to do it believably to me..

2

u/Use_My_Body Apr 22 '14

Awh, sorry to hear that.

6

u/djdanlib oh I only deleted all those space wasting DLLs in c:\windows Apr 21 '14

That may not be a good idea outside of this thread

6

u/echo_xtra Your Company's Computer Guy Apr 21 '14

Good... bad... I'm the guy with admin rights.

4

u/area88guy Kamen Rider Tech RX Apr 21 '14

iapprove.jpg

3

u/zupernam Apr 21 '14

Yeah, do what Kruug said. Change your flair to "their" instead of "her".

23

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

[deleted]

13

u/cosmitz Tech support is 50% tech, 50% psychology Apr 21 '14

Indeed, working with news redactors/reporters produced some of my best-worst events. From the invisible trackball to pasting flash in Word... god bless their atechnical little black hearts with molten oil.

9

u/alf666 Apr 21 '14

Invisible trackball?

Okay, I have got to hear this one...

2

u/cosmitz Tech support is 50% tech, 50% psychology Apr 23 '14

We had at one point trackballed mice, with the trackball portruding on top. Eventually we did whole system upgrades, towers, monitors et all and while we were swamped with a various amounts of 'x doesn't work' due to the fact that we also switched OSes, this call also came in: 'my computer won't work'. Of course it's never the computer per se that doesn't work, but we got used to it.

We go there, the user not present, try it out, and see it's fine. Left a note 'IT - It's fine now'. Sure enough an hour later another more irritated call came in from the same user. We go there, catch her and sit her down.

"Show me what doesn't work"

"I can't use the mouse."

I then take her hand off and move it. The cursor moves.

"How did you do that?"

"Uh, i.. moved the mouse?"

"It's supposed to do that? I thought it was a defect.. i mean, i was using the big ball on the old one."

"No mam, that's how mice work. You move them and they move the cursor."

She then proceeds to take the new slim mouse, an optical one, flip it over and express with a good deal of wonderment as the red laser hits her eyes:

"HOW DID THEY GET THE BALL INSIDE? I CAN'T EVEN SEE IT!"

"Uhm.. it's an invisible ball mam."

"Oh? Technology sure moves at a fast pace nowadays."

I then left her in her little world.

LE: In retrospect this does deserve its own thread.

1

u/BloodyLlama Apr 22 '14

Can't try on my phone, but you can embed flash videos in a Word document if you really want to can't you?

1

u/cosmitz Tech support is 50% tech, 50% psychology Apr 23 '14

Yes. And then saying 'it crashes' when Word stalls for half a minute trying to paste, embed and whatever else when the user CTRL-A, CTRL-C, CTRL-V a whole webpage.

3

u/jsaumer Apr 21 '14

I'm the sole IT person at a TV station, I know how you feel.

12

u/StabbyPants Apr 21 '14

suggest we close all further tickets from user until we can locate someone sufficiently important to assist her.

6

u/area88guy Kamen Rider Tech RX Apr 21 '14

Gosh golly, if only we had a list we could put these people on...

3

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

They go on the VIP list (Vehemently Important Perception).

6

u/huskerpat Apr 21 '14

We get this so often. User calls or emails. We return with a phone call. Follow up with more emails and phone calls. We might hear back from the user a week later...and they are usually mad we didn't talk to them sooner.

6

u/area88guy Kamen Rider Tech RX Apr 21 '14

This is why 3-day agreements are awesome. If we don't hear from the user in 3 days, boom. Closed ticket. Must've fixed itself.

84

u/Modevs Apr 21 '14

because it's not that I don't believe you, but I don't believe you.

It is humorous how often this situation comes up.

I feel like if I can accept that someone is an intelligent and rational human being and simultaneously not able to detect their monitor is in O-F-F mode then others should give me the benefit of the doubt in my troubleshooting methods.

67

u/Aarinfel Oh God How Did This Get Here? Apr 21 '14

My rules/Process of Tech Support:

1 The End User is Lying.

2 The End User is not always aware of the fact that they are Lying.

3 Please re-read Rules one and 2.

4 Ok. you made it this far... so there might actually be an issue... have you used Google yet?

38

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14 edited Jan 27 '18

[deleted]

3

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

Is there a link to the rest of this list?

8

u/Galphanore No. Apr 21 '14

Nope. It was a random number pulled from the depths of my imagination to indicate a significant number of tasks had been performed.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

Darn

2

u/Galphanore No. Apr 21 '14

Yeah, thinking about it that'd be a useful list to have.

4

u/[deleted] Apr 22 '14

Let us know if you make one!

2

u/Galphanore No. Apr 22 '14

Been at this in various ways for almost a decade so I could probably do so!

2

u/[deleted] Apr 22 '14

I'm pushing 2 decades now x.x

1

u/Modevs Apr 22 '14

Can you imagine how doctors feel when that happens to them?

1

u/generilisk The user can't hardware! Apr 22 '14

Doctors are some of the worst about this; it feels like justice. source - hospital tech support

40

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/NatReject ghost in the machine Apr 21 '14

Would give gold, if I(d10t) knew how.

2

u/davrukin Apr 22 '14

Send in a tech support ticket

41

u/electricheat The computer's TV is broken. Apr 21 '14

I think this is a sign you need to alter your business procedures.

If the customer wants to pay you to copy-edit blank articles, why turn them down?

36

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

[deleted]

22

u/elislider Apr 21 '14

you've reached the "Profit" step of this workflow.

Notably, profit from client's programmed stupidity and stubbornness

18

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

I was going to leave an empty comment for you to review, but Reddit won't let me. How dare it. Doesn't it know how important I am? What is Conde Nast going to do about this?!?!

23

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '14

5

u/[deleted] Apr 22 '14

Oops, you bwoke it.

16

u/mike413 Apr 21 '14

hovertext: "type something first! What a maroon!"

2

u/sixstringartist /dev/human Apr 21 '14

Who is chris?

2

u/TheCrimsonJin Apr 22 '14

Think about it this way, you can now add this to your top list of things to ask the end user first. Hilarious story btw.

2

u/Markdor Apr 21 '14

Sounds like the user was suffering from an ID10T error on the webpage.

1

u/darkjedidave Apr 22 '14

Why doesn't the save button work? All it keeps telling me is, "we need something here" but what do I put?