Funny and Humorous Technical Support Tales and Stories

i work in the hardware upgrade area of a best buy. the other day was another where i wanted to tell the customer what an idiot he was...

he calls up a few hours prior to my shift starting and tells the technician on duty that his brand new hp had a bad modem. the technician asked him to do some minor troubleshooting and then told him to bring it in.

after my shift started the man came in and gave me his computer, receipt and story. i turned it on and tested my local dial-up via hyperterminal. after a few busy signals i connected just fine. i then checked the customer's receipt and determined he was now an msn user. fearing that he would come back a second time because his internet account doesn't work but his modem does, i volunteer to set up his msn acct. a few minutes and that is done as well.

i showed him everything was fine and sent him home.

a few hours later he calls up and reminds me of who he is. guess what...his modem wasn't working again. i asked him to change the cable he was using and he said that it couldn't be the cable because it works when plugged into his other computer from the wall. i asked him to verify that is was plugged into the modem. he said "yeah, the plug says 'ethernet'."

One of my co-workers while taking a tech support call for an isp asked the customer to close all his windows and let her know when he was done. She could hear what sounded like someone running up and down stairs and some bangs and she kept saying "hello?" "hello", hearing no response.

After a couple of minutes he came back on the phone and was very out of breath.

"ok, I closed all my windows, but just give me a moment to catch my breath. I have alot of windows in my house!".

My fellow tech had to put the guy on hold to laugh and she knew she was in for a long call.

I've been doing tech support for about four months now and I think for the quick training I was subjected to, I'm pretty good at what I do. Even before the training, I had at least a remote idea about the web and computers. One night another tech transfer's a call to me because they claimed the customer was an idiot and couldn't be helped. I took the call thinking how bad can he be.

Me: Hello, how can I help you?

Idiot: Yeah, I can't get on the net.

Me: Okay sir, what's happening?

Idiot: This box keeps popping up about windows.

Me: What OS do you have?

Idiot: OS what?

Me: What version of windows do you have?

Idiot: Windows, well I don't know. I had windows 95 but I don't know what happend.

Me: Do you still have the windows disc sir?

Idiot: You mean the "sloppy disk".

Me: The what!

Idiot: The sloppy disk that you put in the computer!

Me: You mean floppy disk? No sir you would need the windows disc that goes into the D drive.

Idiot: Well I don't have one!

Me: So what your saying is, you don't have an OS?

Idiot: No, all I want to do is get on the net!

Me: Okay sir this is what you do. Find someone who knows anything about computers and have them install windows. Then install our software. If your still having difficulty then call us back.

Idiot: Bla, bla, bla, bla!

Needless to say the gentleman called back the next day giving the same headache to two more tech's.

Well, this is more about my own personal cluelessness than of any other person. I really should have known better...

I'm a rather geeky individual, so I run Zonealarm2 firewall on my Internet-connected machines (a real neat program, by the way). Anyway, yesterday I noticed some odd activity in my firewall logs. About ten requests from different IPs were trying to connect to port 7800 on my main machine, which is odd, as I didn't remember setting up any servers on that port (I'm also a server nut, too ):-)

Naturally, being familiar with programs like NetBus and Back Oriface, I assumed that I was being port-scanned for those different daemons' presence (for those of you that don't know, port #s below 1024 are reserved for FTP, web and other "high-security-clearance" servers. User programs live at 1025 and above). Called up my ISP, waited 15 minutes to ask a tech if they knew about any exploits that run on port 7800. They say no. I hang up.

Tonight, same thing starts happening, only less regularly. As an experiment, I go through my firewall control, unchecking all the "this program may act as a server" permissions, to see if the port closes (I forgot to mention that, tonight, I actually was able to connect to port 7800 on my machine. I wasn't able to the other day). So I'm freaking out, running virus scans, etc, right? I close a few network programs and shut down my OpenNap server, in preperation for restart.

Guess what? The port 7800 closes! Imagine that...

Stupid me set the darn server to RUN on port 7800 and then forgot! ::inserts head through new hole in moniter::

Ah well, just another lesson that users aren't the only clueless ones :-)

-- Aatheus, Geeky Centaur

I do tech support for a company that provides a course over the internet. In order to take the course you must register and sign in and all that good stuff.

I get a call last week and it goes something like this:

Student: Hi, I am trying to log in but I don't know what to put in for my password.

Me: Okay sir, can I get your name?

Student: Sure...it's ___________.

I TRY to pull up his account.....I can't find his account

Me: Sir, are you sure you registered for our course on our site?

Student: Well, I am trying to register now"

Me: Okay sir, can you tell me what your screen says.

Student: It's asking me to enter my name and then there is a place for password and confirm password, but like I said, I don't know what my password is and what the confirm password is.

Me: (TRYING TO BE PATIENT WITH THE STUDENT) Okay, what it is asking you to do is chose a user name and then select a password...type the password in the first box that asks for the password...in the box that says "confirm password" you are going to enter the same thing. This will be your password, that you chose so you can log into our site.

Student: So I can put anything?

Me: YES!!!

He finally got it...I guess, cause he hasn't called back...hehe...this is just ONE of the MANY ID 10 T errors I get, ID 10 T errors are great...cause the customer tends to think it is a serious issue...when all it really means is IDIOT.

Though I have worked as an supporter for quite some time, the stories I'll relate happened to me and were not due to some unknowing customer/user.

Just a few examples how even a (later) supporter can be dumb as stone ;)

1. Back in the 80's the most common home computer was the C64 from Commodore. I was the proud 10-year old owner of one and also of a 1541 floppy drive (5 1/4). The disks that you could purchase then were NEVER pre-formatted.

I typed a very long program in the C64 and entered the save-command. But every time I tried to load it, the disk could not be accessed. I was starting to go berserk when my brother show up and asked: "Did you FORMAT the disk prior to use ?" My only answer: "What is 'format'? What are you talking about?" :)

2. My first approach to hardware support: A friend of mine had moved into her own appartment and had taken her PC (an old 286 sx) with her, which had been set up by her former boy-friend. When I fumbled the DOS on the machine I thought: "No prob. Just boot with a disk and reinstall." But the bios was switched to boot first from hard disk. So I tried to enter the bios and alter the bootup sequence. The bios was password-locked and my friends former boy-friend wasn't all to eager to relate it to us (he was kind of an a**h*le). So she said to me: "I trust you. Do what you can and fix it." Needless to say, that I had NEVER seen the interiors of a PC before. So I removed the cover, took a look inside, gulped, and closed the PC again. After meditating on the matter I went out and organized a spare motherboard for the "worst case scenario".

Again I opened the PC, and removed EVERY SINGLE part from it. There I sat with everything strewn about (motherboard, memory, hard disk, floppy drive etc.) and didn't know what to do. In the end I put it all back together and started the PC. Surprise! I could access the bios and configured it porpably. But after rebooting the bios was clean again. My friend appeared and asked me: "What are these batteries for ?" Guess what? In the old 286 the bios power nearly always was not an onboard battery but in some kind of plastic block with normal R6 batteries. And I forgot to put THESE back in the PC... ;)

3. The unwilling keyboard

My second PC I "built" myself from single components (as almost every computer I owned). I screwed the mainboard into the casing, connected every connector I could find, tested them out, put in the cpu, memory, all the cards, drives - you know that procedure.

After starting the computer, the keyboard didn't react. No matter what I tried it would not produce even a single character on the screen. As everything else seemed allright I connected the keyboard to another PC and it worked fine. I tried a second keyboard on my new PC - nothing. Rats. So I removed again the cover and checked the mainboard - you know, looking for some kind of visible damage on the keyboard controller or connector. Nah. All seemed fine. My last guess was the controller card (back there the controllers weren't onboard). I walked out and bought a new controller card, screwed it into my PC - still not working.

That was the point, where I gave up.

That moment my friend from story #2 went in and grinned. My PC had a 'lock' in the casing by which the keyboard could be locked. So she asked: "When you tested the connectors of the mainboard...Did you lock the keyboard ? And if so - did you UNLOCK it again?"

Must I say that the bios was set up to halt on every error without reporting it - not even a "keyboard locked error"...?

So for all "techies" out there who think they know everything: NO ONE was _born_ with computer knowledge. We all have worked up our way...:)

What is it when a system admin calls tech support then treats us like we don't know what the he!! we are talking about.

I had a Admin call and tell me that he couldn't get his NT 4.0 to print after he installed a lite driver for his Windows 2000 Machine. (can we say DUHH here) He had installed a second printer pointed it to the same port and did not bother to uninstall the other driver. He corrupted the whole install. After he explained the setup he had ????? i had to wonder whether or not cracker jacks is now giving out IT admin licensing. He had the printer going to a print server connected to his network the driver installed to his network server and shared out from there to the clients. talk about useless. anyways after finally getting him to delete the driver and reinstall, miracle it worked on all stations.

Why can't i have a job like that?

I recently switched over to MSN as an ISP. I started to have problems receiving mail. When I called the helpdesk the first Techie had me do some delete and adds. After that did not work I called again,different techie different group of suggestions. Same result third call,different techie again, different suggestions. After an hour and a half of this I said enough for this night. Get in to work next morning call.and I am told it's not anything to do with your computer that the power outages in California is affecting their servers. A day later it started working. Two weeks go by same problem happens. Another call and am told we are having server problems. Three days pass,I call again another Techie, who says they see no server problems but some users may need to use @hotmail.msn.com instead of just @msn.com. Is there a vast right-wing techie conspiracy to jerk me around?

I was sent from Chicago to Tuscon AZ. to attach a PC (actually a glorified calculator - this was in 1983) to a blood testing machine at a Red Cross Blood Donation center. I carefully explained the process and especially pointed out that one button on the machine MUST BE OFF. This installation took about 3 days and I made sure everything worked before I left and went to the airport and turned in my rental car. When I get to the ticket counter, the agent looks at my name and says there is an URGENT message and I must call the blood bank right away. The head of the bank says the system is not working and I MUST come right away. I asked a few questions first especially about the BUTTON, but she insisted it did not work and I must come NOW. So I change my flight (for next day, there were no other ones for that day), rent another car, go to the blood bank, PUSH the BUTTON, leave and get another hotel room for the night. Back home the next day.

My tale, like the title says is rather short, but it was enough to make me groun inwardly.

Imagine this conversation if you would:

Me: "Ok, now I'd like you to press the right arrow key on your keyboard."

Him : "Woah, hold on, you went way over my head just now."

...

I do video technical support for Sony Electronics. I got a call from a lady who was having a problem with her TV. I asked her for the model number and she gave me a model that would not come up in the computer. I told her all our TV model numbers start with a K. She insisted that she gave me the right model number but I couldn't find it. I told her to read it directly from the back of the TV and she said she was. I then told her to look at the name on the front of the TV and she said it said Sony. (She was getting very impatient with me at this point). I then asked her to spell it and she shouted "SANYO!". I then gave her the phone number to Sanyo. This actually happened to me twice with 2 different customers.

My husband and I recently purchased our first computer. One night we stayed up late to figure out how to "get online" with the rest of the world. We are not supid people, both college graduates... RN and a CPA behind our names.

Anyway there we were sitting on the floor getting through all the technical instructions of the internet installation Finally we clicked "sign on". We were delighted when we heard our phone ringing (despite it was midnight). We thought since the computer stated that it was "dialing", that it actually connected and was now ringing. We let it ring a few times then suddenly the computer started to talk to us, "Hi, Mrs. Sullivan". We were shocked to hear the computer addressing me by name. A moment later it said "This is Laura, I am returning your call about babysitting tomorrow". We were startled to hear our babysitter's voice coming from the computer. We had no idea that a phone call not only could interfere with the internet, but also speak indirectly through the computer. Needless to say our teenage babysitter was far more versed on the use of the internet than my husband and I were at that time. She certainly got a good laugh at us, and won't let us forget it!

I was doing the usual, answering calls at the second largest internet company in the world, and I finally got one of the most amusing calls i have ever receieved it went like this:

t=tech c=caller

T=Thank you for tech support blah blah (the usual)

C= Yeah i keep getting random disconnects, usually it takes me two or three times to get the internet warmed up before i can get on !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I spent a little time at N*L on tech support (though far from tech it was)

One of the best calls that I had was from a lady (L):-

L- Hi I'm having problems logging on to your website.

M- And what is the problem mam.

L- Well I registered for you website last night and now I can't get back onto it because the password is not working.

M- OK what error are you recieving?

L- Well I can't even get the password to type in.

M- How do you mean?

L- Everytime I try to type I just get stars.

M- Yes !@@!?!

L- Well I need to type my password in but it won't let me!

DOH - Oh to be innocent of the web!!!

Barry

I work as a computer lab assistant for my university's computing center... basically I get paid to sit in a lab, fill the printers, clear paper jams, and call my superiors whenever something serious happens.

Well, I have had this job for about a semester, and since our university supports 3 platforms (Windows machines running win 98, Macs running Mac OS 8, and Solaris workstations) I have seen a lot of people with compatibility issues...

The best though, about a week ago, I was working in a lab in the dank bowels of the physics building, when I hear coming from my lab this loud "KLAK KLAK KLAK" at a regular interval. My immediate reaction was "Oh no, there goes someone's term paper"

Turns out, this girl had logged in normally, then she put her floppy into the drive... the Iomega Zip drive. Well, I called my supervisor, like my job description dictates, and we had a good laugh... It took a pair of needlenose pliers to get the thing out.

Another time, same lab, a guy comes in with a very old floppy, tries to read it in one of these friendly P3-550 systems... the computer can't read it, throws a disk format error, and suggests formatting the disk. Well, the user informs me when he asks for help that the disk can't be reformatted because it is the only non-print copy of his masters thesis from around 1987...

well, I called my supervisor like usual, because I had NO CLUE where we could find a 386 box on campus that would read the disk. Supervisor has me walk the guy through filing what we call a "trouble report" which is basically a glorified web-based email system that sends email to the admins and the maintenance and repair groups...

well, I filled out the entire trouble report for him, and gave him 2 instructions: "Put your name and email address and maybe a phone number or something on it and press send". Of course, the guy neglects to put down any user info (no phone number, no email address, no name, no info whatsoever) and just skipped right on to the "send" part of it.

sometimes I wish people, especially doctoral students, would have the attention span to PERFORM 2 SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS!!!

ah well, I am pretty sure he did not get his reply....

OK, two tales for you today. One from each side of the fence.

I am a student at university. I have a computer in my room, and recently paid for a university LAN connection. A week later, I can't see anything off-campus. I check, tracert to outside servers. The problem seems to be with nat-aa.(this_university).ac . I telnet to the server (just to see what it is) and find out that I need to register (I already knew this, the leaflets they give out say that you have to register for offsite access, but nobody had been able to tell me how to register).

I fill out the registration program on the NAT server, and it says "server in static mode (No new users permitted) - please contact your network administrator"

I contact the computer systems people. They say "the registration is simple, but if you can't get it to work, bring your computer in a week on Friday and we'll get someone who knows about computers sort it out."

The next day, I tell a friend about this. His response? "Yeah, it sometimes goes into static mode for no reason. There's a patch available from the site that makes the software, but I overheard a few of the techs talking and they can't figure out how to install it. Hold on a minute..." He puts the phone down. A minute later "...there ya go, it should work now." I find out later that the anti-BOFH (Would kill your home directory, but can't figure out why "rm ~" doesn't work) has his firat name for his password, so Dave could just go to the server and take it out of static mode again.

Grr, useless

--------------

And now, a tale from the other side.

I do volunteer tech support for students and friends. Just the simple stuff. Anyone who knows me and who occasionally needs help can send email to helpdesk@tradepace.zzn.com , and me and a group of friends will try and sort it out. I have no idea who gave this woman the address, but our policy is to try and help everyone who writes, cos one of us must have given them the address.

BTW, this is a condensed version of a conversation conducted by email, with the whole conversation quoted.

She writes in, asking if we can tell her her password.

Response: What password?

Her: I need the password for my email. I pay you good money for my email, and I need the password. I can't read this email address at the website, I need the password.

[note - we do not provide email. We offer free unofficial tech support cos we know a fair bit, and were fed up of our online friends moaning about useless official channels on our chatroom]

[Aha! Webmail - find out what site it is, and direct her to the "security question" page]

Response: What's the email address its for?

Her: My address is email.www.hotmail@com

[Huh?]

Me: OK, go to (address of the password reminder page - which it took about 20 seconds to find from the hotmail front page), and answer the questions. It'll tell you your password.

Her: Why the **** should I tell you where I libve?!!? You ***ing perverts, you just **** want to come and ****ing look at me, ******ing arseholes. I just want you to give me the password I paid you for. Don't ****ing bother me again, you intarnet people R all ****ing peedophiles any ***ing way!!!

Me: *closes the case on our little luser tracking database*

I work tech support at a small ISP in Arkansas. I know... that in and of itself should be enough to base a sitcom on. A desperate and paranoid elderly woman calls up at exactly eight-o-nine a.m. I remember the time so distinctly because she squealed, "My internet's broke, I keep gettin a big old number 650 on my panel, and my mouse won't work! It'll turn colors and all that but it won't click!" I immediately glanced at the clock and did a breathing exercise. Granny Capslock tells me her internet's broke and she needs to see if she had been outbid for a Tweety shirt on EBay. She's about four cups of Folger's into her buzz and in no mood to be toyed with. My decision was to check DUN and NCP, as she was still not connecting after I determined how horribly she had blown her password. I say, "Okay, ma'am. We'll get you fixed up right away. Let's just check some settings. Do you see My Computer?" The old lady, aghast, replied, "No!! Can you see mine?!" I placed her on hold and lay down in the floor....

I worked tech support/lab monitoring for a college. Anyway, this user called up, and here was the jist of the call.

EU (end user) : How do I get this to stop?

Me (me, duh.) : Get what to stop?

CPU (user's comp): (female voice) Hey big stud, come f*** me in the a**.

EU : (exasperated) THAT!

We were required to get the EU's student/faculty ID. It turns out that this guy was the Math department's Vice-Chairperson.

EU : MY WIFE WILL BE HOME IN A FEW MINUTES!!! PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!!!

Me : Ok, have you closed all the programs running?

CPU : I want you to spank me. I've been a bad girl.

EU : YES!!! IT WON'T STOP!

I knew a reboot would probably fix his problem, but I had put it on speakerphone and we (my coworkers and I) agreed to string this one out, b/c we were sooo bored that night. I walked him through using the Close Program dialogue box to close programs one by one. The poor schmuck got soo worried, one of my more senior coworkers decided that we had better stop short of giving him a coronary. I finally had him reboot his computer after about 5+ mins of letting him sweat. Problem solved. He was soo grateful, too.

___________

Another interesting one. This one came in to a friend of mine on the weekend (our main tech support center is closed, so lusers are given the individual lab numbers by a recording). Apparently a young coed at our university had decided to make her personal web server space turn a profit for her. Unfortunately, she was doing this by posting nude pictures of herself on her webpage, and then adding porn banners to her page. We have a strict, "no porn," rule and an equally strict, "no profit," rule in effect for our web server. So we shut her site down. She called in to find out why and was totally embarrassed by my friend's explanation. Some of the guys got a kick out of it after they got one of the web guys to give them access to the images.

__________

Last, but not least.

We had this really interesting character, who lived in the dorms and apparently had no computer of his own, so he decided he'd come into our flagship (no less) lab and commandeer one of the computers as his own. He began using this one machine consistently, day in, day out. At first we didn't care, because many users sat at the same stations again and again. It didn't stop there, as he began leaving notes on his computer, saying that he'll be right back, do not touch, etc. Because of the volume of traffic in this lab, we have a 5 minute rule. Users have to be back in 5 minutes or we reboot the machine and put any disks into lost & found. So, when he'd leave we'd reboot the machine, which would piss him off quite considerably. He came to complain to me one day, and I politely explained the 5 minute rule to him, to which he argued that it takes longer than that to get to the top floor of his dorm and back. I suggested that he plan better and bring everything he needs in the first trip, or whatever would allow him to stay. He continued to argue, but the rule was specific and posted in at least 5 places in the lab, as well as being available on the web and in hardcopy, so I remained firm. He became very belligerent and threatened me. So I told him he could take it up with my supervisor, which he did, and was told the same thing by my supervisor. My supervisor then took a peek into the system and discovered that this user had been systematically circumventing the security in NT to install numerous unauthorized programs. So, I slapped in our reinstall floppy (it just fdisks and copies the files from the network to create a "clean" computer). Every time we did this, the user would reinstall the programs, and yell at us. He even continued to leave his computer logged in and began to leave notes like, "If anybody touches this machine, I'll kill them!" What a freak. We reported this to campus police and they paid him a visit. Now, as if he wasn't belligerent enough, he comes down into the lab, kicks the d

oor to the lab assistant room (we had a separate, glass-walled office for this lab) and proceeds to attack the lab assistant on duty. The problem for this guy was that he was about 40-50 pounds lighter and 4+" shorter than the lab assistant he chose to pick a fight with. As we all knew about and hated this idiot, the lab assistant wasted little time in dispatching the little bastard. When the police came, he was taped up with electrical tape (no joke, like a movie) to restrain him. After the moron out of jail, he tried to sue the lab assistant and our department for whatever wrongs we had done to him. He was banned from the labs and any network or dialup access to any of the university's computers. I'd say he was lucky not to be tossed out of the university.

Several years ago, I worked for a very large computer servicing company who shall remain nameless, working on a HUGE corporate account, who will remain nameless also (in Los Angeles).

We get a call from a distraught user:

Customer: "Yes, we're having mouse problems here."

Tech: "Well, does the mouse not move, or...?"

Customer: "No, you don't understand- we're having MOUSE

problems- you need to come quick."

Tech: Sigh, "Ok- be right there.." (Damn executives always think they are soooo important)

The tech gets to the location, and begins messing with the mouse.

Tech: "Well, it seems to be working...what is the problem you are having?"

Customer: "There is a mouse living inside my computer."

Tech: "WHAT?!"

Customer: "There is a mouse living inside my computer, and he won't go away."

Tech: Chuckle, chuckle- "Oh, I see..."

Turns out that another tech had removed one of the PC card slot covers- left a gaping hole in the unit.

A mouse had made his home in there, since it was nice and

warm. The tech brought the machine in, and cleaned off the

rat droppings and wee-wee off the video card, which was, BTW

still working just fine. The customer had tried to tape the hole shut- but the mouse would just come back in every night and chew through the tape to get into his new apartment.

Solution: We put a new card cover on the slot and sent the computer back, laughing. This is a true story.

Customers, dear customers...when you call tech support it COULD help if you were near the computer in question when you call

I had a call about a week ago from a person I sold a computer to. This person is about 50 years old, and has a son who claims to know it all. I really have no time for 2-minute experts as they tend to be an annoyance to techs.

(Introduction stuff omitted)

Me: "Can you tell me what has actually happened?"

User: "I went to start up the PC, and it wouldn't start. I don't know much about all this computing crap stuff." (oooh this is not a good way to describe my area of expertise!) "Let me go and get my son". (Ohhh gooody... NOT).

User2: "Hi, I think the problem is the PSU has received a fault current from the motherboard which has caused the circuit to overload and terminate unexpectedly. Perhaps a capacitor has gone dead?".

(At this time I know that this is total and utter bullsh**. Plus I do know that this person has a real rats nest of power cabling behind the desk. The sort of thing that is capable of catching fire. I suspect the overload protection on the powerstrip has tripped.)

Me: "O .. kay .. Is anything connected to the power strip under the desk still working? Test it out by switching on the desk lamp please."

User2: "No - it's not working..."

Me: "Can you locate a small black or red button on that powerstrip and press it?"

User2: (fumbling noise, swearing, more fumbling)

User2: "Got it, pressing it now..."

(At this stage I hear the noise from the fax machine, and the telltale beep from the PC.)

User2: "Okay! It's working now! Everything is working, even the desk lamp. Thanks!".

Me: "No problem."

(Ending call blah blah blah)

Not as bad as some others I have struck anyway!

I actually wish I was there, but a friend of mine got the call from a friend of his. (this is back when a 5 1/4" floppy drive was still somehow useful..)

The guy was complaining that his drive was not reading his floppies (5 1/4" ones, of course...). So my friend asked him if he locked the floppies in. Doesn't have a clue what that meant... My friend explains, and makes sure the floppy IS getting inside the drive's cavity before locking the drive (and that it actually WAS something that looked like a 5 1/4" drive). Still nothing, drive not ready, as if no floppy was inserted. So, the natural thing to do, he asks to try another floppy. Same thing, so he asks to try another one, and another one. The guy finally says he can't try another one, cause he doesn't have anymore left.

*(!?!?!?!?)* My friend decides to go over. Once there he asks the guy where are the floppies... In the computer he says *(!!!!!???????)*

Not too sure about what was the floppie's destiny, he asked the guy to show him how he read his floppies with a disk he brought himself... (anyone has a clue?????) he was feeding the floppies in between slots, so they all fell inside the computer, right on top of the drive...

Sometimes, what sounds like "outer limits" is just the inner limits of anoter one's unederstanding limit...

I used to work as a LSA at a big Swedish company. My favorite case was this one:

Me: Hi, how can I help you?

Customer: This new Toshiba Portége you gave me the other day won't start (she was angry).

Me: That's strange. I will come by your office and have a look.

She got this new Toshiba just a couple of days earlier and it was me who had installed it to her.

I went to her office and asked her to show me the problem.

Customer: This #@£!$#! computer will not start.

Me: Ehhh... Show me the computer and I will have a look at it.

Customer: What do you mean, it's THERE! (pointing at the desk, really angry)

Me: Ehhh.. that is not the computer, that is the docking station for the computer! Where is the computer?

Customer: ....I have this box with the display at home... (I think she just realized what the problem was)

Me: (trying to not laugh) Ok, I think it will work fine if you bring the computer back to work and put it into the docking station.

She was very embarrassed when I left.

I'm not actually tech support, I'm a secretary who happens to be young and full of techie wisdom, which means I'm the one everyone calls BEFORE they call our helpdesk. The other day I had to run to the opposite end of our offices to help out on a printer situation.

"It keeps jamming! What's wrong with it???" cried the secretary, followed by her tale of woe about rush jobs and urgent memos (I decided not to mention that she called ME away from MY job, just as rush and urgent as her own!)

I examined the printer, took out the paper trays to check for jams, restarted it, cleared the print queue, removed the toner, unplugged and replugged, etc. Every time I made an adjustment, she tried to print again. And it kept jamming.

I was about to tell her to call HelpDesk and have them send a professional (hah) up to look at, when I noticed the packing tape along the sides of the paper tray. My stomach filled with dread.

"Why is there tape on the paper tray?" I muttered, half to myself.

"Well, it won't stay shut without it." the secretary replied.

"Why won't it stay shut?? How much paper did you put in here?" I asked, wishing I had a tape recorder or at least a witness to this insanity.

"Well, the whole ream."

"The whole ream doesn't FIT in the paper tray though!" I wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.

"That's why I had to tape it shut! I practically had to sit on it to get the lid back on."

"You aren't supposed to PUT a whole ream in there, it says right here '250 sheets max'. That's HALF a ream.," I repeated, regretting I ever agreed to help her.

"But we were told not to waste paper, that we have to use ALL of each ream!" the completely ignorant secretary retorted.

"Yes, but not ALL AT ONCE! You can't FORCE all the paper in there and not expect it to jam!! It only takes HALF A REAM!!!" By this time, my voice was getting higher and louder.

The secretary still didn't understand what I was talking about, so I left her cube-mate to explain it to her and fumed back to my desk.

We need much more strict hiring policies here.

Our department is spread throughout six or seven 'markets', or cities. To keep us all using the same forms, we created a shared database in Lotus Notes, placed all our forms in it, and then created a 'discussion group' or message board. Some of these forms and their ongoing revisions are placed in the discussion group to be picked over by the writers.

In fact, after recently uploading a fresh batch of "blessed" documents to our database, I went in and created a table in our discussion group in a private entry and uploaded the same documents there, per the request of my boss. I then added my boss, a secretary in Philly (whom we'll call T.) and the secretary's boss (now called P.) to both the 'intended audience' and made them editors, so they could upload any comments. This took me the better part of a day because the file names on the fifty or sixty documents were not what the titles of the forms were and were actually spread throughout our network. Once I made sure everything was perfect, I notified the audience (consisting of T. and P.) of my new entry.

Imagine my surprise and frustration when T. calls me up today and asks for me to 'find' a form and send it to P. Apparently she only has the hard copy, and needs to make edits before sending it to her client.

I quickly write down the info, even going as far as to ask her what form number is in the bottom corner (already thinking that it should BE in our forms database). I get off the phone and look at what I'd written. Not two weeks earlier I had worked on this very same document, which was both on our forms database AS WELL AS the private entry on the discussion group.

Confused as to why they'd waste my time sending them something when they could directly access the database (the whole point of creating the database, I might add), I decided that I would indeed send them the document, as well as a link to both the approrpiate section of the forms database AND the private discussion group entry. I sent the email directly to P., with a cc: to T. and a bcc: to my boss.

I'm totally frustrated that my hours of work are all for naught, because these women can't be bothered to access the database OR the discussion group!

I work for the tech support department in my company. One friday afternoon, one of our user's computer was making noise. A colleague decided to solve the problem. After a couple of minutes, the user came to my office to tell me his computer was out of order. I went to his office to check what the problem was.

Result: The power supply was fried. I looked at the power supply and found something stuck in fan. I asked the user why a paper clip was there, and he said: "well, my computer was making noise, so my colleague decided to fix it...with a paper clip".

Our department gave him the tech of the month certificate for his initiative!

I have always considered myself Fairly intelligenat, until this incidednt.

My ex Boyfriend who is a computer engineer istalled net-meeting so we could talk and see each other on the internet whilst he was away. Upon firts using the equipment I could see him on my screen but I could hardly hear him,although he could hear me perfectly well... see where this is going? ...

Anyway , I kept telling him to move closer to his microphone and he was at the other end shouting "it's nearly IN my mouth" at which piont he said "ummm you have turned up your speakers?" I am so ashamed that this is a true story!

As a rather busty female who happens to also be a tech, I have a couple of fixes for the 'bust' problem that many of you may wish to use next time you encounter it:

1. Lift the user's chair, or lower their desk. This may not work for users who have a risk of carpal tunnel syndrome, but I find it eases my wrists as well.

2. Give them a wrist pad. One of those long bits of neoprene that they sell with mouse pads - putting it on the desk moves the keyboard just a bit further away from the .. ah .. problem.

I used to work tech support for a company that provided

mainframe software to hospitals. You wouldn't believe the

people hospitals hire to run their computers.

Tech: Software Company support, this is Mike.

Cust: Hi Mike, this is Paul, the system admin at Some

Hospital. The system is running a bit slow, and I think

we may have a runaway process. Can you dial in and check

it out?

Tech: Sure Paul, no problem. I'll check it out and give

you a call back.

(Mike dials in, checks the system, fixes problem, calls

hospital's data center to notify Paul.)

Cust: Computer Center, this is Shelley.

Tech: Hi, it's Mike from Software Company. Can I speak to

Paul, please?

Cust: Paul? We don't have any Paul working here.

Tech: ??? Um... he called about 30 minutes ago and said you

had a problem with the system running slow. He said his

name was Paul.

Cust: No... nobody by the name of Paul works here...

Tech: The system administrator? He said his name was Paul.

Cust: No, there's nobody here named Paul.

(voices in background on Cust end of phone)

Cust: (talking to someone else in the room) Oh... do you

think maybe he means Paulo?

Cust: (talking to Mike) Are you looking for Paulo, the

system administrator?

Tech: (in disbelief) Yes, I suppose I might have gotten

the name wrong. Can I talk to Paulo, please?

First off, I'm not a tech supporter by trade. But in the place where I worked, it didn't take much to be considered an "expert."

A university student I was supervising called me from another floor one day to tell me the computer I set her to use was not working. This is how the call went:

Her: Yeah, every time I turn on the computer it just tells me 'Windows has shut down.'

Me: That's odd. Hmm. Does it tell you anything before that?

Her: No... As soon as I turn it on, nothing comes up at all. It just immedietly says 'Windows has shut down.'

Me: Well, let me come take a look. (I walk downstairs)

Sure enough, when I came in the room the computer screen had 'Windows has shut down. You may now turn off your computer.' I pressed a few keys; nothing happened of course.

Me: "Well, let's turn it off and on one more time so I can see what's happening."

So she reached out and turned off the monitor and then turned it back on again.

My 80-year-old mother is making a small amount of progress with her new computer. She's no longer terrified of it, at least, and even followed my suggestion that she take a Windows class at the local senior center.

I recieved an email from her the other day saying that the teacher had convinced her she needed to install a virus-checking program. "They tell me it's easy," she said. "I just have to put it in the computer and it will give me instructions to follow. I asked where to put it in and they told me it was probably the top slot on the machine so I looked, but I know that slot is too small. Can you help me?"

I replied that if she couldn't find the CD-ROM drive, she probably wasn't ready to try installing a program.

enuf said read below

Outlook seems to have lost my Personal Address Book. Do you have any spare copies?

Regards

**** *******

***** ********* *******

My last two tales were things that happened to my dad, but this one actually happened to me. There's a new employee in the office where I work. I knew she was still learning the ropes, but I didn't realize just how much she had to learn until today. Our copier is notorious for jamming, and sometimes it is hard to get the jammed paper out, so I wasn't surprised when she came to me with a request to help her remove some papers from the copy machine. What did surprise me was to find her standing and staring at the papers in the sorter tray. I picked up the papers, handed them to her, and walked away.

I'm looking to buy a used computer for myself. I just saw an ad for someone selling one with a "SCASSI" hard drive.

I work for the biggest tech support center in the world . I fix msn software. But any way i had just clocked in and after about 5 min of an unusual availability streak my phone beeped I went through my opening speach and asked the client what the issue was and he calmly ststed theat his computer got hungry and ate his sandwich that he had sitting on his cup holder that he also said was a very handy tool.

I almost didn't hit the mute button fast enough before i started to roll over with laughter. After about two minutes of client complaining that the sandwich must have made the computer sick and it wont come on, i finally found enough composur to tell him the bad news about his cdrom needind to be replaced along with his tower

I work for Server Support for a large OEM company, and most of the time get fairly knowledgeable admins calling in with issues. Sometimes I forget how good I have it.

Sometimes I get rudely awakened:

(call)

Thank you for calling *ell Server Support. May I have you service tag number please?

(pause) I'm not sure what you're asking me for.

The service tag is a 5-7 alphanumeric sequence found on a white label on the back of the server. (I think that phrase is ingrained into my brain at some level)

(pause) Oh the back of the what? (*Warning! This is not a usualy call!* Alarms begining to go off in my head)

The server, 'mam. The large box, prolly has 4 or 5 large fans in it. It should be all black.

(pause) I dont have one of those. (Ok, every now and then a desktop user sneaks into the server queue by virtue of not KNOWING what a server is. Happens, and if there aren't any calls in the system, I usually try and help them out if I can, because I know a transfer will put them at then end of the desktop queue, for a happy 30 minutes of introspection)

What kind of issue are you having with your system, 'mam?

I'm having problems connecting to A*L. (Who'd of guessed it)

Ok, and can you read off the system type on the desktop please?

On the what?

On the computer part. The (grasping for terms) part where you put the floppies and CD's into the system.

Oh, its a Gateway 2000.

(pause) I'm sorry?

It says G-A-T-E-W-A-Y 2-0-0-0 on the box.

(pause) (Totally boggled why she would call *ell Server Support) I'm sorry 'mam, but you'll need to contact Gateway for help with their systems, as they have much more information about them then I would have access to. (Which is honestly true - I get confused by things without RAID arrays anymore - which is its own little hell)

But they told me to call you!

(pause) May I ask who told you to call (emphasis)*ell Server Support(/emphasis)?

A*L of course. They gave me this number and said it was a problem with my system! (load fluff_detector) Something with the modem!

(pause - while imagining some A*L support tech laughing his *SS off after sending this poor lady into harm's way) Perhaps they accidentally gave you the wrong number?

They even checked the number after I wrote it down!

(I bet they did, too) Did they mention why they thought we might be able to help you with another company's system?

(pause) Hmmm. No.

(unload fluff_detector) Perhaps it was next to the number they meant to give you?

I suppose that could happen.

It does seem reasonable that Gateway would know, for instance, what type of modem you might have. Perhaps you might try contacting them for the best possible support. (Now I know why we say these same lines over and over again - its because when you're stunned, you can say them again without having to think)

Do you have their number?

(Screaming to myself) Let me check their website a moment please...

Oh thank you so much! (She really is a nice person, but it's still stunning how people can believe anything after a few lines of technical jargon)

(pulling up www.gateway.com - wonder if I would be fired for opening this page) Ah, here it is...1-800-GATEWAY should get through.

Thanks for your help!

And thank you for calling *ell Server Support! (couldn't resist it!)

(/call)

I could not retain sanity being hooked into a phone, waiting for calls like that all day. Desktop support needs a raise! Sometimes I do like my job.

I work internal tech support for a major mobile phone company. Well, one of the on-site legal consultants is having problems mapping to a drive. The call went something like this:

Me: Help Desk this is Daniel.

User: Yes, I can't open my L: drive

Me: OK...what path is your L: drive mapped to?

User: That's not the problem. It just won't open.

Me: Well I need to know the path so I can determine if that server is down.

User: I don't know the path. All I know is that it's the L: drive. I mean, L stands for Legal right?

Tech support is so much fun... ;)

I work at a call center, and one day for a call from a elderly sounding lady, who was so upset, because she couldn't understand the "computer stuff" after listening to a long story about what she did to start the computer she finally got to the problem in question. her computer was prompting her to press any key to continue. I swear she actually asked me where to find the any key, I thought this was just a joke that was going around, but now I know it's not always just a joke when you are a over the phone computer hardware tech

I'm the Help Desk Admin for a real estate company. I provide support for the employees. Sometimes we get requests for file restores.

One day this girl emailed me sometime in December and asked:

"If I typed a document back in September and didn't save it, can you retreive it for me"

Sure - all non-saved files are just floating out there in cyber space for me to just go out and grab them!

I was helping a friend set up the fax portion of his fax-modem. I installed the software and then went home to send a fax to test it. First I called my friend and explained that to receive the fax he needed to hit the "Receive" button in the program and not pick up the phone.

So I sent the fax. I let it ring for about 30 seconds and then gave up and called back. The following conversation:

Me: Hey, it didn't go through, eh?

Him: No, not yet.

Me: Weird. What happened when you clicked the receive button?

Him: Oh, I haven't clicked that yet.

Me: Eh?

Him: I haven't clicked it yet. Shall I do it now?

Me: Well, since a fax is transferred through the phone lines, just like we are talking now, the two fax machines need to talk to each other. So you need to click the receive button while the phone is ringing so that your fax will know to answer so it can talk to my fax.

Him: You mean it's not like e-mail?

Me: No.

I've been posting stories (probably too many) about teaching my 80-year-old mom how to use a computer. This latest one had me ROFLing, though.

She went for her second Windows class the other day and the instructor told her she should install a anti-virus program. She finally did find the CD-ROM drive, but I told her that since the computer was so old and slow (a P166 but she doesn't need or *deserve* a faster one) she wouldn't want to have it running in the background, so she should run it manually every week or so.

She replied that it all sounded too complicated and did I think if she was very careful with her email it would be okay to do without a virus scanner? I replied that since she never downloads anything, she might be able to get by but to never open any file attachments that ended in .exe or .vbs. To emphasize what she should look for, I made the file extensions bold and red.

She cheerfully answered, "Okay, I'll be very careful. I won't open anything with RED attachments."

My retired parents bought a computer "for the grandkids to use". Both of my parents had used computers when they where working, but they had been retired for a few years so 'Windows' was new to them when they brought it home and Dad started tinkering with the settings, file organization and the 'inards'(as Dad wanted to add several peripherals).

Needless to say, nothing worked after he put the cover back on. Mom asked me to come over and see what was wrong with it as 'it's going to give your father a heart attack.'

So I head over with my trusty repair kit and sure enough, he had installed items not compatible with his system and he had removed necessary files from the Windows directory (he didn't think they were necessary as he couldn't get them to do anything and they were just taking up space). Several hours later, I got the system up and running. Pointed out which items wouldn't work and why they wouldn't work and made him promise to let me install the replacements when he got them.

Two weeks later I get another panicked call from my mother - Dad's done it again. So I go over and this time have to reformat and reload everything. This happened several more times until I made Mom swear she wouldn't let Dad touch the settings or install anything every again or I wouldn't come over and fix it again.

Some time later, I get call - this time from Dad (who in his younger days worked for a major space pioneer corporation working with early transistors).

Dad: It won't boot up.

Me: What new thing did you install?

Dad: Nothing

Me: Well what did you do to it last?

Dad: I put the hard drive back in.

Me: You put the hard drive back in? Why was it out?

Dad: long rambling answer and then...And in the process I dropped the hard drive. It was made a funny rattle when I shook it, but I took it apart and soldiered it back together - good as new.

Me: Sorry Dad- you trashed the drive. -long lenghty discussion on the differrence between old and new technologies-

Dad: But I've done it in the past!

Me: Yes Dad - that might have worked then, but for now you'll have to get a new one.

Thankfully, he's left it alone since.

I've started a new job (3 months now) as a webmaster for a Sheriff's Office. I generally don't get any phone calls except for people from in the office and other agencies.

Anyway, the other day I got a call from a lady that wanted to know when she could schedule visitation with her son (he was in the jail here). I paused for a second, looking around to see if it was one of the usual jokesters, but they had all left for the day. I then asked her to hold and forwarded her to the main number.

Not really a tech support tale but certainly an interesting phone call. The phone numbers here are all pretty similar and she must have just mis-dialed. Although it did give me an idea for something to add to the web site...

David

I work in an ISP call center, and one of the most common phrases I hear when someone's connection corrupts is "but it's never done this before!"

That never fails to blidside me; I mean, what do you say? When my car breaks down I don't complain to the towtruck driver that it's never broken down before!

I do telephone technical support, but my wife is the source of many of my "caller from Hell" stories. Nonetheless, she often has valid points. For example, the time I upgraded her computer and forgot to plug the keyboard back in, she was understandably amused at the message "Keyboard not detected. Press (F1) to continue."

My favorite of all time was when she called me and asked (with a hint of laughter in her voice) "What kind of jam does your laser printer like?" "Huh? What are you talking about?" "Well, I tried to print out a letter, and your laser printer says 'Feed jam' and I wanted to know what kind of jam to feed it." Not one to be outdone, I quickly responded "It's partial to paper jam--it asks for that one all the time."

I then, after agreeing that a lot of techies needed a better command of the English language, explained how to cure a feed jam.

I used to work for a cable ISP that employed a large number of tech support reps, and was ramping up its department in very quick order. It's not too difficult to conceive that perhaps one of these new hires may have slipped through the cracks.

This older gentleman with a large white beard was hired on as a tech support rep. The (untrue) rumor circulated that he was the father of one of the call center managers, so everyone was walking on eggshells around him for a while. Little did they know what a prize he would be.

One particular slow night, he walked over to the large bank of TVs used by the cable monitoring group and changed to the porno channel. He then turned up the sound to FULL VOLUME, in full sight and sound range of the rest of the center, and sat there watching it. I don't know who told him to cut it out.

He told one customer that in order to get his cable modem working, he would have to change the background image on his computer and then reboot. It had worked for a previous customer. (Newsflash: A reboot alone helps.)

He was making HD space on his workstation, and decided to delete his Windows directory because he didn't need it.

I think he lasted about a year before he left.

This is a TRUE story that happened to me. I was working at a local "Mom & Pop" PC store in 1990 we built custom computers. I was the main tech. Got a call set to me from the sales dep. it was an elderly woman and itwent like this:

ME: Hello how can I help you

Her: Hello my computer is broken

ME: Ok. What is wrong?

Her: It wont turn on

Ok so I did the normal checks and had to tell her to bring it in. After she got it to me I could only say that it looked "Wrong" nothing was out of place but something was not correct. After poping off the cover and checking it out it seems that the Motherboard was dead. So I went back out to the front and asked her " When did it break"? Well I finally asked the correct question she said and this is an exact quote " IT WORKED BEFORE I WASHED IT"

Well It turns out the tower was a little dirty so she took it off the desk and put it in her DISHWASHER and ran it just like it was a dirty dish! Well after getting the best laugh of the week and telling the owner of the store, he told me to build her a new PC for free. (that was nice of him)

Oh, I did send her home to bring me the KB, MOUSE and speakers. The rest of the PC that got washed!

Hope this makes you laugh!! Cool site!

When I used to do tech support for ATT worldnet, there was a 3 week paid training session.

The guy doing the training was an experienced tech, eventhough he was only 19. He'd tell us

Of some horror stories and mostly everyone would laugh and not really believe them…. Until they'd hit the floor and actually get the same calls. Here is one of them which I personally got.

Me: Thank you for calling ATT worldnet, my name is Tudor, how may I help you.

Cust: I can't log into into The Zone!

Me: …The Zone… what exactly is it? (im sorry I don't know every single URL on the internet)

Cust: You know… it's the Microsoft gaming site…

Me: Alright, are you able to browse any other sites?

Cust: yes, I can log in through Earthlink and AOL and the page comes up fine.

OK… so it sounds like a router table configuration issue. Worldnett isn't routing any packets from them to The Zone. After a bit of checking, this was confirmed. Customer informed.

Cust: Alright, how do I change the router table?

Me: I inform him that the router table is controled by network operations and that I could not do it. Cust demands supervisor.

Me: I inform him that the supervisor will just tell him the same thing, and that there's no way no how the router table will be changed by him demanding it, and that's its an issue that's up to network ops to fix. I put the issue in the contact history.

So far so good, right?

Wrong, because apparently this is where things take a turn for the bizarre

Cust: You know… ever since I started playing on The Zone, my computer has been acting strange. I know this because I've been watching my ports (uh oh, he said port. Normally this means they know more than you and that you're an idiot, but this guy was a few levels beyond that. Just wait and read) I know that "they" are out to get me … because I found some kiddy porn on Porncity.net and I sent them a nasty email about it… and ever since then I've been getting hacked (makes sense to me, piss off some pedophile hackers and you get burned, right?)

Me: uhm… who is "they"?

Cust: The internet pedophiles. They're out to get me… (At this point I'm actually praying that this call is monitored so I can have proof of it). Ever since I became friends with this one boy named Robbie… I've been getting hacked…

Me: (trying to make SOME sense out of all of this) Now if Robbie was your friend, why would he be hacking you? (oh my God, what am I doing? I'm playing along with this guy's delusions!)

Cust: Yeah, but the internet pedophiles are making him do it!

At this point I opened this guy's contact history. Sure enough, he's told the same grand tale to 5 other techs. Between switching to mute volume to contain my laughter and typing in his contact history, I finally got through the call. I wonder if Robbie was an FBI agent…

Moral of the story: don't send hate mails to people you don't know =)

I work for a general contractor, so i am really only Part Time IT Man... but i still get some good ones. A couple of them:

1. One of our Project Managers came in with a question about windows 3.1 (which i know nothing about, but they ask anyway). He wanted to know how hard it was to get the icons back on the desktop. When i asked why, he said "Well, we gave my dad an old PC and he wanted to type a letter. He deleted all the icons so he had a nice clear space to type in..."

2. One of my bonehead moments... The same project manager and his brother (my boss) are in my office working on an estimate. They want to back date the estimate three days earlier. I immediately dive into the program looking for settings to change. Just as i am getting frustrated, the PM leans over and says "Can you just change the date in the little system tray thingy?"... DOH!

I started doing tech support for a local ISP a few years ago. I had no college degree and no formal training when I started but I discovered that most of tech support was hand holding and ego stroking. In the beginning I was overwhelmed but the top ten questions I was asked made me feel better: (and yes, they are all true and no exaggeration)

1. Does the monitor have to be plugged in to work?

2. Should I use something special to clean my computer or will plain soap and water work?

3. I've owned the computer for years, I use one at work, I'm smarter than you are and I never heard of defragging or a scan disk. Do you get some kind of commision when I use them?

4.(Everytime Altavista, Yahoo, MSN, etc change their site format): Why did you mess up my Altavista page? I had all my stocks and weather listed and you deleted them.

5. (In my Outlook Inbox at least once a week): Dear Tech Support, How come I can't e-mail anyone? From Dumb User.

6. I changed my password on my login screen so my kid's won't be able to use the net, and of course I didn't notify my ISP. How come it won't connect?

7. I've owned my computer for over three years and I've never shut it off. Is that bad?

8. I spent big bucks on my machine and it came with Virus Protection. How come I got a virus? What do you mean update the Virus Scan? Why do I have to do that? Why doesn't your ISP just kill the viruses?

9. My computer is in the shop right now so I can't read my e-mail. Does that mean that someone else is getting it and reading it?

10. (my all time favorite) I don't mind giving you a username, but I don't trust you with my password. (as they give me their credit card number to set up their new account)

On the other hand, thank goodness for dummies or I wouldn't have a job or nearly as many laughs.

hello tech support here

ya hi, my dog broke my computer.

how?

she had just gone playing and booom!! it goes.

but you just told me your dog broke it.

oh no! the computer broke itself!

Me: Thank you for calling tech support this is sarah, can I have your full email address please?

Him: yes its uh blah@blah.com

Me: What can I help you with?

Him: Well, I was trying to scan a picture on my computer upstairs and I decided to send it to the computer down stairs, but now I must of closed the program to quick, before it sent. So now I get an error when I open outlook express.

(Okay, easy problem, all we have to do is delete the outbox). So I walked him through it and we opened OE again.)

Me: Sir, is the message gone.

Him: No maam, it's still in the outbox

(? Okay I take him through and delete the box again. Open it up and it is still their. The file is a little over a meg and for some reason staying there.)

Me: Now sir is it still there?

Him: Yes maam, it's still in my sentitems folder.

(WHAT? Took him through and deleted the sent items folder and low and behold it was gone.)

Me: Have you tried puting it on a floppy? (IE Save it to disk and walk your ass downstairs.}

Him: Ya know I didn't even think of there.

Another of my favorites, is the lady who called me and told me that her sister reported to her that she had sent her a virus, but when she ran scan disk she didn't find anything. I said well what is the virus protector that you are using. She explained to me where she got it from and that she wasn't sure of the name of it but you go to start, then programs, accessories.....enough said. Had to explain to her that that only scanned for errors on the hard drive and she should consider getting a virus scanner.

On a fairly slow Saturday, A man runs into our computer shop and slams his hand down on the counter.

Man (M) " The damn thing hasn't worked right from the day I got it! It rarely dials and when I get connected, it disconnects for no apparent reason. I've been putting up with this sh&# for months now! I'm so f*$#ing angry that I can't see straight! If you guys had tech support worth a damn, I should have had all my problems over long ago. I expect proper credit for the harrassment I've endured at the hands of your phone support and for all the time I've not been able to get connected."

Tech (T) "Sir, I ......."

M "Don't even try to talk me out of returning it. I expect my fu@#ing money back! You A$$#oles aren't going to take advantage of me for even one more f^@$ing day!"

T "Sir, I ....."

M " I suppose you have something real F#@$ing smart to say!?"

T "The phone store is next door."

Without a word, he picked up the phone he had slammed onto the counter in his hand and went next door.

ME:Thank you for calling __________ highspeed internet service, my name is Kevin, how can I help you.

SUB:Put a F@#(ing manager on the phone now!

ME:Okay sir, before I can transfer you to a manager I have to get some information from you. Can I please get your phone number with the are code first?

SUB:(Gives phone number along with many slurs)

ME:Sir please be patient I am just accessing your account, could you please give me an idea of what your problem is?

SUB:I'll tell you what my GOD D$#M problem is, this modem is broken, it's slow and it does not work, I've had 2 of your stupid F&$#ing techs at my door and neither one of them knew his ass from a hole in the wall!

ME:I'm sorry to hear that sir, at this time I am Pinging your modem to check your speeds and it looks fine from this end you are reaching 42ms with no packet loss.

SUB:I don't give a s#$t what your tests say, what the F$%k is a ping, and why are you doing it to me? Actaully F*&K this, just send another idiot to come pick up this slow piece of S&*T.

ME:That's no problem sir, I can send a tech out to pick up your modem, but there will be a $25.00 charge.

SUB:$25.00....Why the hell should I have to pay some idiot to drive over to to take my modem! You just hold on for a second....Long Pause....Sliding Door Opens.....Faint noise of something hitting the ground and shattering....

ME:What was that sir?

SUB:That was your piece of S*^T modem flying off my 5th floor balcony...Now you can tell your F&^ing tech that he can come pick up the pieces and you can bill me that $25.00!

ME:( Getting rather frustrated with this idiot ) That's great sir, so I'll bill you that $25.00 plus $699.99 for the modem that you purposly threw off your balcony, plus taxes.

SUB: F&(K you, you can;t prove anything.....CLICK

The funniest part about this call was that I was being audited by my supervisor at the time and when your audited the call is recorded :) NO PROOF HE SAYS! HA!

I used to work for a small startup company that had a call center located in my area. I wasn't in IT yet, but I was on my way. The company turned to me when the two actual IT guys weren't there. I've got one amusing story about the company, and one of my own boo-boo's.

The first story was rather interesting. I was minding my own business, which was internet development, when one of the customer service supervisors came running toward my desk. Apparently they were having some serious server outages. The supervisor had been on the phone with IT in our main office, but even they were unable to resolve what was happening. One of our local IT guys was on vacation, and the other one had not responded to several pages, and I was the only person left with access to the secure server room. She handed me the portable phone with main office IT on it, and I headed to the server room. As soon as I opened the soundproofed door, I was assaulted with a caucaphony of beeps! It appeared that one of our smaller UPS's had gone out, taking two more with it. The strange thing is that they didn't just shut down, they reset themselves, and when more machines than they could handle came back online, they reset again. Basically, a server would be available for about three minutes, and then kick out again. The quick fix for this was of course to plug everything into the hot socket for the building's UPS. Of course, fitting eight servers, four monitors, and other assorted equipment into the two reachable sockets required some quick thinking. I went out on the call floor and explained that I needed to get the servers on a constant power supply, and "requisitioned" the ONLY TWO power strips in the building, both of which happened to reside under the desk of our workforce coordinator, who had quite a reputation for being computer illiterate. Anyway, I had just gotten everything plugged in and running stably when there came a knock on the door. It was the workforce coordinator, wanting to know if she could have her power strips back now...

My own oops was in a sort of similar situation. I was getting ready to go out the door after a 13 hour shift when the same workforce coordinator informed me that our Network Admin wanted me on the phone. It seems he had been trying to walk her through rebooting our call center client server. I went into the server room and rebooted while we chatted. When the server came online, there were some processes that should have started that didn't. Fixing it required logging in with the Admin account for that machine. The network admin said he trusted me enough to let me have the password so I could get things up and running again. Keep in mind I had just worked 13 hours straight... Anyway, the password was Ngen!! (bang, bang) something. Naturally he was just saying n, g, e, n, bang, bang, x, x, x. It took me about five tries to realize that he meant !, not the WORD bang... We had a good laugh over that, and after I unlocked the account again having tried to log in incorrectly too many times, we got everything running again.

This one was almost a hair-ripper. I work Unix support for a large aerospace firm, and our base OS/application loads include the Unix version of Netscape.

A couple of days ago, I was working a trouble ticket from a user who couldn't get any web pages to come up no matter how hard they tried. After some conversation,

I determined that their proxy settings (we have a corporate firewall and web proxy servers for the whole company) were not correct.

I spent nearly a full half-hour on the phone, walking the user through configuring their proxy settings to get out through the firewall. At the end of this, the

user said it was working, so I closed the ticket.

An hour later, I get a call back from this same user, complaining that they still couldn't get to sites outside the firewall. One of my coworkers intervened at this point,

and offered to take the call. I gratefully accepted as I had just about had it up to my eyeballs with the user.

My coworker started the user's netscape app on his workstation (you can do that with Unix and X11), and opened up the proxy settings. I recall hearing him start laughing, and

then he called me over to see what the problem was.

Our proxy server has "proxy-support" as the beginning portion of it's hostname, and the autoconfig file everyone's supposed to use is called "proxy.pac." In both cases, the user had spelled "proxy" as

"proxie."

The scary part is that this was, supposedly, someone with a four-year engineering degree.

I work in a call center, but I'm sure this story will be found infinitely amusing:

We use Netscape to do some of our work and data entry which has been going fairly smoothly until last weeks meeting with my boss. According to someone in our IT department she says that Netscape has training modules for MS Excel and Word. She also says that she thinks that it has a training program to teach people how to type.

Here's my questions for her: (which I'm too nice to ask)

1. Why would a browser have training modules?

2. Why on earth would Netscape support Microsoft applications?

3. If this is coming from our IT staff, (which I highly doubt) why are they getting paid more than I?

And last but not least:

4. If Netscape has these training modules does it also have one that teaches common sense?

One of the many days at work (working at a retail/repair shop)

We all of course get some of the most unknowing human beings walk in and ask questions or have problems that only common sense would tell you the right answer.

The best is when you deal with people that get old computers and try to use new technology on it.

One day i received a phone call from a man who had gotten an old 486 for 200 bucks (don't ask me why, but he thought it was a good deal)

So as it goes

(man) I just bought this "new" computer from a buddy of mine and I'm having trouble loading this AOL CD i got in the mail

(me) well what's the problem your having?

(man) I stick the CD in and nothing comes on

(me) well maybe your autoplay function isn't working, are you running windows.

(man) yes I'm running Windows 95

(me) ok, do this for me, go to the "My Computer" icon and double click on it, then look for the icon that looks like a cd-rom and double click on that.

(man) there is no cd-rom icon

(me) ok well, maybe a wire has come loose, why don't you bring it in so I can take a look at it.

So an hour had passed and the man brought the machine in, and I looked at it puzzled.

All that was on the computer was a 3.5" floppy and a 5.25" floppy drive.

(me) sir you dont have a cd-rom in this computer

(man) Yes i do, this thing right here with the flap, i put the cd in and it doesn't spin up

I had to explain to the man that his buddy just ripped him off, and that floppy drive isn't a cd-rom, the man left in a fit of anger, but i laughed hysterically.

I am not a techie. I am the fool on the other end - the worst kind (ever heard the expression a little knowledge is a dangerous thing?).

I suffered from "weird screen syndrome".I phoned IT support the other day because when I turned up one morning and switched on the screen it was blue. Then Blue and pink, then red and green, then it proceeded to go through all the different colour sequences of the rainbow (at one point it made the correct colour sequence of neapolitan ice cream).

The response I got from a very tired sounding helpdesk operator was "Sir, please switch your base unit on"

I had left the base unit on all night and then switched it off, thinking I was switching it on, in the morning. These variable colour changes are an HP monitor default setting.

Incidentally, you can also get a variation of weird screen syndrome when you need to degauss. My old boss once sent 2 monitors back to the manufacturer for this (all either of them needed was a degauss). He also went through 5 mice before I showed him how to clean them.

Weird screen III (just when you thought it was safe). Sent an Access database to our in-house Access whiz for him to jazz up. It came back without the database window being visible. I kept opening the relationship window and then clicking on the database window icon. Nothing. I phoned him back and said "Hey you sent me a version with no database window". He said "see the scroll bar? Right? Now scroll to the right". There it was - a minimised database window (as a Techie he gets those huge 85" monitors that make us mere mortals so jealous).

Seen the mouse pointer on the Compaq Armada sometimes go haywire (float persistently to the edge of the screen?). I discovered that this is due to typing with it on your lap. When you push down on the little nipple to control the pointer you are bending the board - simply bend it the other way to fix it. Keep this up and after a few weeks you will snap the damn thing in half and, hey presto, and ergonomic split keyboard laptop (one half on each knee). I also snapped a key off in the lock on my Compaq docking station - I turned it with tweezers a few times before I called up and admitted it.

One case where I wasn't being a total div was when I bought a Time PC. In booting up Windows for the first time (why not pre-install it?) on a brand spanking new top of the line Time Machine it suffered such a fatal error that no amount of telephone support could fix it (Friday afternoon machine perhaps?). They had to give me my money back.

Its not always the users fault you know - sometimes PC's and software are just plain crap. That's why we often jump straight to the wrong conclusions and thereby provide such great stories for you guys. Keep up the good work.

I worked at Microsoft, in the Travel section.

One morning, a coworker said 'come look at this'. Someone had busted into his computer and took some boards out of it. Okay, we called security. The security guy finally shows up, looks at the computer like some untouchable article.

We're waiting for him to start asking questions. He stands there.

So we start saying we came in at such and such time....but he cuts us off, saying "Did they steal any pens or pencils, or anything else off the desk?"

?????????

My company produce a CD-based document library system which consists of about 20+ CDs. When the users locate a document, they are asked to insert a disc from the library. To make it easier, some people copy the discs to a network drive and read them fromm there.

Anyway, I had a call earlier from an IT guy at one of my customer's sites. He was getting asked for CDs. He didn't seem to think this was right and he had confused our first line team so they'd put him through to me. I asked if he had copied the CDs to his network - advising him that this would take 15GB of space. He said no, and that he'd just run the SETUP.EXE routine to install the application (this doesn't copy the discs - it doesn't even ask for them). So I said that the program was correct in asking for the CD - in the absence of anywhere else to look, it goes for the CD. He eventually saw the logic in my argument and put the CD in - lo and behold it worked.

What I can't fathom is how he thought the document would appear on his screen! Osmosis? And he's a techie... Give me strength!

This happened a while ago... some old users were having problems getting to web sites. It *might* start bringing up the top or parts after a while, but never enough.

We finally brought it in. I figured it out fairly easily...

It was an odd model, I forget from where, but it had a couple of jacks built into the case for the on-board 2400 baud modem.

Yep, 2400. Tells you how old.

Plug it into the right modem (a 33.6 that was actually installed properly), and it worked a lot faster....

I've worked in the Computer Services dept. of a local college for almost four years. One of the funniest calls I ever received was about four months ago when a secretary asked me how to dispose of confidential documents. I gave her our standard answer: "run the documents through the shredder."

She informed me that she had done that, but didn't know how to get rid of the original information on a floppy disk. I told her to put the disk in the computer and use the "quick format" option to erase the disk. She hesitated, then said the disk no longer fit into the computer. "Why not?" I asked.

"Well," she replied, "the floppy disk kind of got stuck in the shredder with the printed documents."

I informed her that if the computer couldn't accept the disk, she probably didn't have to worry (at least not about the documents!)

This isn't really a technical tale, but it involves a computer...sort of.

I work at a place that refurbishes old computers and gives them away to schools for free. The procedure is, you grab a computer, grab a monitor, grab a keyboard and mouse, test them, fix anything that's broken and upgrade non-standard parts, wrap everything with bubble wrap and send it out.

I was playing with old parts and put together a little computer for myself. Just for fun, I set it to use a Dvorak keyboard. If you don't know, a Dvorak keyboard is designed better than the traditional Qwerty keyboard, which was designed to slow down typists on old typewriters so the keys wouldn't jam. There's obviously no worry of this with computers so the Dvorak keyboard was designed with the most commonly used letters on the home row, so it's easier to type. I popped the keys off a regular keyboard and stuck them back on in Dvorak format. Then I set my computer to use the Dvorak keyboard. (Any Windows PC can do this.)

Anyway, the point is that I was using a keyboard with the keys all rearranged. So I came in the next morning a few hours late and my keyboard's gone!!

I said to the induhvidual sitting at the desk I was at the day before (we don't have assigned desks, which sometimes stinks, such as now), "Hey, did you see a keyboard with the keys all rearranged anywhere?"

"No..."

So I'm looking all around my desk and I don't see the keyboard. Well, I decided to forget it for a while and go back to the warehouse and grab some parts. As I was walking along, I passed the section where we put the packed computers that are ready to go out to schools. I noticed a familliar keyboard peeking out of some bubble-wrap. I took a closer look. It was my Dvorak keyboard!!

Some idiot had taken my Dvorak keyboard, put it on a regular computer and tried to send it out! And s/he never noticed! The computer was set to Qwerty! The keyboard was a Dvorak! When you typed letters with the keyboard different letters would show up on the screen!

So I swapped my keyboard with a regular one. I commented to another cow-worker, "Look what some idiot did! He sent out my customized keyboard!" (I didn't dare use such a complicated word as Dvorak.) He said, "What's different about it?"

If my jaw were not on a hinge it would have hit the floor. I grabbed the arm of another passing cow-worker. "TELL ME, TELL ME WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS KEYBOARD!" I screamed.

"Well, there's a little notch out of this side. But other than that it looks okay." (It was one of the IBM keyboards with a notch in one side.)

I grabbed a regular keyboard off another desk. "COMPARE THE TWO FRIGGIN' KEYBOARDS!"

"Oh...........it's..............broken!"

There is now a large sign taped to my keyboard: "DVORAK KEYBOARD: DO NOT SEND OUT!"

One of the induhviduals has been bragging around the office that he was involved in a hit-and-run over the weekend. He hit someone, and drove off quickly. I think this makes an excellent case for reporting him.

(traditional tech greetings and verification)

HIM: I cant send email to anyone. Ive tried many addresses. Are your servers still having problems?

ME: Whats error msg are you receiving?

HIM: something about the email address being rejected

ME: Are you sure you are sending to a valid email address?

HIM: Im positive.

ME: theres no odd punction or spaces or anything?

HIM: Ive been using email for years now, I know how to do it.

I instruct him to forward me a copy of the bounce back. When he is repeating my email address back to me for confirmation he starts off with "www." I quickly correct him, thinking little of his simple minded verbal mistake.

I receive the bounce back.

- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -

(www.user@isp.com)

MAILBOX NOT FOUND

After a painful process of removing a www. from all the email addresses in his address book, all was said and done.

Working in an Australian ISP with a Canadian accent has given me some real weirdos who think I'm American and for whatever reason hate Americans.

The strangest call I've had along those lines was:

Me: Welcome to blah blah blah... how can I help you?

Him: You don't need to shout, we don't shout at each other in this country you know!

Call went downhill from there. Funniest bit was

Me: What's your account name?

Him: Nappy Express.

Me: [unable to find it in the database] Could you spell that please?

Him: You don't know how to spell nappy?

Me: Might be line noise or something but it's best you tell me exactly how you spell your account name so I get the correct account.

Him: *exasperated sigh* It's just nappy express! You do know how we spell nappy in this country don't you?

Me: Look, better safe than sorry, could you just spell it please?

Him: [as if to a child] n-a-p-e-e-e-x-p-r-e-s-s.

I wish I'd complimented him on his original spelling.

Just another nightind ISP-land, 80+ calls holding, hour long wait times and I get this luser complaining about the TV listings on his homepage, demanding to know where we get them from.

Seems that he's mad because the listings said that channel 14 would be showing Xena at 4pm... and even the digital guide on the cable remote says that Xena is supposed to be on. (As if I'm supposed to know EXACTLY what his tv remote looks like!) But when he goes there it's nothing but an infomercial and he wants to know why we can't get his TV listings straight!

Good for the call times... bad for a tech's nerves.

I am a 2nd level tech for a company that supports many different operating systems and levels of users. I just checked out a system that was "Running slow" so I decided to check out the system properties right off the bat. now keep in mind that the user just purchased her computer 2 months ago from Best Buy and it has been in the shop 5 times since the user has owned the system. i had the user read to me everyting that was on all the different irqs. Everything looked fine till the user hit irq9 where I found the NIC, Sound card, Video card, PCI controler, ISA controler, Modem, and the link to irq2, plus a irq holder for all the physical objects. That is a new record here in the office for the number of unique objects on any single irq.

JA!

I'm the IT director for a small (25 emp) company.

I come into work one Monday morning and my boss immediately calls me into his office where another employee is sitting. He tells me I need to sit down so we can discuss my job performance. (Now I get a bit nervous running through my head what could have gone wrong)

He begins to explain that this is (insert name here) and he has not had network access for 3 days. He wants to know why I haven't fixed the problem, how I like working there, etc, etc.

Okay, fine. I go to the user's compuer, I open explorer, I click the + sign next to My Computer to expand the folders, and the 'network' magically appeared.

Needless to say, I was asked to leave the room so the boss could talk to the other guy about why he hasn't done any work in 3 days.

Ah, the techie life and the morons we babysit.

We had been having some problems with our new video capture card. Since they are open banker's hours, long distance, there was about a 30-45 minute wait until the technician came on the line. While my wife and I were waiting, we decided to do some housework. I happened to be on the phone while my wife was cleaning up. After about ten minutes, I see my wife hobble in from outside holding her leg with a blood soaked rag. The conversation went something like this:

Me:"What happened to your leg?"

Wife:"Well, I was taking the garbage out, and a piece of broken glass was sticking out of the bag. I think it cut my leg a little."

Me:"Well, let's see how bad it is"

I look at it, and the gash is about 2 inches wide, and gushing blood!

Me:"Dear, we have to get you over to the hospital to have that looked at."

Wife:"Oh no you don't! We waited over half an hour to get him on the line, and I want this card fixed now! My leg will wait for 5 minutes."

Me:"Um, OK...."

Needless to say, there wasn't much else we could try. I can only imagine what the tech on the other side of the phone was thinking at this point.

I work internal support for a electronics company, you'd think our users would at least understand the very basic stuff, but now and again they crack me up. Case in point early this morning I got this call...

User: My computer's not working...

Me: What's wrong with it?

User: The screen is blank.

Me: Is the power light on the monitor on?

User: Yes.

Me: What Color is it?

User: Amber.

Me: Is the green power light on the computer on?

User: (Sheepishly) No.

Me: Try pushing the power button...(trying hard not to laugh at this point)...is it working now?

Of course it was...

Caller:My monitor just won't hook up to my computer!

Secretary:Oh, do you have the right port?

C:I'm not sure, but when the monitor works by itself, it's also a little fuzzy.

S:What do you mean, a little fuzzy?

C:Well it works fine for the normal channels, but cable has a lot of static.

I'm not an official tech although I have a 3 PC LAN at home (soon to be 4, having computers is like eating peanuts, can you stop at one?) and I'm probably not the first with this story, but I have to tell the one about catching my wife trying to insert a CD ROM into a 5 1/4" floppy drive slot. When I screamed at her to stop she couldn't understand the fuss!!Incredibly, she had used the CD ROM drive many times. Probably a case of PEBCK, or a blonde day.Yep, she's a blonde. Needless to say, I copied all the files to the hard drive and banished the 5 1/4" drive.

Love your site

Regards, Rob

Not exactly a tech tale, but I found it amusing.

Back about 20 years ago, when the IBM PC's were hot stuff and a 10 MB hard disk drive was HUGE, my supervisor managed to convince our chief engineer that my boss needed a hard drive in his dual-floppy computer. He ordered the drive and I installed it; it was one of those "hard card" designs and was probably the easiest hardware installation I'd ever done. Once it was installed, I tested it by writing a simple Basic program that opened a file and just wrote junk to the file until it couldn't get any bigger, then quietly terminated. I ran the program and saw my test file (named test.txt) had a size of just under 10,000,000 bytes. I deleted the file and told my supervisor it was working.

Ten minutes later, he called me from his office and said, "Just exactly what does test.bas do?" I answered "It writes a file until the hard drive can't hold any more, then stops." "OK, how do I get my hard drive space back? I only have a couple of K left." "Just delete test.txt."

About 25 yers ago, in the days when TRS-DOS, LDOS, and CP/M were still battling it out and the iBM PC was still a rumor, my boss bought our lab a very nice, CP/M-based system which came with lots of neat software. He asked me to back up all the diskettes and have the originals stored in the company's safe. I had never used CP/M before, so I asked him to write the command down. He wrote down the command, which was, I think, "CPYDISK A: B:." He also worte which drive the original went in and which drive took the target. I inserted the original in drive A;, and the target in drive B: (as he toled me) and typed in the command. After about five minutes, I checked the directory of drive B:. Empty. I checked drive A:. Empty. I called my boss and explained what happened. He immediately chewed me out, telling me I'd stupidly copies the blank disk tot he original. When he came down to the lab and I showed him the paper, he stared at it for several seconds, said "Oops; sorry. I transposed the source and destination."

Fortunately, the vendor had me mail them the damaged original diskette and replaced it immediately.

I work for a company that provides contract support for several companies, including a major OEM.

[Tech] Me,

[ID10-T] Customer.

[ID10-T] "I'm trying to fix my system, and I don't know what to do next."

[Tech] Well, what's on your screen right now?

[ID10-T] "Well, it's the white background with the CD's, and there's a window there that lists all my drives on the top, and on the bottom says 'Initialization was successful."

[Tech] So you wanted to erase your drive and install to a clean disk?

[ID10-T] "Yup. So what do I do next?"

[Tech] Well, from here you quit out of Drive Setup, close the Utilities window, and double-click on *[brand-name]* OS Install.

[ID10-T] "Great. And that will keep all of my information on my hard drive intact -- right?

[Tech] Wait -- I thought you said that you had just initialized the hard drive?

[ID10-T] Yup -- but that doesn't erase it, does it?

[Tech] Did you see the warning that says "Initializing will DESTROY all data on your drive?"

[ID10-T] Of course I saw it -- I read the message before I clicked it. But when they said "destroy," they don't realy mean, like DESTROY, do they?

[Tech] ?!?!?!?

Sadly, I've never had any terribly funny tech stories of my own (after a year and a half of tech support), but this happened to my trainer, and I think it's quite wonderful.

The user's company had just upgraded all their hardware, and needed to reinstall some software we had sold them. Unfortunately, though, the disks that they had for the software were 5 1/4, and new computers all had 3 1/2" drives. My trainer asked the EU to see if there was anywhere on the network that still had a 5 1/4" drive--and she disappeared for ten minutes. When she got back on the phone, she told him "Okay, we're ready to go!"

"Did you find a computer with a drive you can use?" he asked.

"No, but I found a pair of scissors, and cut it so it would fit."

"Um... I'll send you a new copy of the software..."

I both hope and don't hope that the story is true.

came accross this while reading the logs of a call that another tech had at the cable modem isp I worked for at the time.

" Subscribers's wife called to cancel the service for the modem. Subscriber is going to be away for 30-45 years and will be unable to use the service"

One day I got a massage from my ceo:

"There is a customer, his name is David, that very upset about are Tech-support, he left us a massage several times but we didn't call him back".

I asked my boss for his number to call him back, but I was replied: "He didn't left and he'll call again".

Well, after a while we got a massage from David on our voice mail box:

"My name is David, I'm very upset, I have a problem please call me back asap !!!" and guess what ... again ... he didn't leave any phone number !!!

I operate a fairly sizeable LAN across a city for the local Government agency responsible for the area. The LAN includes their Staff, Councillors, Mayor, Child Care Centres, Library Staff and Patrons across 8 suburbs... the list goes on. We still Operate a Fujitsu M640 Mainframe Class from the late 70's. This Mainframe runs Netbeui, and requires NT (shudder) to have the Protocol installed so it can communicate via the RS232 Cable. One of the Retards who holds a position qualifying a laptop, company car, phone, office that most people call Management, as well as the standard Desktop Computer. The User had just received his first laptop, and phoned us on the company phone from his car, WHILE HE WAS DRIVING, because he was attempting to use his computer at that time.

The call log was as follows:

GOOD MORNING ******* CITY COUNCIL INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SUPPORT, THIS IS ALEX, HOW CAN I HELP YOU?

Yes hi Alex, this is (insert idiot name here), my Mainframe Session has crashed.

OK ---- CAN I BOUNCE THE SESSION FOR YOU? WHATS YOUR TERMINAL I.D.?

uh, M26C0P21

------, IM SORRY BUT THAT IS YOUR PRINTER I.D. - DO YOU SEE THE P IN THE I.D. ? THAT MEANS ITS A PRINTER, I NEED THE I.D. THAT YOU HAVE BUT IT MUST HAVE A T IN IT...

uh - HEWLETT? but it has packard on the end of it?

*MUTE* LAUGHTER

NO, THATS THE BRAND NAME OF THE COMPUTER, WHAT IS YOUR TERMINAL I.D. - IT MAY BE PRINTED FOR YOU. LIFT THE COMPUTER, AND ON THE BOTTOM THERE WILL BE A STICKER WITH OUR LOGO, IT WILL HAVE A SERIAL NUMBER, NETWORK I.D. AND YOUR MAINFRAME TERMINAL I.D.

ahhh... there it is. M20C0T09

OKAY I WILL BOUNCE THAT FOR YOU. *KEYSTROKES ON THE MAIN TERMINAL* THATS DONE, THE SCREEN WILL CHANGE IN A FEW MOMENTS AND YOU WILL BE RIGHT AS RAIN

(protocol suggests we should stay on the line to make sure the bounce completes correctly)

SO JUST LET ME KNOW WHEN ITS DONE AND YOU WILL BE ON YOUR WAY.

its not changing. nothing is happening.

OK... IS THIS W98 OR WNT?

"...."

WHEN DID YOU RECEIVE THE LAPTOP?

yesterday...

OK THEN IT WILL BE RUNNING WINDOWS 98. CAN YOU PRESS DOWN ON THE CTRL-ALT-DEL KEYS ON YOUR KEYBOARD, AND TELL ME ANY PROGRAMS THAT ARE NOT RESPONDING.

one minute. i just have to pull over.

PULL OVER? ARE YOU IN YOUR CAR?

yes...

*head bangs on monitor, mute again, and speaker phone on so my colleagues can hear*

SO YOU ARE TELLING ME YOU ARE TRYING TO CONNECT TO THE MAINFRAME OVER THE NETWORK... WHILE YOU ARE IN YOUR CAR?

well thats what a laptop is for isnt it?

*MUTE SO MY COLLEAGUES CAN RELEASE THEIR LAUGHTER*

OK WELL YOU CAN'T ACTUALLY...... (i think you get the idea now)

We all ended up having a laugh about it, and exchanged stories over the dumbest idiots we have ever had. watch this space.... more to come.

A customer calls me and asks if I could work on his ANCIENT Packard Bell so I tell him I'll be right over, So I arrive at his house and we start it up and he tells me that he had gotten a new phoneline installed and since the local ISP said they would not change his phone number he would have to tell all his friends that he had a new number... I explained that dial-up ISP's don't really care what phone line you call from, as long as the password and login is the same. (Problem 1 fixed)

Next he tells me that the computer is slow starting up and that he thinks that he needs a new hard drive since it only has 0kb free... So I check it out and there is obviously at least 2 gig free and so not to make him feel stupid, I inform him of how to check his hard drive space, how to run defrag, and how to clear his history and Temporary Internet files. Upon showing him his history (connected to the internet mind you), I opened his Internet explorer and so his home page was a pornographic gay male site, I quickly went to the address bar and went to go to a more pleasant site. So right when I typed in the www. the history box pops up and shows me all the sites that he's been too. (very risque porn and bestiality sites) By this time I was very unconfortable and started to almost laugh at this sad little man.

He begins to appologize to me and tells me that he can't help himself blah, blah, blah. (History and Temporary files cleared) (Problem 2 fixed)

And at last he wants some registry problems fixed. And wanted some picture files to be associated with certain program. I show him how to do this and while doing some post config tests, I made sure that the graphic viewing program, so I opened a picture that was in the root directory. Big mistake. I opened a sexually explicit picture with two men. (Use your imagination...ick)

By this time I have had it and was getting up to leave, and he grabbed me and asked/begged me not to tell anyone. Needless to say the easiest and most disgusting job ended up coming to $500.

Ok, If you have ever learned anything in Tech Support, you have learned that there is allways a person that will never understand what you are talking about. Sometimes you are temped by makeing something up in your head just so that they do not bother you anymore. This is why you should not do that.

Me) Ok what seems to be the problem?

Other person) Well my computer is broke.

Me) Ok, why dont you tell me what happened.

OP) Well I was working on a customer file when my computer stoped working. Now it says that my computer is broken.

Me) Is that the exact error message that you saw?

OP) Yes, that is what it said, do you think that I can not read or something?

Me) (thinking yes) No thats not what I mean it is just that I have never heard of that error message before. Why dont you show me me computer and show me the message.

I then went to her desk to see exactly what the problem was.....

Me) Ok the screen is blank,(off) Where is the error meessage?

OP) Well it flashed on right before the computer turned off.

Me) Ok...(thinking what the hell) Where is the power switch to the computer.

OP) How am I supposed to know that?

Me) (this is when I looked under the desk and saw the power strip light was right where her feet were and it was off) Ok see this thing, this is where the electricty comes from to make the computer work. When the red light is not on, the power is not going to the computer. Ok so to make the computer work correctley you need to have power go to it. Ok?

OP)OH.... Ok so why is the computer broke?

Me) well I think you hit the switch with your foot.

OP) oh... OK so why is the computer broke?

Me) (giving up on this one) OK well dont worry about it now, it was jus a B2-9 Proxy Error Problem dealing with User Interface. ( this was my big mistake)

A little later on I get a call from my Admin. He is wondering what a B2-9 Proxy error problem is....

I explained to him what I had to do and how I gave up on the person explaining how a computer needs power to work. We both got a good laugh. But then A Microsoft Tech. called asking me the same question....

I found out that since the Other Person did not know what the problem was she call around 10 diffrent compainies and my boss, and his boss, and the CEO of the company. Microsoft Techs, other ISP's ect..... It was a mess, at the end of it all I ended up giving a lechture about the B2-9 proxy error problem. When at the end of it everyone relized it was a joke, I got chewed out like you have never seen before. But at least to this day and it has been at least 2 years, people that I have never even met have heard about the B2-9 Proxy error problem, and at least can get a good laugh about it.

I worked at a Radio Shack franchise as manager and chief computer technician for about 2 years, one day a customer comes in looking for a keyboard since his wasnt working anymore. I went next door to look at it and while we were there he talked about how it was a non standard keyboard that came with their server. I started looking at it and noticed something brown oozing out of the bottom seam (this was on the keyboard not the computer case) I pick it up and tilt it a little more brown stuff comes out. I ask what had been spilled in it and he says "My Wife dumped a cup of cappicino in it last night, but its suppose to be spill proof" I had to explain that it may be, for small spills but when 3/4 of the keys are stuck in the down position it wont work. started looking at the connector and it was a standard ps-2 connection. Went next door, charged him $30 for a new keyboard, and ended up tearing the old one apart, removing the electronics, cleaning the membrane, and tossing the keyboard itself with keys, and back plate in the dish washer at home to clean out the hardened cappucino. took it over and he paid me another $10 for the cleaning of it.

on a second note.

he thought that standard keyboard plugs were like the rest of his in his store. he had dummy terminals setup around the store with the old telephone type plug ins to the back of the monitor then a RS232 connector going to the server. This is a man who purchased a dot matrix printer for $500 to hook up when his old one died and the company bullied him into it to print labels off. I could have gotten the same printer for him for under $50 at MSU Salvage but he wanted the company to be happy. when it died a month later they tried making him purchase another one for the same amount, saying they didnt support hardware problems.

I work at a place that refurbishes computers that have been donated by generous individuals or companies that are upgrading. We refurbish them and give them away to schools for free. We are mostly volunteer-run, so we get many people that are new to computers and want to learn, maybe those that are taking computers in school and need some practical experience. I myself started because of this. However some people know the dictionary definitions of how computers work but have zero practical experience. Also zero common sense. I hope I was not like this when I joined. Anyway, I'm training two new people who are in college. They read books and do tests, but they have never even seen the inside of a computer!

Person number 1: Graham, I don't understand...this computer won't power up!

Me: (seeing that the light for the monitor is off. A quick check in the back reveals the problem.) Oh, you must have forgotten to plug in the power cable for your monitor.

She actually removes the power cable from the computer and plugs it into the monitor!!!

Person number 2: Hey, Graham, I want to remove the RAM from this computer just to see if I can do it...is that okay?

Me: (foolishly thinking that not even he could be as foolish as the last one) Sure! No problem! But you'll need to remove the power cable for the hard drive so you can get at the RAM.

Person number 2: (much later, and very worried) Graham, I think I broke something...the computer can't find the hard drive...

Me: Um, did you reconnect the power cable!

And then the light dawns...

One computer Person 1 was working on had a bad hard drive. So I told her to replace it, and that she needed to remove a little carriage that held both the floppy and hard drives, then she could unscrew the hard drive from the carriage. About fifteen minutes later she had installed the new drive and suddenly started laughing.

Me: Eh, what's so funny?

Person number 1: Oh, all this time I put the drive in backwards! See, the carriage won't go in! (She starts to take out the screws...)

Me: Well, wait a minute, it looks right to me, let me take a look. (Some drives have places to put screws in in several places and it was possible she had chosen the wrong one, but no...)

Me: You have the carriage in backward!

It was a good thing she had a good sense of humor. Otherwise she would have really put the drive in backwards.

i run a web hosting/design company in a small town, i love this place and the people and in my field you can work anywhere :) anyway, as a courtesy to the locals, we do tech support on the side and rarely charge a fee for the service in most cases. unfortunately, some people take this to an extreem and we could not resist a little sport in one case: THIS IS THE TALE...

(*phone ringing*)

my partner: thank you for calling ########, how can i help you?

(*a few seconds pass*)

partner with hand over phone: it's her again. she says her computer is telling her to insert bootable media.

(*idea pops in my head*)

i pick up a blank floppy and slowly circle it above my head.

(*my partner looks a bit confused at first, then a slight smile appeared on his face*)

my partner: okay, i want you to look at he front of your tower (*partner clicking on speaker phone*) and press the button on your floppy disk drive.

customer: my tower? what is that?

my partner: the box that stands upright that your put your CD's in.

customer: oh, my CPU. okay. (*click of floppy popping out*)

my partner: now, see the plastic disk that just popped out? i want you to pull it out of the machine very carefully. be sure and be very gentle. if you jar it, you could ruin the magnetic fields.

after a minute or so, the customer says: okay, i have it out, now what?

my partner: okay, the magnetic fields are out of alignment just a fraction, so we are going to have to fix this. take the floppy and spin it above your head as fast as you can and say floppy 15 times. the tone of your voice will help settle the fields.

customer: okay... floppy, floppy,floppy, floppy, etc ...

my partner: okay now, gently place the floppy back in the hole you took it out of and push it in until you hear a click.

a few seconds this time: *click*

my parner: now push the enter key on your keyboard one time.

customer: it still says insert bootable media.

my partner: hmmm, sounds pretty bad. only one thing left to do at this point. take out the floppy very gently and and hold it very close to your mouth and say floppy 15 times.

customer: *click* (muffled) floppy, floppy, floppy, etc...

my partner: now set the floppy next to your keyboard and press the enter key.

customer: okay. WOW it worked!

To this day she still has no clue what had just happened ;)

I work 3rd level tech support for a wireless company. We come across this problem with many "virgin" cellular users. Unfortunately, our 1st and 2nd level support should have caught this one, so that doesn't say much for them. This customer called in, after purchasing her cell phone 3 months prior, complaining that she is not receiving her calls. I had to call her contact number to get in touch with her, because after spending an hour testing her account with a test phone, I could not duplicate the situation, and she lived inside the city limits, so there was no problem with reception. I asked her to make a test call outbound, the call connected. I called her number, the call went to an "unavailable" message. I had her tell me how many "signal bars" were on the phone and to make another test call. She replied saying she had all 5 bars, and the next test call outbound connected again. Looking at her call records for the past month, and her past 2 bills, she really has not received any phone calls. I asked her to make one more test call outbound. This time, I heard a very faint tone (turns out to be the wake-up tone most cell phones make when powering on). Come to find out, she was not pressing "end" to end the call, she was pressing the power button, and was turning the phone off after she made a call, and would not turn it back on until ready to make another call. Very politely, I had to explain to her that the phone needs to be turned on to receive phone calls. She did not understand. She asked, "I don't have a very big package of minutes to use. Won't keeping my phone on charge me airtime?"

What's sad about this, is that when I was in 1st and 2nd level support, we received a HIGH volume of calls with this same problem. How about making "virgins" take a mandatory class called "Cellular 101"?

I am a DSL support agent for a large ISP and this is a phone call I get at least two times a day:

Tech: "Thank you for calling Qwest DSL technical support how can I help you today?"

Customer: "Hi, I'm filling out my ISP information worksheet, and I need some help."

Tech: "Okay, where are you stuck?"

Customer: "Well it's asking for my ISP name and the technical support phone number. What's my ISP name?"

Tech: "Qwest."

Customer: "Not Qwest.net?"

Tech: "You can put Qwest.net if you would like."

Customer: "And what's the technical support phone number?"

I work for a big chain of electronic stores as a in-store tech.

It's silly season here I think. I've been getting some weird people come upto the tech bench of late. The other day I had a couple of conspiracy theorists come upto me and ask why they had a TV card in side their HP computer in the first place!!! The machine had just come back from service and the service techs sent that the machine was having problems from the fact that the after-market Philips TV card was locking up Windows. Anyway they had no idea how the card got into the machine (I think their son put it in) and so gutted the machine and brought it back to us in bits!!! 'Shock-horror'. One of the women kept saying that she worked for the government and why did her LAN card now have a government serial number on it!!! This is what kinda happened.

"...Errrr... It's a HP serial number, that's all".

"What about these cables, they weren't in there before and why does one run to the modem?"

"...!!! Well they've got to be in the machine in the first place for the machine to work".

I then showed the mad couple what each cable did.

"Then why is the government putting cables in my machine!"

There's me standing there, thinking 'Did I just talk to a brick wall'. "The government hasn't done anything, HP put them in there in the first place for the thing to work".

The she went into her bag and got out all the other cards. 'WHAT THE **** HAS SHE DONE!!!!!!!!'

"...Errrr, mam... Are those cards from your PC".

"Yes, where did you think I got them from?"

"Mam, under the warranty agreement you can't do that... What are you wanting from us today?".

"I want to have my machine exchanged"

"Nope! I can't do that-".

"Why not, the government is spying on us".

At this point I was really trying not to smile or laugh. "Errr...How are they doing that mam".

"We think someone in the service center put this in my machine. This modem and where did this card come from (the TV card)".

"Well that modem card is a LAN card-"

"I knew THAT!!! Where did this one come from".

"I don't know mam. It's not standard in HP machines, maybe your son put it in there-".

"No! And what's this number?"

"That's a HP serial number-".

"NO it's not, I work for the government".

"What do you do for them?"

"I'm not going to tell you that! Now are you going to exchange this out or not".

"No mam, I can't do that. You've opened up your machine and removed everything from inside. If you want us to put it back together we'll have to charge you $60 an hour".

" I've taken this machine to the FBI you know and they checked it out".

"...And what did they say?".

"Well they had a look at it and didn't say much at all, they just gave it back to us".

'Oooh, I wonder why!!!' "Is that right".

"And right now after this we're driving to DC and handing it over to the US Marshals office for them it have a look".

"Well... Okay, your going to drive all that way?".

"YES, well we're not going to fly you know!!!"

I didn't want to ask, so I left that!

"Okay, mam. What else can I do for you?"

"Your not going to exchange this PC?"

"Sorry, I can't do that".

"Then I want you to put it back together, but I'm not paying, I have a B*** B** service plan".

"I can't do that under your service plan, you'll need to pay us to it".

"Why? This machine is covered for three years".

"But not under you taken the thing to bits".

"Then I want your name and the managers name?"

"My name is Lee, it's on my shirt as you can see and the managers name is M*** K*******".

"I want your full name?"

"You can't have that, sorry".

"Why not?"

"You could be anybody".

With that they left the store, bits and all. A couple of days later their son phoned and asked if he could have a manager so he could ask for an exchange. The managers answer "NO".

I had been in my first real support job for about six weeks and I was still trying really hard to impress my supervisor (which was not easy). So I was upset to have her pull me aside and dress me down for saying I had set up a certain user's computer had reported I had double checked everything. Well the user was calling her and said it would not even power on!

When I went to check the computer the user was not there, so I powered it on and it worked fine. I powered it back off and I was sitting there puzzled when the user walked in. I said it was working and she exclaimed, "you got it working! How did you do that?!?".

I explained that all I had done was turn it on. She reached over and flipped on the monitor and nothing happened. She looked at me like I was the biggest liar ever and said, "see, it does not work." I reached down to the mini tower next to her desk and slowly, very slowly so she could see, pressed the power switch. The monitor came to life and then she asked, "what is that thing on the floor?"

I work as tech support for a major PC maker. and although I get some weird calls the one my freind got takes the cake.

(Names have been changed to protect the innocent. or stupid)

Tech support: Thank you for calling -------- (goes through speil and gets name and serial # of computer.)

Tech support: How may I help you.

USER: Yeah I just got my computer back from bench repair and they did not do a thing.

Tech support: You still have the same problem.

USER: Yeah, it still will not turn on.

Tech support: OK. I'll bring up the service and find out what they did to the computer.

This is what he finds.

Box Waybills 3/12/01 12:01:16 PM - FedEx ****** FedEx ******

*** Number Reference Number Unit Shipment Waybill

********* ******* FedEx 473532861742

Contact Shipping Address Return Waybill

***************************

***-***-**** **** Texas **** South

**********, TX *****

Serial Number Status Warranty Status

********** Shipped Customer-Y / ******

Description Manufacturer Manufacturer Part

**** DESKTOP PC *****

Repair History

Awaiting Receip Specify--No Power to the tower...

Receive

Sort No Power

Symptom Fix unit is contaminated with roaches. No Power Other Fix (see comment field)

NTF Screen Unit is to be returned with letter

FRU Repair to the end user stating why the

unit was

Customer Suppor refused repair. Live insects are/were

NTF residing inside the computer. Return

Customer Contac with letter of explanation SHIP AS IS

Audit

Ship

Part Usage

Part Number Description

No parts used.

Additional Accessories

Part Number Description

No additional accessories received.

Repair Cycles

Cycle CSO Number Reference Number Receipt Date Shipment Date

* ********* ********** ************* *****

The computer had live coakroaches in it. And this computer was in his daughters bedroom.

My freind explained why no service was done to the computer and ended the call.

After laughing about this for awhile we found out from people around us that this is pretty common.

talk about your computer having a few bugs.

I currently work for Direcpc as a senior tech. Our system downloads information though a satilite dish that is mounted. The satilite signal is about the size of a golf ball. It is hard to get and an inch of movement can cause the person to lose a signal. I told a customer that he lost his signal because the dish was mounted on a tree in his yard. The Customer then said "but it has worked for about 3 years with no problem...and the tree has not moved!" this is the rest of the conversation:

ME: "Sir I understand that you have had no problem for a while but the dish must be mounted to a Non-Moving surface and tree's over time"

HIM: "Trees don't move though!"

ME: "OK sir lets just say that the we live in a perfect world. And lets also say that in this (perfect world) the tree only grows straight up...but the fact is sir the TREE STILL MOVED!"

HIM: I am going to move the dish to my roof and I bet that the LNB (line noise blocker...what cuts out alot of air noise) is bad!

Needless to say he did not call back.

My friend and I work in a large company install high speed

connections. That is to say we configure customer routers

and our company's and walk customers through the basic

install procedures over the telephone. Well, my friend has

the great privilege of working with people in the most

remote parts of the world. In fact it seems sometimes that

her customers have traded live stock to install their T1.

Well before she can get the lines installed, my friend needs

to call the customer and get some basic information. You

know, things like contact names, what equipment they have,

domain names, etc. On this particular occasion my friend

called the customer and asked to speak to the "technical

contact". This was a department store only in overseas in

a remote location. These were the most technically saavy

people there were for miles. Nobody in the place seemed to

know what she was talking about until someone suggested that

she spoke to the "electronics expert". My friend patiently

waited on the line when the store employees grabbed the

"electronics expert". He gets on the line and immediately

gets completely confused at the first question, "are you

going to be the person next to the router when the T1 is

installed?" Apparently he was the "electric appliance"

expert. He only understood blenders and toaster ovens, not

computers or routers. He puts my friend on hold and gets

the mall manager. Ofcourse the mall manager knows nothing.

So the call gets bounced around for a while until my friend

is talking to a bunch of people in an office where the modem

is kept. They are all sitting there debating all the

questions my friend is asking. My friend asks where the

router will be kept. They tell her it will be where the

modem is now kept, in a safe with a hole drilled out of it

so nobody can steal it. That seems to be the only answer

they have a clue about because when the questioning procedes

things start to get a bit messy.

My friend very innocently asks "How many IP addresses do you

have and what is your domain name?" There is a whole lot

of unintelligable discussion around the room until my friend

hears "I can't find a screw driver. Here just pry it open

with this." And then she hears the sound of bending metal

right before one of the customers come back to the phone.

They inform her that they cannot find their IP addresses in

there router. Where inside the router should they look?

They had pried open their $4000 router with a the back of a

hammer to locate the IP addresses. The kicker of this is

they wanted to know if they should open the modem to look

for the domain name.

They ended up cancelling their order a few weeks later. They

must not have ever been able to find those IP addresses.

I'm the only support tech at one of the few long standing free UNIX shell services. I was doing great, not a single dumb question... 5 minutes to the end of my work day I get this email:

Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 13:36:31 -0500

From: Clueless Luser (clueless_luser@freemail.com)

To: support@FreeShellAccountService.com

Subject: question bout yer site

hello

why do all the free shell accounts seem to be linux?

because i wanted to have a program on the web that runs all the time

but it only runs in windows - and i'm not on all that much....

____________________________________________________________

Windows SHELL accounts? Uhm.. no?

*boggle*

By the by, his IP traced to a rather large and "user friendly" ISP.

I'm sorry, but this was just funny.

I work as a tech for a big blue/yellow electronics outlet and we get many people in not knowing a thing about computers. Here is just one example:

C: "I need fer y'all to fix my mouse, it ain't working no good."

Us: "Well sir, we can clean it for you, but we'll have to charge you $10 to scratch the dirt off with our fingernail, I would suggest you do that yourself!"

C: "What should I use to clean it with?"

Us: "Your fingernail."

C: "I tried that, it didn't do no good."

Us: "You just need to scratch it off, with your fingernail."

C: "Well, if I do that and it doesn't work, whadya think I oughta do?"

Us: "Buy a new mouse."

C: "What kind?"

Us: "A basic mouse, one without a wheel."

C: "Oh, one without this wheel?"

Us: "No sir, that is a ball, this is a type of mouse with a wheel here. Just get a basic mouse."

C: "A basic what?"

Us:"...Mouse!"

C: "huh?"

We now we think people should take a test or get a licence to by a PC these days.

This story is about is about myself.

Now, I'm fairly good with computers, I have even done some of my own upgrades (video card, memory, etc.).

One day I decided to buy and new, top-of-the-line sound system for my pc. I bought brand new speakers and an SB Live! soundcard. I went inside the case and hooked the card into the PCI slot, put tyhe case back on, booted it up, disabled my s***y onboard sound, and inserted an audio cd. silence.

After a few seconds thought I realized I had forgoten to change the audio cable from the connector on the MoBo to the one on the sound card. I shut down the PC, unhooked everything (AGAIN!), opened it up, and noticed there were 4 connecters the audio cable could go on. Without consulting the manual as to which one it goes on (Stupid, always check the manual!) I chose the one on the far right.

I closed the PC up, booted, and played the audio cd. Frustrated, I turned the speakers all the way up, Listening for any trace of sound, to no avail. I shut down, opened the case, consulted the manual, and realized i should have put it on the far left.

After correcting my mistake, I booted up and played the cd.

The deafening blast of audio that burst forth from my speakers litterally knocked me off my seat (acually, i sort of jumped backwards)

My ears were ringing for at least an hour afterward.

I work as a tech support at a school where each classroom has a computer.

A teacher just came to the Help Desk and told me "one of her students has broken the monitor."

I went there, what was that? The horizontal adjust has been set to the far left. I set it back, and told her I fixed it up.

In the way from the computer to the door, it has been hard to keep from laughing but I managed to hold up. She had a class being given, and I didn´t want the students to know about her "computing skills".

Gosh I wish I had such a piece of device !

Quote :

"hello!

My account executive XYZ, has his Ac adaptor for

laptop 765-D that does not work anymore.

We don't know the reason, but

He does not load memory on laptop anymore.

We need another one"

Working at Staples in the electronics department, sometimes I wish I could tell a customer what I really think of him.

A Luser comes in wanting to return a cash register he purchased from us. The cash register is a simple one, where you have to program the tax rate, the users, and the departments and their associated tax rates. He said he wants to return it because it's too hard to program. Now the Staples that I work at does not have a tech center, and, once the equipment leaves our doors, technical support is provided by the manufacturer. The luser said he called the manufacturer (Royal) and the tech support rep told him to take it back to Staples (obviously, Royal provides morons as tech support people). As a goodwill, I offered to start the programming for him, but not all of it, since he has twenty-some odd departments and I have other customers to take care of. I was off the next day, so I left specific instructions to the person who works in the Electronics department to tell the luser that I only started programming the departments, and the rest he'll have to do himself.

The luser returns two days after I come back, telling me that I did not program it correctly. I told him, in my nicest way, that we were not a tech center and that I started it and that it's pretty simple. He said it's too hard for him and that he wants another cash register. I told him that all of the cash registers that we carry needs some kind of programming. He tells me that he wants to return it then. I bit my lip then. What I really wanted to say: "Go ahead and return it, you moron. It's obvious that you are too stupid to own one anyway. If you want no programming, then spend a couple of thousand bucks on a Point of Sale System where everything is programmed for you."

After answering the phone and speaking with an elderly gentleman who admitted up front that he knew nothing about computers but nonetheless wanted to get connected, I finally figured out that he wanted to put his business on the web. I went over some options with him, explaining he could have a web page explaining his business and one for his products, one for help, etc. Baffled, he replied: "That seems like alot. I don't think we need a whole page, maybe we could just start with a half-page?"

at one time I was a Gateway Technition, the afternoon at Tech support was going good, all smooth, all calls where down to buisness, serious, reached for coffee cup taking a sip, my line jingled, after saying opening script including how may I help you, a concerned females voice says "I have a question that may be dumb" mam the only dumb question is the question not asked, "well ok, what is the numbers for on my Mouse?" stuned for a moment, asked what the numbers looked like, "theres F1 F2 up to F12 and the usual numbers 1 to 0 at the bottom is Ctrl and Alt" then a light light, suddenly realised she has a Touch pad on her Keyboard, explained the F1 ect was her keyboard and asked if the mouse was part or attached to her keyboard? "yes, the young man who sold me my Computer told me it was my Mouse" ok mam you have a combination keyboard with touch pad, the touchpad is equal to a mouse, she then understood and stated we had helped her and thanked us for being there.

at Tech Support, day going ok, when line jingled, opening with script to include How may I help you? a very upset and distraunt elderly womans voice says "My start button jumped sudenly to the top right, what is this some sort of a joke my Computer is playing on me?" this happens alot, and many calls come in on this one, also this one is a how to, so enplained to the woman that this happens when the left mouse button is a bit slow on release, she then calmed down some, explained that computers get confused also and that the compuer is fine and that I will need to say only once this is a how to, explained the procedure for click drag and drop, "Oh I understand, but I'm not very Coordinated, it doesn't want to cooperate with me" explained that she will need to work and practice with what I had explained to her, "Ok but if it doesn't work I will be calling you back"

ok mam you have a good day.

this one is humorous as picturing a person trying to click the right spot hold and drag the startbar to the position they want.

This message was found on the Tech Support answering machine

at our ISP. It was saved on our mailbox and passed around

the office for all to hear:

"Uuuhh... yes. My name is (customer), XXX-XXXX. I wanna

move my computer to the other side of the room. I wanna

unplug the phone jack and the electrical jack. Is that

okay? Thank you."

(This is a verbatim transcript)

We had a customer call in and say that his monitor would not work and that he tried everything. We asked him the usuall stuff and he said that he gave up already and that he went outside and placed the monitor in the parking lot. We said ok, really where is it, he said listen ...

...next thing we heard was an engine from an automobile. Then we heard a loud pop and crunching sounds. He turned off his vehicle and said i know it doesnt work now. WE still thought he was joking. So he hung up the phone and we just wrote it off as a joke. The very next day, we got an overnight package from this store. Inside the box was the monitor in a thousand pieces.

this damn guy was extremely pissed, who in the world would spend that kind of money to ups junk????

needless to say, this person is not a store manager anymore

Yeah, this is another one, from the same teacher who had her monitor adjusted and thought it has been broken.

Now she has come to the Help Desk and told me when "she turned on the monitor, the power light would be green, and then orange."

I thought, if the power light goes orange, the monitor must not have been getting any signal from the computer. Knowing how much of a computer illiterate the poor teacher is, I went to solve the problem, expecting to see a monitor cable unattached and such...

I´ve checked, the cable was in place. Then I TURNED ON THE COMPUTER, and she was happy again! :P

Question: is there really that much of a difference between lower case and upper case letters?

WHY is it so hard for end users to understand the phrase "LOWER CASE LETTERS"? Why do they always ask "Is that lower cap letters?" or "What is that?"

I would like to believe and trust that the human race has some common sense. That a person with a stupid DEGREE calling ME for support should know how to capitalize letters and such. The internet is eating away peoples brains.

I was working in a "family" owned & operated computer store.

A woman from the local county government office called & asked to speak to the technician that. "Instructed her to put her keyboard in the dishwasher to clean it".

The boss (my father-in-law) said he would handle the call. He said "No technician that works here, would have told you that." He said "I would fire anyone that did..."

She asked.. "What if it was you??"

He said " I would quit & let my sons take over".

She said she didn't remember the technicians name....but... " The only problem I have is.... When I put the keyboard in the top tray... How do I keep the cord from falling through & getting tangled in the spinning sprayer???"

We had alot of laughs with this...

Hello, I want a refund for computer work had done.

Is there a problem with a repair?

Yes, I had a new battery put into my p/c. When I brought it back home It won't turn on.

Is it plugged in?

Yes, it is I checked the cords & they are all plugged in.

Do you have it plugged into a surge protector?

No..

Is the computer itself turned on & showing any power lights?

I turn it on & nothing happens. There is a green light on my monitor.

Is it plugged into the wall??

I have checked all the cords & they are plugged in.

This sounds silly, but Ihave to ask.. Is there a black cord going from the back of your computer to the electrical outlet in the wall?

Let me look again. Ohhhh no there is not. I don't have a cord.

Well we don't take power cords into th shop with repairs. Is one laying there?

No.... but.... that might be what is laying in my back seat..

When a customer brings any un-needed computer parts into the store with a repair. Or practice is to give them back to them before they leave.

I work with computers as a hobbie and have been doing so for many years, my buddies at work come to me with thier problems.

One day Derek, asked me if I could come over. His games were not making any sound and he "Checked Everything!" My error was taking him at his word. I didn't know where he lived so I got directions. One the way, due to poor directions, I only got lost twice. I finally found the right place, but he didn't tell me it was an apartment. So I'm walking around the parking lot thinking he would come out to meet me. Nope. Well, It's been an hour since I left home and I decided to head over to the Apt office. I get there and a group of seven people are in a meeting. They stop for me and one lady asks if I need help. Feeling really stupid, I told her I was meeting a friend, but didn't know which apt he was in. She called my friend for me and let him know I had arrived. Another 15 minutes go by before he shows up. We head over to his place, chat with his girl and then get to the computer. He explains he checked the drivers and all the settings. I grab a cord coming out of the speakers and show him the loose end.. I plugged in the audio cord, clicked on the volume bar and heard a nice loud "BING". I said my goodbye's and headed home. Lesson learned, before spending 5 gallons of gas, 8 cigarettes and 1 hours and 45 minutes my my game playing time, I now ask "Is it plugged in?"

Well, I witnessed this some months ago, and it even made its way to some german computer-related joke-sites (I guess i wasnt the only one who saw this ;)

There was a guys sitting in our PC-Pool one morning. 6 other students sitting next to him. He keeps hammering on his keyboard, pushing ALT+CTRL+DEL (im glad we shut that off ;)). Then another user leans over, and tell him in this always-cool-voice: "This is UNIX. UNIX isn't Windows. You cant persuade UNIX to do what you want!"

I was "literally" Rolling on Floor, Laughing.

Oh yeah, another one:

Im working in a Call-Center for the biggest German ISP, T-Online. T-Online has been offering A-DSL for about a year now. One evening, a user calls in, demanding to talk to someone who know about "this DSL thing". I told him that I knew about it and he could ask me. He said that he couldnt connect. I asked him what he did, and he said: nothing: I received a letter telling me that my DSL-Port was to be activated yesterday, I have the Hardware and have connected the PC-Ethernet card to the DSL-Modem and the Modem to the Splitter, and that it worked yesterday. So i asked him about the Sync-LED and Power-LED .... yes, all green. I asked him if the Ethernet LED was lit up, too. He told me it wasnt. Since it worked yesterday, i figured there could be a problem with the cable between DSL Modem and his Computer. I asked him. He said he had moved his Computer from the Bedroom to his Living room. I asked him if he used the same cable. Yes, he said, but i added some inches.

He cut the cable in half and used some spare wire he had to connect the lines of the 2 halves.

People can be so stupid.

Cheerio

Sid

I work for a very well know computer manufacturer in their tech department. Im a co-ordinater that asigns jobs to the field techs within the factory. One day i get a call from a woman who reports she cannot access the network. because the caller was quite important i assigned my best tech to this and sent him on his way. 30 minutes later the irrate tech returns cursing the womans name. He had gone up while the woman had gone for coffee (as usual)and had duly gone through checking her system, the settings, the NIC, and the lan points but everything checked out fine. Just as he was about to admit defeat the woman returned.

"You reported a problem with your network" he asked

"Yes" she replied and pulled out her mobile phone "Every time i try and make a call it says no network coverage...."

This is not a tale, but a quote from Albert Einstein that has become the unofficial motto of my help desk:

"There is a race between mankind and the universe. Mankind is trying to build bigger, better, faster, and more foolproof machines. The universe is trying to build bigger, better, and faster fools. So far the universe is winning."

I had a user call up having problems with getting connected to our ISP. We discovered that more than likely his password file had become corrupt. (after several long boring steps to prove it wasn't something else). So we had him to "find files" and then type in *.pwl to try to find out what password files he had on his system. I tell him "That's *.pwl sir as in Shift-number 8 key, period, pwl as in paul-william-larry" I repeated this twice exactly like that. He comes back and says he found a couple of files and so we have him delete that so we can have him go back online and recreate it. First to make sure things are going ok we have him reboot his computer. When it comes back up he says it's askin him for .dll files. I asked him if he was sure it hadn't asked for those before. He said no, but then again weren't those the files we had him just delete? Turns out specifying *.pwl as in "paul-william-larry" confused him so he put in what we thought it said and then lied to us when we asked him what files it pulled up. We told him to go back to his OEM and have them help him fix his .dll problem and then call us back if he was still having problems. The tech who was listening in with me that day and myself just about died laughing. Poor guy.

Recently got a call from a woman claiming to be a sys admin for a major car maker, her internet connection wouldn't work, checked the setting and quickly realized that she had removed all of her dial up settings and replaced them with LAN settings, this is on her home computer and she's not on a home network. Asked her how her settings got that way she explain that she had notice that her machine at work was much faster when accessing the interet and she wanted her home machine to be just as fast so she changed them, after changing all of her settings back to dail up network settings and explaining the difference between dial up and LAN (to a System Administrater) I inquired whom she worked for and e-mailed them my resume, then went out for a smoke and a good laugh.