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February 09, 2005
Can I Help You?
This is a true story from the WordPerfect help line. Needless to say, the help desk employee was fired; however, he/she is currently suing the WordPerfect organization for "Termination without Cause."
"Ridge Hall computer assistant; may I help you?"
"Yes, well, I'm having trouble with WordPerfect."
"What sort of trouble?"
"Well, I was just typing along, and all of a sudden the words went away."
"Went away?"
"They disappeared."
"Hmm. So what does your screen look like now?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"It's blank; it won't accept anything when I type."
"Are you still in WordPerfect, or did you get out?"
"How do I tell?"
"Can you see the C: prompt on the screen?"
"What's a sea-prompt?"
"Never mind. Can you move the cursor around on the screen?"
"There isn't any cursor: I told you, it won't accept anything I type."
"Does your monitor have a power indicator?"
"What's a monitor?"
"It's the thing with the screen on it that looks like a TV. Does it have a little light that tells you when it's on?"
"I don't know."
"Well, then look on the back of the monitor and find where the power cord goes into it. Can you see that?"
"Yes, I think so."
"Great. Follow the cord to the plug, and tell me if it's plugged into the wall."
".......Yes, it is."
"When you were behind the monitor, did you notice that there were two cables plugged into the back of it, not just one?"
"No."
"Well, there are. I need you to look back there again and find the other cable."
".......Okay, here it is."
"Follow it for me, and tell me if it's plugged securely into the back of your computer."
"I can't reach."
"Uh huh. Well, can you see if it is?"
"No."
"Even if you maybe put your knee on something and lean way over?"
"Oh, it's not because I don't have the right angle - it's because it's dark."
"Dark?"
"Yes - the office light is off, and the only light I have is coming in from the window."
"Well, turn on the office light then."
"I can't."
"No? Why not?"
"Because there's a power outage."
"A power... A power outage? Aha, Okay, we've got it licked now.
Do you still have the boxes and manuals and packing stuff your computer came in?"
"Well, yes, I keep them in the closet."
"Good. Go get them, and unplug your system and pack it up just like it was when you got it. Then take it back to the store you bought it from."
"Really? Is it that bad?"
"Yes, I'm afraid it is."
"Well, all right then, I suppose. What do I tell them?"
"Tell them you're too stupid to own a computer."
Posted by dminky at February 9, 2005 11:01 AM
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Comments
This is not only likely to be true but probably really common.
When I worked ISP tech support, back before they shipped all that work to India, every now and then there'd be a power outage that effected about 80% of our customers at once. We were a local ISP based on a peninsula that was cut off from the main land by a canal, so, all power had to come over that canal by way of high-tension wires or generated by the small power plant right on our side of the canal. So, if anything happened to any of those wires or the powerplant, large sections of the peninsula, called Cape Cod, would black out. Sometimes the whole thing would go at once.
So, whenever the whole of Cape Cod had a blackout, including our main offices with all the modems and servers or anything, we'd be bombarded with thousands of angry customers on the phones demanding to know why WE were keeping them off the internet. And we'd kindly ask them if any of their lights worked, and no they didn't. And why is that? Power outage, right? So.. if there's a power outage.. how can you turn your computer on? .. No, we didn't shut your computer off. No. Power outage. Right. Yes, we're out too. No, we can't do anything about this. What? NO we are NOT the power company, nor are we connected to them, nor does ANYONE on our staff know how to fix the problem, because it's a BIG SCARY ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING thing. If any of us knew that crap, we wouldn't be working at an ISP, thank you.
... the only reason we even answered the phone was to explain the situation to the 20% of our customers that did not live on Cape Cod and as such were never affected by these blackouts.
Posted by: Eric at February 10, 2005 01:38 AM