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Not wanting to threadjack this post I'm starting my own.
But Betweenshades, I can top you. Wish I couldn't but you just had to re-awaken the repressed memories didn't you?
Since this happened 10 years ago, what I have in quotes may or may not be accurate to the exact wording. I can assure you however that what I put in quotations will be accurate as to the content of what was said and how it was said.
Anywho...
A while ago, back in my days of computer retail.
You know when computers were custom made and you didn't throw them away and buy a new one just because the case is getting dusty.
I had sold a woman a new computer. She wanted the internet on it and so I pointed her towards the local cable company and the cable internet that was just starting to become popular. I helped her get signed up and she paid for the service over the phone and then the cable company and I coordinated when the services would be up so I could come over and install the computer for her.
So computer is built and the Cable is installed. I go over and hook everything up and get her online. Yay! Everything is happy.
Or so thought I.
About three weeks later I get a VERY angry call from herasking demanding at the top of her lungs to know where in the hell her order is.
Now for two of those weeks, I was on vacation and I'm wondering if someone else had placed an order and being the poor schlub who answered the phone I may have been unaware. So I ask when the order was placed (sure enough, right when I went on vacation) and I went to check our records.
Nothing.
I go and tell her that there is no record of any order and this sends her into a screaming rage (nothing she said was coherent) and she hung up on me by the classic process of slamming the phone on the desk several times before pressing the off button.
Charming.
The very next day the woman comes in with her husband (who is built like a brick wall and is a Maryland State Trooper...in uniform) and demands the money that we took from her back. She throws a printout of the credit card statement at me. I pick it up and I'm trying to read it while listening to her threaten to have her husband arrest me for theft and seeing in the corner of my eye this guy puffing himself up and making himself look even more imposing.
I look and see that there is the charge for the $1,200 for the computer and installation and nothing else.
Confused (and a little nervous from the MST towering over me like a cartoon depiction of a Marine Corp Drill Sargent towering over the skinniest and most nerdy of all the raw recruits) I point out the charge and state that she got the computer and the installation and asked what the problem was.
New rants and ravings ensue and once again I can't understand what she is talking about. Her husband says that he and his wife are looking for an order placed on the day in question. I look at the statement and the only transaction on that date is an order with Amazon.com. "Was this about a book order?" I asked.
"YES!" she screamed at me. "I placed this order on your computer and your internet and I want those books or my money NOW GODDAMNIT!"
Now knowing that is a case of "dumbshit-itis" and not the fault of me or my store in any way shape or form I do the roll-stretch of the neck and I draw myself to my full height. I look the trooper in the eye and say...
"First of all sir, the threats of arrest are pointless as I can show you hotel receipts for the day in question. The order was not given to me and so *I* never took your wife's money.
Secondly (interrupting him so he couldn't get a word in edgewise), the order was placed to Amazon.com. While the computer I sold your wife and the internet service I helped her to sign up for and hooked her new computer up to may have been used to make this purchase, we can no more be held accountable for this order than Verizon can if the order was placed over the phone.
And thirdly, if you do not get your wife to calm down and stop hurling obscenities towards me about and my breeding them *I* will call the police myself and have her removed."
The officer then started to say something with an angry look on his face, then that look turned to confused. He calmly asked me to see the statement. I hand it to him and point out the charge where she paid for the computer and the installation which he agreed that he got and I pointed out the Amazon.com next to the charge his wife was frothing at the mouth over.
I wish I could say that I was exaggerating about the frothing at the mouth. Spittle was flying all over the place. I burned up a can of Windex cleaning the counters after they left.
The trooper facepalmed, apologized for wasting my time and took his wife by the arm and hauled her out of the store. Before you start thinking "abusive husband", he had to haul her out since she wouldn't leave.
I listened to them screaming at each other across the parking lot and even when they got to the car she wouldn't get in and they stood there screaming at each other for another 20 minutes before she stormed off and grabbed a taxi leaving the trooper to stand there for another 5 minutes staring down the road that the taxi and her left on.
Never saw either of them again. Can't say that I really am disappointed about that fact.
But Betweenshades, I can top you. Wish I couldn't but you just had to re-awaken the repressed memories didn't you?
Since this happened 10 years ago, what I have in quotes may or may not be accurate to the exact wording. I can assure you however that what I put in quotations will be accurate as to the content of what was said and how it was said.
Anywho...
A while ago, back in my days of computer retail.
You know when computers were custom made and you didn't throw them away and buy a new one just because the case is getting dusty.
I had sold a woman a new computer. She wanted the internet on it and so I pointed her towards the local cable company and the cable internet that was just starting to become popular. I helped her get signed up and she paid for the service over the phone and then the cable company and I coordinated when the services would be up so I could come over and install the computer for her.
So computer is built and the Cable is installed. I go over and hook everything up and get her online. Yay! Everything is happy.
Or so thought I.
About three weeks later I get a VERY angry call from her
Now for two of those weeks, I was on vacation and I'm wondering if someone else had placed an order and being the poor schlub who answered the phone I may have been unaware. So I ask when the order was placed (sure enough, right when I went on vacation) and I went to check our records.
Nothing.
I go and tell her that there is no record of any order and this sends her into a screaming rage (nothing she said was coherent) and she hung up on me by the classic process of slamming the phone on the desk several times before pressing the off button.
Charming.
The very next day the woman comes in with her husband (who is built like a brick wall and is a Maryland State Trooper...in uniform) and demands the money that we took from her back. She throws a printout of the credit card statement at me. I pick it up and I'm trying to read it while listening to her threaten to have her husband arrest me for theft and seeing in the corner of my eye this guy puffing himself up and making himself look even more imposing.
I look and see that there is the charge for the $1,200 for the computer and installation and nothing else.
Confused (and a little nervous from the MST towering over me like a cartoon depiction of a Marine Corp Drill Sargent towering over the skinniest and most nerdy of all the raw recruits) I point out the charge and state that she got the computer and the installation and asked what the problem was.
New rants and ravings ensue and once again I can't understand what she is talking about. Her husband says that he and his wife are looking for an order placed on the day in question. I look at the statement and the only transaction on that date is an order with Amazon.com. "Was this about a book order?" I asked.
"YES!" she screamed at me. "I placed this order on your computer and your internet and I want those books or my money NOW GODDAMNIT!"
Now knowing that is a case of "dumbshit-itis" and not the fault of me or my store in any way shape or form I do the roll-stretch of the neck and I draw myself to my full height. I look the trooper in the eye and say...
"First of all sir, the threats of arrest are pointless as I can show you hotel receipts for the day in question. The order was not given to me and so *I* never took your wife's money.
Secondly (interrupting him so he couldn't get a word in edgewise), the order was placed to Amazon.com. While the computer I sold your wife and the internet service I helped her to sign up for and hooked her new computer up to may have been used to make this purchase, we can no more be held accountable for this order than Verizon can if the order was placed over the phone.
And thirdly, if you do not get your wife to calm down and stop hurling obscenities towards me about and my breeding them *I* will call the police myself and have her removed."
The officer then started to say something with an angry look on his face, then that look turned to confused. He calmly asked me to see the statement. I hand it to him and point out the charge where she paid for the computer and the installation which he agreed that he got and I pointed out the Amazon.com next to the charge his wife was frothing at the mouth over.
I wish I could say that I was exaggerating about the frothing at the mouth. Spittle was flying all over the place. I burned up a can of Windex cleaning the counters after they left.
The trooper facepalmed, apologized for wasting my time and took his wife by the arm and hauled her out of the store. Before you start thinking "abusive husband", he had to haul her out since she wouldn't leave.
I listened to them screaming at each other across the parking lot and even when they got to the car she wouldn't get in and they stood there screaming at each other for another 20 minutes before she stormed off and grabbed a taxi leaving the trooper to stand there for another 5 minutes staring down the road that the taxi and her left on.
Never saw either of them again. Can't say that I really am disappointed about that fact.
. Wow, that is .. a new kind of special...granted it was 10 years ago (I believe?) and fewer people knew anything about computers..but .. wow.
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