This hasn't been a great morning. Eugene's on vacation, we're shorthanded, and the call volume is higher than normal. It's luchtime and I've already had too many SCs.
Two were teachers whose schools had bought them new laptops and needed help getting our software on them. Problem was that the versions they had dated from last century and were on floppy disks, and their new laptops didn't have floppy drives. The solution is to buy the update, which is on a CD. Another solution would be to buy an external floppy drive to install the software from that. The only catch to that approach is that we don't guarantee that the version we made in 1997 will work on Windows XP which came out years later (because our programmers aren't psychic, ya know).
The first one wasn't happy, but grudgingly accepted that, sometimes, updating your computer means updating your software.
The second one flat out refused to accept that answer. Here exact words were, "I work for a school district and I know for a fact they won't buy any update for me and I don't make enough money to buy a floppy drive with no guarantees that it will even work."
Then she tried the expectant silence.
Since she sounded like she was waiting for me to offer her something for free, I gave it to her. Sympathy is free, right?
Then there was Smart Guy. Smart Guy called and told me flat out he wasn't going to give me his serial number because, I quote, "[he was] in a car driving to the school where the computer is."
OK. As far as excuses for not being in front of the computer when calling us go, that's a new one for me.
I'm not comfortable giving detailed technical information to somebody who is trying to drive, nor am I happy to be giving it to somebody who hasn't yet proven he owns a legal copy of our software. So I suggested that he call again when he got in front of the computer.
He insisted that I "point [him] in the right direction" a bit and he would call back after he got there. That sounded good and, in the hopes of getting him off the phone BEFORE he turned into a school parking lot and took out a few kids, I gave him one sentence of very general advice. He interrupted to ask me to repeat it slowly so he could, get this, write it down.
Yes. He was admitting to actually calling, writing and driving at the same time.
I told him to call from in from in front of the computer if he needed to write things down.
Instead of taking the hint, he started peppering me with questions which required very long technical answers. Answers I wasn't prepared to give someone who hadn't even told me his serial number and certainly wasn't going to give to someone who was writing them down while driving.
I told him I couldn't answer any more questions until he was in front of the computer. I'm so sorry, but that's how it is. We'll be here until 5, my direct extension is xxx, blah blah, I'm acting nice, but you're going nowhere, mister.
His response to that was to outline the general info I had given him earlier and ask me to confirm it was correct. In the interest of ending the call quickly, I confirmed it.
His next line was priceless:
"Oh good. I really would have hated to walk into the school lab and not have any idea how that worked. Now I can look smart."
Two were teachers whose schools had bought them new laptops and needed help getting our software on them. Problem was that the versions they had dated from last century and were on floppy disks, and their new laptops didn't have floppy drives. The solution is to buy the update, which is on a CD. Another solution would be to buy an external floppy drive to install the software from that. The only catch to that approach is that we don't guarantee that the version we made in 1997 will work on Windows XP which came out years later (because our programmers aren't psychic, ya know).
The first one wasn't happy, but grudgingly accepted that, sometimes, updating your computer means updating your software.
The second one flat out refused to accept that answer. Here exact words were, "I work for a school district and I know for a fact they won't buy any update for me and I don't make enough money to buy a floppy drive with no guarantees that it will even work."
Then she tried the expectant silence.
Since she sounded like she was waiting for me to offer her something for free, I gave it to her. Sympathy is free, right?

Then there was Smart Guy. Smart Guy called and told me flat out he wasn't going to give me his serial number because, I quote, "[he was] in a car driving to the school where the computer is."
OK. As far as excuses for not being in front of the computer when calling us go, that's a new one for me.
I'm not comfortable giving detailed technical information to somebody who is trying to drive, nor am I happy to be giving it to somebody who hasn't yet proven he owns a legal copy of our software. So I suggested that he call again when he got in front of the computer.
He insisted that I "point [him] in the right direction" a bit and he would call back after he got there. That sounded good and, in the hopes of getting him off the phone BEFORE he turned into a school parking lot and took out a few kids, I gave him one sentence of very general advice. He interrupted to ask me to repeat it slowly so he could, get this, write it down.
Yes. He was admitting to actually calling, writing and driving at the same time.

I told him to call from in from in front of the computer if he needed to write things down.
Instead of taking the hint, he started peppering me with questions which required very long technical answers. Answers I wasn't prepared to give someone who hadn't even told me his serial number and certainly wasn't going to give to someone who was writing them down while driving.
I told him I couldn't answer any more questions until he was in front of the computer. I'm so sorry, but that's how it is. We'll be here until 5, my direct extension is xxx, blah blah, I'm acting nice, but you're going nowhere, mister.
His response to that was to outline the general info I had given him earlier and ask me to confirm it was correct. In the interest of ending the call quickly, I confirmed it.
His next line was priceless:
"Oh good. I really would have hated to walk into the school lab and not have any idea how that worked. Now I can look smart."


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