It's Still National Jerk Month

[Dips]

I swear. The first call I took topped everything else. I'll just post my memo to Mark regarding the call. It tells everything [details are added in brackets]. I changed some names, of course.

Hi Mark,

A user called Joe Fool called asking for the install key for the above license. I was about to give it to him when he revealed that he didn't have the autorization disk because it was in the possession of First Baptist Church [First Baptist Church is the actual registered owner of the software license in question] and getting it "would be a problem."

That set off alarm bells, but it might mean simply that getting to the church would be physically difficult so I told him to have the church contact me and give me permission to give out their install key to him.

That's when he pitched a fit and started yelling. He mentioned talking to you and that you told him to call us when he was ready to install. Since I didn't see any note regarding that call my guess is that you assumed, like I did at first, that he was still affiliated with First Baptist Church.

Anyhoo, just to calm him down I offered to try and contact you and put him on hold. I got your voice mail at your home office and left a message. I also called the number listed in the registration and got ahold of the secretary at First Baptist Church to see if they would authorize letting Mr. Fool use their license. I know we don't usually do that [our policy is to make the user do his own legwork], but if I thought it was more expedient in this one case [because of having a hopping mad user on hold].

Not surprisingly, she didn't know what I was talking about regarding [name of our product]. She also didn't seem to recognize the name Joe Fool, which doesn't really mean much but doesn't help Mr. Fool's case. She offered to let me leave a voice mail message for the pastor, which I did. I'm waiting to hear back.

Mr. Fool was still on hold, so I told him I was waiting to hear back from both you and the pastor of First Baptist Church. Please try us again this afternoon, etc.

He continued pitching a fit. I told him my hands were tied and ended the call. Just before hanging up he made some threat about having his lawyer contact us. I almost hope that happens.

Dips

Sigh.

[friendofjimmyk]

Goody, goody, I love the lawyer threats! Bring it on!

Do people realize how much lawyers cost? Do they realize that the time in court and the legal costs of persuing such nonsense is not worth it? They are the same folks that will claim "it's the principle" when confronted with questions such as those.

[IT Grunt]

Arrrr me matey... me thinks thar be a pirate sailin' them waters...

[draftermatt]

Do people realize how much lawyers cost?

Sometimes I think its more because they think you will cave if threatened with a lawyer.

When in reality the only lawyer they can afford is the guy on TV who only does medical malpractice.

[ArenaBoy]

The lawyer threats are always hilarious. Guy will be wasting his time.

[protege]

The lawyer threats are always hilarious. Guy will be wasting his time.

Even better are the threats that some people post over the net. Some of you might remember that one of them (on a previous edition of CS) threatened to kick my ass. Since I really doubted he'd actually do it, I told him to "bring it on." 8 years later, I'm still waiting

Anyway, these "I'm getting a lawyer" folks are just like that. All talk and no action.

[phillippbo]

My favorite response of all time to threatening to go to a lawyer has to go to AT&T @Home. For those who may not know, once upon a time I worked for them, and in spite of having horrendous service in some areas, there were a couple of things they did that I loved. One of them was the blacklist where customers could be banned from ever having @Home service ever again for among other things "employee abuse". The other was the response we were told to give when someone threatened legal action. As near as I can recall, this was the wording I usually used:

SC: "<blah, blah, yakkity-schmackity, not happy with answer I just gave> ...I'm going to sue!"

Me: "Well, is there anything else I can help you with?"

SC: "You mean you're not going to try to make me happy?!"

Me: "Sir/Ma'am, you called me with an issue that you would like resolved. Legal action is the last recourse that you have as a consumer to resolve any dispute, so you have just told me there is absolutely nothing that anybody working for us can do to resolve the issue. In addition, from this point on anything that I say on behalf of the company would probably be used in court against the company, so I am prohibited from giving you further information on this subject. The only information I can give you is the name and address of the company legal department for further contact. So, is there anything else I can help you with?"

SC: <backpedal, backpedal, backpedal>

(Not an exact wording because it would differ depending on the call, and sometimes I was so bothered by the customer's attitude that I would sputter out the words or forget some of them. It should still give you an overall idea of what we were expected to say.)

There were only a few times the customer still insisted on the "I'm going to sue" meme, and those customers were hung up on after two more warnings. Gotta love it.

[MadMike]

Even better are the threats that some people post over the net. Some of you might remember that one of them (on a previous edition of CS) threatened to kick my ass. Since I really doubted he'd actually do it, I told him to "bring it on." 8 years later, I'm still waiting

I remember that guy. I think I banned him about half a dozen times myself. I'm really wishing you, me, and Bek could have paid him a little visit when she was visiting. What was that you told me before -- "He'd have kittens?"

[Dips]

My favorite response of all time to threatening to go to a lawyer has to go to AT&T @Home. <snip>

Heh. I like that. I saw another thread where somebody mentioned shutting down the lawyer-criers by responding along those lines. Very funny.

I was planning to say something similar to Mr. Fool, but he hung up right after pulling the lawyer card and he hasn't called back (that I know of). I still haven't heard back from the pastor, but that's not MY problem.

My guess is that nothing more will come of this or Mr. Fool will call and try to talk with another employee hoping for a better answer. I've taken the liberty of placing a nice flag and note on the license record, just in case that happens.

[Jester]

I had jury duty yesterday. I was not selected for the jury, but just the jury selection process was long, tedious, arduous, and very, very tiring.

There are times when legal action is necessary and appropriate. There are times where it is misplaced, but the suing party thought it was necessary and appropriate, and they have something resembling a case, even if they don't win. But my guess is that if any of these entitlement whores actually did pursue legal action, both the judge and the jury (if it got that far) would look on the situation and the litigating party with a very unamused eye for such frivolous bullshit.

In case you are wondering, the case that I was not selected for was a medical malpractice suit involving an ER doctor. Whatever the outcome, the plaintiff thought she had been wrongfully injured by said doctor, resulting in permanent disability, and was suing him due to this. Whatever the eventual verdict in this case, this is an appropriate legal action.

The SC's who whine about getting their lawyer over not getting their way for some petty little thing? NOT appropriate legal action.

Idiots. Bloody frickin' idiots.

[Lehk]

let him sue, then when he loses send a copy of the court records to your own legal department for copyright enforcement and send a copy to the feds for all sorts of computer misuse charges, fraud, and piracy.

[Spiffy McMoron]

Heh, when I read the title of this topic, I had a fleeting thought of an actual "National Jerk Month", kind of like a "Breast Cancer Awareness Month", or a "Black History Month", wherein we try to educate the masses as to the dangers of an unnoticed jerk, and have fun games, adn celebrations to mark off the month.

Seriously, I think that "I'm going to sue" is turning into the new "Cheques in the mail!" or "I'll do it tomorrow." - the small sentence that means that we can do whatever the fuck we want to in the short term.

[ladodger34]

He continued pitching a fit. I told him my hands were tied and ended the call. Just before hanging up he made some threat about having his lawyer contact us. I almost hope that happens.

Back in my city days, one of my idiot softball players got carried away and tried to start a fight with the scorekeeper because he (scorekeeper) messed up. He got kicked out of the game and I suspended for 2 games as per league policy. He whines like a little girl for a while and threatens to sue the city. Department head says fine, next time he calls, transfer him to the city attorney's office.

That pretty much ended any talk of suing the city.

[powerboy]

Even better are the threats that some people post over the net. Some of you might remember that one of them (on a previous edition of CS) threatened to kick my ass. Since I really doubted he'd actually do it, I told him to "bring it on." 8 years later, I'm still waiting

Anyway, these "I'm getting a lawyer" folks are just like that. All talk and no action.

You are still waiting also. It has been for me, about 8 years also.

The back story for me:

I was on another forum, and I disaggreed with the post maker. I proved him wrong, and so ofcourse, he is going to fly to my house, so he can kill me

[Jester]

Years ago, I was a member of a chat forum in which myself and a few others were extraordinarily obnoxious, quite often intentionally so to people we found to be complete blithering idiots.

Frankly, we didn't consider it a good day if we didn't get at least one death threat.

JESTER: "Let me see if I have this straight: you're going to buy an airline ticket, fly all the way out to Arizona, spend money on a hotel, and somehow find me in this sprawling metropolis, taking time off of work while you are doing this, all so you can kick my ass...and all because you didn't like what I said?"
IDIOT: "Yes."
JESTER: "And you're calling ME stupid?"