Yes, you need to be in front of your computer

[Naaman]

*20 minute drive later, after being offered pizza, beer, and a carton of cigarettes*

Nice to see you've got your friend trained on the current "out of hours" rates

[earl colby pottinger]

Diffirent for me.

Nice to see you've got your friend trained on the current "out of hours" rates

I don't drink or smoke. Going rate $50 per hour for companies,
Chicken Wings, Coke or Jolt, Creme filled donuts for friends.

Any other payment plans.

[technical.angel]

Boyfriends would get tech support for backrubs.

Sigh, I miss that payment.

[gijoecam]

Why is it these days whenever a customer calls in with problems on their computer, they're not at it? Many will call from work, but aren't there to tell me what settings they have, or what error message they receive, yet I'm supposed to know the answer to "My internet doesn't work", and nothing else.

I had a lady today who wanted help setting up her dial up connection with Windows 2000. Thing was, she was five minutes away from home, driving in her car. When I told her she would need to be there, she made me wait on the line while she drove home, got her shit out of her car, dropped her purse off, unloaded her groceries, went to the bathroom, and then she was ready!

If you're going to call about computer problems, please expect us to expect you to be in front of your computer, ready to go. And, I really am not interested in waiting for you to take care of your personal needs when I could be helping another customer!

Well, in the customer's defense, the insanely long hold times associated with *some* tech support lines would be justification for such behavior. The customer's time is no less valuable than the IT support employee's time; they're just getting paid for theirs.

I've been guilty of doing just such a thing with my cable company. I had issues with my internet being completely offline for two days over a holiday, and the first day of the work week, tech support generally puts the caller in the hold loop for at least 20 minutes, and after a holiday, it's even longer. After my 40 minute commute home (on hold the whole way), I still had an additional 10 minute wait in front of the computer until I was helped. I think it was time well-spent.

[greensinestro]

Well, in the customer's defense, the insanely long hold times associated with *some* tech support lines would be justification for such behavior. The customer's time is no less valuable than the IT support employee's time; they're just getting paid for theirs.

I've been guilty of doing just such a thing with my cable company. I had issues with my internet being completely offline for two days over a holiday, and the first day of the work week, tech support generally puts the caller in the hold loop for at least 20 minutes, and after a holiday, it's even longer. After my 40 minute commute home (on hold the whole way), I still had an additional 10 minute wait in front of the computer until I was helped. I think it was time well-spent.

I'm sorry, but I would beg to differ here. Our hold time was not that long at all, and it was at a time of day when the calls were not peaking. What added to the frustration on this was she could have called back, after I told her our hold times were not that long at all, and even after she got home, I had to wait for her to do her personal business, including going to the freaking bathroom, toilet flushing and all!

[gijoecam]

I'm sorry, but I would beg to differ here. Our hold time was not that long at all, and it was at a time of day when the calls were not peaking. What added to the frustration on this was she could have called back, after I told her our hold times were not that long at all, and even after she got home, I had to wait for her to do her personal business, including going to the freaking bathroom, toilet flushing and all!

I'm not saying that I condone what the customer did (i.e. keeping you on hold) I just don't think that the customer is wrong to call tech support from the car if there is a reasonable expectation they may be stuck on hold for an inordinate amount of time. You didn't like being kept on hold for 15 minutes waiting for the customer. Do you think that the customer really enjoys the 15+ minutes of lousy commercials most hold systems bombard us with?

In her case, when you picked up the phone, the proper thing to do was to say, "Oh, I thought I was going to be stuck on hold longer than I was. I'm actually not in front of the computer now. I'll try back as soon as I get home."