Translation: "Fuck off, I can't help you"

[vehystrix]

Generally I find helpdesks helpful, but there's always one or two incidents that stick in your mind and colour your experiences. Though as someone who works in PC repairing the worst possible moment is when you have absolutely no idea what the hell the problem is. You're getting paid to fix it, but you're stumped. In these cases I take the "Dr House" approach and just try everything and see if it gets worse or better.

Interwebz it. The solution to your problem will be on a forum somewhere....

...along with several recommendations to delete system32.

That reminds me of one of the funniest 4chan threads I saw:

<spoiler=Big image. May be best to open in new tab>http://media.riemurasia.net/albumit/mmedia/r/xws/95y/300559/683852004.jpg

That's just beyond awesome, who the hell runs command lines they got from /b/ when they don't know jack ? i mean really if you don't see a problem with;
"@echo off"
"del c:\windows\system32.dll"

You almost deserve to get your computer bricked.

Disclaimer: do NOT, absolutely NOT do this...it's just an example...

Not just that, but then to proceed running a welding magnet over the hard drive to 'recover' the lost files?

 

[lacktheknack]

Generally I find helpdesks helpful, but there's always one or two incidents that stick in your mind and colour your experiences. Though as someone who works in PC repairing the worst possible moment is when you have absolutely no idea what the hell the problem is. You're getting paid to fix it, but you're stumped. In these cases I take the "Dr House" approach and just try everything and see if it gets worse or better.

Interwebz it. The solution to your problem will be on a forum somewhere....

...along with several recommendations to delete system32.

That reminds me of one of the funniest 4chan threads I saw:

<spoiler=Big image. May be best to open in new tab>http://media.riemurasia.net/albumit/mmedia/r/xws/95y/300559/683852004.jpg

That's just beyond awesome, who the hell runs command lines they got from /b/ when they don't know jack ? i mean really if you don't see a problem with;
"@echo off"
"del c:\windows\system32.dll"

You almost deserve to get your computer bricked.

Disclaimer: do NOT, absolutely NOT do this...it's just an example...

The guy who bricked his Dad's computer must've been trolling. NO ONE is that stupid.

 

[Mekado]

Generally I find helpdesks helpful, but there's always one or two incidents that stick in your mind and colour your experiences. Though as someone who works in PC repairing the worst possible moment is when you have absolutely no idea what the hell the problem is. You're getting paid to fix it, but you're stumped. In these cases I take the "Dr House" approach and just try everything and see if it gets worse or better.

Interwebz it. The solution to your problem will be on a forum somewhere....

...along with several recommendations to delete system32.

That reminds me of one of the funniest 4chan threads I saw:

<spoiler=Big image. May be best to open in new tab>http://media.riemurasia.net/albumit/mmedia/r/xws/95y/300559/683852004.jpg

That's just beyond awesome, who the hell runs command lines they got from /b/ when they don't know jack ? i mean really if you don't see a problem with;
"@echo off"
"del c:\windows\system32.dll"

You almost deserve to get your computer bricked.

Disclaimer: do NOT, absolutely NOT do this...it's just an example...

The guy who bricked his Dad's computer must've been trolling. NO ONE is that stupid.

I sure hope so, if not his dad probably killed him, Darwin at work i guess

But yeah, i sincerely hope it was just a troll...then again, he did post screens of missing system32.dll and reinstall of winxp (they might not be his though...who knows?)

 

[Gladion]

It's almost never the drivers.

Oh. Now that I see this topic from this point of view, I must say I gotta agree. You changed everything.

the "N shit" part makes me believe that

Stop right there. The "N shit" part was just because I felt like writing that. I was writing a post in some internet forums, not a documentary. It wasn't worth going into that deeply. The topic isn't that serious an issue anyways... relax.

 

[Adam Galli]

Unplug it for 30 seconds then plug it back in.

 

[AmayaOnnaOtaku]

"Is it plugged in?"

Having run a tech department, you'd be surprised that really is a problem. Seriously. At a University.

There is a reason for the dumb questions, it is shocking how often asking 10 dumb questions resolves the problem.

Exactly. Every technical support person who ever get A+ Certified knows that there is protocol to fixing the issue. First is to Identify the problem. Yes, asking if the computer is turned on or if its plugged in or not may seem stupid, but in order to properly diagnose the issue and fix it, we need to know precisely what is wrong and what was done to the computer before the issue started. Especially if I cannot physically come to where you are and fix it. If I have to do that, be prepared for a nice bill for my efforts.

 

[danintexas]

Anyone who complains about phone tech support has never done it.

Back when I was still serving in the front line trenches I had a few fun ones.... Lady bought a modem and wanted me to tell her how to get to the internet. Only problem is she didn't even have a computer. Then she went on for a good 10 minutes telling me how I am stupid and she wanted to kill my children.

Another fun one was the dude who shot his dog over the phone because he wouldn't shut up. Reported that one to the police.

Another ass hole started cussing at me for over half an hour because his printer didn't survive the 6 story free fall out the office window he started when it ran out of paper.

People are impatient little children with zero manners. I feel sorry for anyone who does tech support and realize what they go through and walk through all the "stupid" steps of making sure it is plugged in and turning it off and on again.

IMO - Everyone should spend 6 months waiting tables and doing customer service over the phones. Would end up with alot less spoiled brats in adult bodies out there.

 

[Zeraki]

When I call customer support, and I know more than the person I'm talking to it's really off putting(especially when they treat you as if you're a child). And I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, hate when they tell me to do some really common sense things that I had already tried prior to calling. I've done this dance with Comcast plenty of times when my internet goes down randomly for hours or even days, and the problem was always on their end. Yet they always send a tech out to cover their tracks while they fix their goof up.

And these captcha codes are very annoying, can anyone ever make out what they actually say? I had to do it three times before I saw one I could actually read.

 

[BRex21]

my favorite, is my argument with steam, where he is asking me to do what i already said i did 2 replies previously.
needless to say i am still locked out of the store for not being human enough.

 

[darth.pixie]

You do know that tech support is required to ask you this because they have to fill paperwork, right?

As one of the few PC knowledgeble in my group of friends, I'm usually called for tech support. I couldn't tell you how many times people actually have unplugged items or wrong drivers or they pressed wrong buttons.

There are unknowledgeble people that work for tech support but most as just as frustrated as you are. And they have to act nice about it.

 

[flying_whimsy]

There was a radio advertisement for I forget what, but it was a tech support guy asking "is your computer plugged into the wall?"

"It didn't come with a wall."

 

[Danpascooch]

It's almost never the drivers.

Oh. Now that I see this topic from this point of view, I must say I gotta agree. You changed everything.

the "N shit" part makes me believe that

Stop right there. The "N shit" part was just because I felt like writing that. I was writing a post in some internet forums, not a documentary. It wasn't worth going into that deeply. The topic isn't that serious an issue anyways... relax.

So you're saying I shouldn't listen to the things you say because we're on an internet forum and the words you use have no meaning?

Don't be all sarcastic with me when you were the one who just used "It's an internet forum not a documentary so it doesn't matter what I say" as an argument.

 

[ReservoirAngel]

Anything that involves ANY measure of technobabble in any shape or form. Even technical names for components...that's technobabble to me. Random, unintelligable technobabble.

 

[KeyMaster45]

If you want to avoid the tech support asking you stupid questions it helps if you can beat them to the punch. A mantra I live by when interacting with tech support is as soon as the words "What seems to be the problem sir?" pass their lips is to first, explain the issue issue as best I can. Second, inform them of them of my answers to the BS questions ahead of time.(everything seems to be plugged in correctly; cable X is connected to port Y, etc etc)

Nine times out of 10 I'll get transferred from the first person to someone who knows slightly more about what's going on. I can't tell you how much easier this makes things not only for me but for the people on the other end of the line.

A few things to remember when calling tech support that will make your life easier

1) Be polite: The person on the other end of the line is human, treating them as such will help immensely

2) Be forceful: You are a paying customer and as such don't be afraid to push a point if you feel you're being jerked around, but remain polite and keep your anger in check. If you're persistent eventually you'll get to someone who can actually help you.

3) Give them something to work with: If you want to avoid those mundane questions such as "Is it plugged in?", or "Are you watching a microwave?" (thank you @emeraldrafael for that little nugget) be more descriptive when telling them what's wrong. Tell them what you were doing leading up to the problem, cover what's plugged in and what's not, if you ordered the product from them having your order number hanging around will help immensely. Troubleshooting anything over the phone is not only annoying but damnably hard. Since obviously the tech support person isn't in the room with you, you need to be their proxy for information.

 

[t4nz1t]

I provide technical support for industrial instrumentation. While it's not quite the same as your classic "Help Desk" technical support there is a lot of crossover (all our instruments have attached PC's running the instrument & the operator interface which run on windows). I have the benefit of dealing with customers who are themselves in a professional setting. This doesn't mean I don't get the occasional *ahem* difficult customer but for the most part they are all quite professional.

...as soon as the words "What seems to be the problem sir?" pass their lips is to first, explain the issue issue as best I can. Second, inform them of them of my answers to the BS questions ahead of time.

All of Keymaster45's points are gold but I would preface the above with,"In the interest of saving both of us time, I tried to rule out the easy stuff before calling." After listing off what you've done, follow it with,"Is there anything I missed?" It will demonstrate that you made a good faith effort to be on the ball and are ready for further guidance.

Stupid customer & obnoxious help desk stories get all the attention because they're funny and everyone can easily relate to them. No one shares anecdotes about the time you finally broke down and called tech support about a problem you've had for the last 6 months where the guy (or gal) listened intently to the entire story, asked a couple of clarifying questions and gave you a fix that took under 5 minutes.

Which brings me to my last point, offer a sincere "Thank you" even if we didn't earn it.......

.....it will be an act so unprecedented, we'll assume you're dangerously unstable and might comp you free product.

 

[nagi]

@t4nz0t:
Ah, sweet dreams
http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tech_support.png

That said, yes, I did once require tech support with a modem... which was resolved in like... 2 minutes. Must be because you actually can't outsource the job due to language problems (no, I don't live in an English speaking country).

As for the unplug, 30 sec wait and re-plug: that actually helped my old d-link switch after freezing from a momentary (<0,5 sec) power out.

 

[archvile93]

"Is it plugged in?"

Having run a tech department, you'd be surprised that really is a problem. Seriously. At a University.

There is a reason for the dumb questions, it is shocking how often asking 10 dumb questions resolves the problem.

For example, I had one University Professor who walked into my office litterally screaming at me that we had lost all of his work. I logged in to my sysadmin account, looked at the user directories, and I could see his stuff. I walked him back to his office, clicked on the file manager, and sure enough, no user directories. I asked him if he had completed his network login, he said yes and yelled some more. I checked the userid he was logged in as - guest. I described the network login box and asked him if he filled it in, "NO! I was in a hurry!". Um... ya. Try loggin in. More swearing. Logs in. Look, files! A Phd, in the sciences, 25 years as a prof.

Then there were was the user that taped over her mouseball so that it wouldn't get dirty and then called us to complain it wasn't working. The University Prof who had a dirty mouseball and figured that he would have to clean it less often if he used a metal file to cut a bigger hole for the mouse button so the dirt wouldn't clog it. The person who worked on a file at home and thought that somehow it should be available on her work computer automatically.

Yeah, users are dumber than you think.

Yes, but often they really are just stupid. I had to talk to tech support once to fix what later turned out to be a hard drive failure. One, it took them a week to get an actual human being, and of course I had to call them, they never actually answered my messages. After going through the check sheet, (which I flat out stated before hand could not explain my computer locking up an the screen going black sporadically, requiring a restart and sometimes a disk read error) they decided the graphics card was the problems and insisted that they were right simply because the screen would go black. Eventually, I gave up, and my computer expert friend diagnosed the problem in ten seconds. Sadly this tech support place is considered one of the good ones.

 

[dfcrackhead]

Generally I find helpdesks helpful, but there's always one or two incidents that stick in your mind and colour your experiences. Though as someone who works in PC repairing the worst possible moment is when you have absolutely no idea what the hell the problem is. You're getting paid to fix it, but you're stumped. In these cases I take the "Dr House" approach and just try everything and see if it gets worse or better.

Interwebz it. The solution to your problem will be on a forum somewhere....

...along with several recommendations to delete system32.

That reminds me of one of the funniest 4chan threads I saw:

<spoiler=Big image. May be best to open in new tab>http://media.riemurasia.net/albumit/mmedia/r/xws/95y/300559/683852004.jpg

Holy crap that brought tears to my eyes lmao, that is so awesome.

OT: I must be some weird anomaly here, no horror stories about Tech Support, if they don't help I have friends and personal experience to fix it, so aside from watching my mom on the phone with them for 20 minutes plugging and unplugging a modem over and over again, my tech support has been pretty spot on.

 

[Spade Lead]

What are some of your favorites?

I work for Selling [Company Name Deleted]'s Identity Theft Protection.

As sales people, we are trained to get through a call as quickly as possible, and barring getting a sale, to politely get the fuck out of the call.

Sometimes all you can do is tell someone the number to call if they have any other questions and go away. (Ironically for us, WE are that number, so we also pray they don't call back in ten minutes and reach us again. Yes, I have had customers call back and reach me.)

I imagine for tech support, the solution to a problem you can't fix is to give them someone else's number and pray you don't hear from that customer again...

 

[Plurralbles]

they should send out the flow charts you guys are on about with every single computer available and post it on every tech company's site.

Though it's starting to approach teh point where internet searches are better for 99% of what you need to know, though I can understand internet connection problems requirign more. since you can't access teh internet in that case.