grr

[serena-snape.livejournal.com]

I work tech support for Directv. because of the fires in ca, the signal is blocked by the smoke and high winds in that area. i had a woman today who refused to even attempt to troubleshoot, even though she wasn't near enough to the fires to have to worry about smoke. she was freaking out though, because she has friends and family down there.
now again. she was freaking out.
Last night i had a customer telling me she could see the flames outside her window. she didn't know "if they were two miles away or ten miles away" she tried troubleshooting and everything to get it resolved, but the smoke was too thick. she not only had herself to worry about, but her husband, two children, and third on the way. she was scared enough that since we couldn't get it fixed, she was planning on staying up, all night long, to watch out the window.

and lady today was whining? i really wished i couldve just told her "f*** you lady. other peoples problems are far worse. you wont even try troubleshooting. f*** you."

Comments

[brownizs.livejournal.com]

These are the same type of people that during a Hurricane, will stay put believing that nothing will happen. Human Instinct is to try to protect family & belongings, and not worry about anything else around us.

And of course, you know that watching TV is more important then getting the hell out of dodge.

[pisceandreamer.livejournal.com]

Good lord, I would think that my DirecTV or cable would be the LAST thing I would be worried about if I could actually see the fires from my house.

[notthebuddha.livejournal.com]

I can sort of see smoke blocking the signal, but high winds?

[jasoncrowley.livejournal.com]

I can see my house on fire (http://www.bryanhauer.com/2007/10/23/california-reporter-larry-himmel-watches-his-own-house-burn/) comes to mind

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

My company actually has a policy for what to do if a customer says their house is on fire, and tries to troubleshoot anyways.
Yeah, it's because it happened.

[canray.livejournal.com]

What's the Policy?

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

Ask them to please call the fire department, exit the house, and call us back when the flames are extinguished.
Yes, somebody called in once wanting to know if the house (and computer) being on fire might be the reason their computer didn't work.
Our troubleshooting tree has an option to select for "computer and/or monitor is on fire" in a few points as a result.

[mashiroikaze.livejournal.com]

I would LOVE to see that troubleshooting tree.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

One of my friends was tech tier 1 for a cellphone provider who shall remain anonymous. His troubleshooting tree had an option for what to do if the customer was convinced aliens were interfering with their phone service. Again, this was because someone had gotten the call.

[purple-mctacky.livejournal.com]

what do you do if the aliens get into your phone? I need to know.

[wherdafux-d-cat.livejournal.com]

Wrap it in heavy duty tin foil.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

If a customer claims that aliens are interfering with their phone service, correct procedure is to offer to take the customer entirely out of the phone system, then put them back in on a new account with nothing to connect it to the old one.
You then explain to them that, while you can't stop the aliens from looking for them, the aliens will now have to go through all of our customers to find you again. As there are X many million customers in the database, it will take the aliens a very long time.

[canray.livejournal.com]

I remember horror stories, back in my New York Cable TV support days, of people complainig about the cable being out in huge swaths of New York.

See, there were a lot of uplink connections on a certain pair of towers and...

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

Friends who were working for cellphone providers remember that day as well. Guess what else was on the top of those towers.