I think my dumbest customer story isn’t programming-related but still related to computers. I worked in a small computer repair shop about 3000 years ago, and one day a customer comes in with their family computer that’s “not working.” It turned out to be full of viruses and malware, and when we started working on it it turned out this was due to somebody visiting shady porn sites and clicking on download buttons left and right. I explain the situation to her and then recommend steps on how to avoid this happening in the future, so how to browse safely, antivirus software etc. She feelt a bit embarrassed and says that it’s her son, and that she’ll give him a talking-to.
A few weeks later the same customer comes back with the family computer and this time she’s visibly annoyed, and curiously she’s brought along the keyboard, mouse and monitor. The computer’s got viruses again, and it’s my fault. Why? Because she’d had a talk with her son who had then sworn up and down that he’ll mend his filthy ways. When new viruses cropped up, his explanation was that obviously they’re in the keyboard, mouse and monitor too, and since they hadn’t been in the shop they were still infected and we were just too incompetent to have known this. Naturally she believed her son over my word, and started demanding that we remove the viruses from all the peripherals. I tried for a very long time to explain that it’s just not possible (this was a time when PS/2 connectors were still pretty common and that’s what they had so it wasn’t even theoretically possible), but she wouldn’t budge because her son was a computer whiz (he wasn’t) and a Good Boy™ and would never lie, so clearly I was either incompetent or lying.
Finally I just relented and said “OK you got me, it’s possible your viruses came from the peripherals but I just didn’t want to mention it because removing them is so time-consuming and difficult”. I took all their hardware in and had it unfucked in pretty short order, and I looked at the browser history to make sure that it really was a reinfection via the web, which it was (I remember Pamela Anderson featuring in a lot of the searches, which we techs giggled at.)
I kept their hardware at the shop for a couple of weeks; it’s a tricky and demanding job to remove viruses from mouses, keyboards and monitors, remember? When writing the bill I charged her double the time I actually put in – she didn’t want to pay at all because she felt it was our mistake but at that point my boss, who was a formidable lady, practically put her boot up the customer’s ass and made her cough up the money.
She left in a huff never to be seen again, thank the gods.
People are quick to judge without considering the circumstances. Wasn’t the customer’s attitude equally wrong? Aren’t you implying that the service person should have let her bully him?
This reminds me of the time in HS when a letter broke off my laptop keyboard and my parents insisted on taking it to the shop for a repair. Turns out they really just wanted the shop to turn over my search history and chat logs. I already knew my parents were nosy so I would always delete it anyway.
One day I came home from school and they said the shop fixed the keyboard but just needed my password to test it and do updates. I said no it’s fine if he can type in anything into the password then obviously the keyboard works, and I already did the updates regularly.
They literally had to beg me for the password and they were like pleasssse just give the shop the password so they can finish their checklist and you can get your computer back, and I was like fine if it’s the only way I’m getting it back. Of course nothing came of it because there was nothing to discover.
Then my parents got the computer back but kept it in the trunk of their car for a week, and I accidentally saw it when we were leaving Old Navy which started a whole “I don’t believe this!” discourse in the mall parking lot.
Moral of the story just talk to your kids instead of spying and lying, because they know and it won’t work!
The son scammed her. He told her she needed to disinfect peripherals. The tech is just allowing that to happen and charging a not listening to the tech fee.
I have a similar one! I did house calls. I got called out on a warranty call, someone said a coworker of mine didn’t fix the problem. I look in the notes and the coworker says he did a standard virus removal, suggested virus protection but was turned down.
I get there and sure enough it’s riddled with viruses again. Coworker was legit, notes all in order, I tell the client that this isn’t a warranty issue, the work was done, and it has now been reinfected and will need another removal. He seems fine with this, but his wife flips out and demands I prove it got reinfected.
I suggest that we can check the web history. Since it was popping up ads, we’d see when the pop-ups started, and more importantly we’d see if they had stopped after coworker left. Guy says that’s unnecessary, it definitely got reinfected, and this time he’ll buy an antivirus. Wife is having none of it, says go ahead and check and I’ll see the problem was never fixed. I ask if they’re sure, guy kind of resignedly says to do it.
I’m not one to kink shame, but when all the trans porn site titles came up, the dude was clearly mortified. I didn’t get very far into trying to figure out if I can prove it’s related before the wife says “just fix the damn thing” and stormed out. I hope it wasn’t too bad for him, she seemed a bit difficult to deal with.
I think my dumbest customer story isn’t programming-related but still related to computers. I worked in a small computer repair shop about 3000 years ago, and one day a customer comes in with their family computer that’s “not working.” It turned out to be full of viruses and malware, and when we started working on it it turned out this was due to somebody visiting shady porn sites and clicking on download buttons left and right. I explain the situation to her and then recommend steps on how to avoid this happening in the future, so how to browse safely, antivirus software etc. She feelt a bit embarrassed and says that it’s her son, and that she’ll give him a talking-to.
A few weeks later the same customer comes back with the family computer and this time she’s visibly annoyed, and curiously she’s brought along the keyboard, mouse and monitor. The computer’s got viruses again, and it’s my fault. Why? Because she’d had a talk with her son who had then sworn up and down that he’ll mend his filthy ways. When new viruses cropped up, his explanation was that obviously they’re in the keyboard, mouse and monitor too, and since they hadn’t been in the shop they were still infected and we were just too incompetent to have known this. Naturally she believed her son over my word, and started demanding that we remove the viruses from all the peripherals. I tried for a very long time to explain that it’s just not possible (this was a time when PS/2 connectors were still pretty common and that’s what they had so it wasn’t even theoretically possible), but she wouldn’t budge because her son was a computer whiz (he wasn’t) and a Good Boy™ and would never lie, so clearly I was either incompetent or lying.
Finally I just relented and said “OK you got me, it’s possible your viruses came from the peripherals but I just didn’t want to mention it because removing them is so time-consuming and difficult”. I took all their hardware in and had it unfucked in pretty short order, and I looked at the browser history to make sure that it really was a reinfection via the web, which it was (I remember Pamela Anderson featuring in a lot of the searches, which we techs giggled at.)
I kept their hardware at the shop for a couple of weeks; it’s a tricky and demanding job to remove viruses from mouses, keyboards and monitors, remember? When writing the bill I charged her double the time I actually put in – she didn’t want to pay at all because she felt it was our mistake but at that point my boss, who was a formidable lady, practically put her boot up the customer’s ass and made her cough up the money.
She left in a huff never to be seen again, thank the gods.
Scamming the customer because they don’t know any better, nice
People are quick to judge without considering the circumstances. Wasn’t the customer’s attitude equally wrong? Aren’t you implying that the service person should have let her bully him?
yes the customer was out of line, that’s not an excuse to stoop to their level.
No, they should have told them to get lost.
This reminds me of the time in HS when a letter broke off my laptop keyboard and my parents insisted on taking it to the shop for a repair. Turns out they really just wanted the shop to turn over my search history and chat logs. I already knew my parents were nosy so I would always delete it anyway.
One day I came home from school and they said the shop fixed the keyboard but just needed my password to test it and do updates. I said no it’s fine if he can type in anything into the password then obviously the keyboard works, and I already did the updates regularly.
They literally had to beg me for the password and they were like pleasssse just give the shop the password so they can finish their checklist and you can get your computer back, and I was like fine if it’s the only way I’m getting it back. Of course nothing came of it because there was nothing to discover.
Then my parents got the computer back but kept it in the trunk of their car for a week, and I accidentally saw it when we were leaving Old Navy which started a whole “I don’t believe this!” discourse in the mall parking lot.
Moral of the story just talk to your kids instead of spying and lying, because they know and it won’t work!
She was rude ans annoying, but I still don’t like that you took advantage of her.
You’ve never worked retail have you
I have, actually.
A scam is despiccable in my book, no matter how deserving the victim.
The son scammed her. He told her she needed to disinfect peripherals. The tech is just allowing that to happen and charging a not listening to the tech fee.
Yes, the tech, who is also in a position of trust on the matter, is therefore part of said scam. Twist it all you want, the tech lied and benefited.
what scam? the customer wanted them to work on their computer, so they did, and charged the customer accordingly.
I have a similar one! I did house calls. I got called out on a warranty call, someone said a coworker of mine didn’t fix the problem. I look in the notes and the coworker says he did a standard virus removal, suggested virus protection but was turned down.
I get there and sure enough it’s riddled with viruses again. Coworker was legit, notes all in order, I tell the client that this isn’t a warranty issue, the work was done, and it has now been reinfected and will need another removal. He seems fine with this, but his wife flips out and demands I prove it got reinfected.
I suggest that we can check the web history. Since it was popping up ads, we’d see when the pop-ups started, and more importantly we’d see if they had stopped after coworker left. Guy says that’s unnecessary, it definitely got reinfected, and this time he’ll buy an antivirus. Wife is having none of it, says go ahead and check and I’ll see the problem was never fixed. I ask if they’re sure, guy kind of resignedly says to do it.
I’m not one to kink shame, but when all the trans porn site titles came up, the dude was clearly mortified. I didn’t get very far into trying to figure out if I can prove it’s related before the wife says “just fix the damn thing” and stormed out. I hope it wasn’t too bad for him, she seemed a bit difficult to deal with.
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