Did you call Dell or Compaq Computer recently?

[Cataholic]

So you think you're computer-illiterate? Check out the following
excerpts from a Wall Street Journal article by Jim Carlton


Compaq is considering changing the command "Press Any Key" to "Press Return Key" because of the flood of calls asking where the "Any" key is.

AST technical support had a caller complaining that her mouse was hard to control with the dust cover on. The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was packaged in.

Another Compaq technician received a call from a man complaining that the system wouldn't read word processing files from his old diskettes. After trouble-shooting for magnets and heat failed to diagnose the problem, it was found that the customer labeled the diskettes then rolled them into the typewriter to type the labels.

Another AST customer was asked to send a copy of her defective diskettes. A few days later a letter arrived from the customer along with Xeroxed copies of the floppies.

A Dell technician advised his customer to put his troubled floppy back in the drive and close the door. The customer asked the tech to hold on, and was heard putting the phone down, getting up and crossing the room to close the door to his room.

Another Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of trouble- shooting, the technician discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.

Another Dell customer needed help setting up a new program, so a Dell tech suggested he go to the local Egghead. "Yeah, I got me a couple of friends, "the customer replied. When told Egghead was a software store, the man said, "Oh, I thought you meant for me to find a couple of geeks."

Yet another Dell customer called to complain that his keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it by filling up his tub with soap and water and soaking the keyboard for a day, then removing all the keys and washing them individually.

A Dell technician received a call from a customer who was enraged because his computer had told him he was "bad and an invalid". The tech explained that the computer's "bad command" and "invalid" responses shouldn't be taken personally.

An exasperated caller to Dell Computer Tech Support couldn't get her new Dell Computer to turn on. After ensuring the computer was plugged in, the technician asked her what happened when she pushed the power button. Her response, "I pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens." The "foot pedal" turned out to be the computer's mouse.

Another customer called Compaq tech support to say her brand-new computer wouldn't work. She said she unpacked the unit, plugged it in, and sat there for 20 minutes waiting for something to happen. When asked what happened when she pressed the power switch, she asked "What power switch?"

[slick]

Welcome to my world!!!!

[Jadapit]

ROTFLMAO Omg, those were great. I cant quit laughing.

[Cataholic]

Do you think these really WERE callers? LOL, I thought it might just have been a joke.

[Sara luvs her Tinky]

that is CRAZY!

I wonder if they were real too.. but with all the people living in this great big world anything is possible.

Instead of recording calls for "quality or training purposes", they probably record them for a good laugh.

[critter crazy]

ummmmm.............i would say that they are probably real callers!! An older man at work asked me one day to help him set up an e-mail account on Yahoo. so i went through the process iwth him and set up his password and everything. when we were don i closed it down and began to show him how to access it. a few minutes later i walked back into my office to see how he was making out and he was just staring at the computer screen! so i asked him what the problem was. he turned to me and said he couldnt get the internet to work. he said he did just as i said and hit the internet icon but nothing happened. so i asked him to try again and believe it or not, he was touching the interent icon with his finger on the screen!! I just burst out laughing!!!i couldnt believe it!! so i set him staright, we are high tech, just not that high tech!!!

[Lady's Human]

Having almost 20 years in the Army's equivalent of IT, I can believe they would be real calls.

I once issued a radio to a lieutenant, complete with an instruction manual. All the cables were keyed, so not only would they only fit one jack on the radio set, they would only go in one way.

I got a call from a sergeant about an hour later. The sergeant was OBVIOUSLY trying not to laugh, and he asked me to come up and tell the LT what was wrong with the radio set. I got there to find a blackened, melted mass of metal and plastic that had once been a state of the art US Army radio set. I asked the LT what happenned, so he told me "Well, sergeant, I couldn't get the power cable to go into the jack so I put it in with a hammer and turned on the power supply."

It ain't just Dell customers......

[critter crazy]

Having almost 20 years in the Army's equivalent of IT, I can believe they would be real calls.

I once issued a radio to a lieutenant, complete with an instruction manual. All the cables were keyed, so not only would they only fit one jack on the radio set, they would only go in one way.

I got a call from a sergeant about an hour later. The sergeant was OBVIOUSLY trying not to laugh, and he asked me to come up and tell the LT what was wrong with the radio set. I got there to find a blackened, melted mass of metal and plastic that had once been a state of the art US Army radio set. I asked the LT what happenned, so he told me "Well, sergeant, I couldn't get the power cable to go into the jack so I put it in with a hammer and turned on the power supply."

It ain't just Dell customers......

ha ha ha ha!! I worked full time for the new york army national guard, and i have to say that officers are supposed to be the bright leaders of the army!! but boy do most of them fall short!!!!!! ha ha ha ha ha!!!

[Tubby & Peanut's Mom]

I was on vacation all last week so my boss had to do payroll. I have a step by step instruction list typed out, and this thing has at least 80 steps to it and is 3 pages long, so I didn't think I missed a thing! So here's Terry and I trying to get the motorhome through heavy traffic and parked last week when my cell phone rings - it's my boss. I had typed the instruction "Hit the Insert key" and he was wondering where that was. I told him it was on the keyboard near the Delete key. He says "Oh, you mean the insert key on the KEYboard! I was looking all over the screen for something that said Insert."

Therefore, yes, I believe every one of these calls was real.

[Randi]

LOL again. I saw this about 5 years ago .. or more, and from my experience with collegues, I think most of them could be real. And there's this one:

Caller: "Hello, is this Tech Support?"

Tech: "Yes, it is. How may I help you?"

Caller: "The cup holder on my PC is broken and I am within
my warranty period. How do I go about getting that fixed?"

Tech: "I'm sorry, but did you say a cup holder?"

Caller: "Yes, it's attached to the front of my computer."

Tech: "Please excuse me if I seem a bit stumped. It's because
I am. Did you receive this as part of a promotional at a trade
show? How did you get this cup holder? Does it have any
trademark on it?"

Caller: "It came with my computer. I don't know anything
about a promotional. It just has '4X' on it."

At this point, the Tech Rep had to mute the caller because
he couldn't stand it. He was laughing too hard. The caller
had been using the load drawer of the CD-ROM drive as a
cup holder and snapped it off the drive.

[lady_zana]

Do you think these really WERE callers? LOL, I thought it might just have been a joke.

My husband worked for Lexmark and for Hewlett-Packard before.....he would come home and tell me stories that I could barely believe......I would think that, yes, these were probably real calls!

Of course, they get hundreds and hundreds of calls a day - most of them from logical people......but every now and then one of these types of calls slips in....gives them something to come home and tell their wives!

[lizbud]

Then there was the guy who had an email problem and wondered why.

[Laura's Babies]

(They sound like meeeeeee!)

[smokey the elder]

There used to be a web site called techtales.com which had loads of these! They were supposed to be real calls.

[slleipnir]

A friend of my brothers worked at a call center. I'm not sure if this REALLY happened, but it wouldn't supprise me.

I guess someone called up saying his computer isn't working. The help-guy asked to check if it was plugged in right. And other guy said it didn't matter cause the power was out