I spend a good deal of time answering technical questions and troubleshooting computer problems for my clients, most of whom are in the advertising and graphic art community.
Lately, I’ve been dealing with a number of people who are attempting to perform complex tasks–for example, use $5,000 page imposition software–without having even the most basic of computer skills. I charge far too much money to be spending time with my clients trying to teach them to use the mouse.
It’s frustrating. To give you an idea of HOW frustrating, if I were a postal worker rather than a computer tech, my day would probably look something like this:
Hello. Can I help you? You’d like to mail that letter to your brother? Okay, not a problem. Let me see the letter…Ah, your brother’s name is Jeb. Okay, there’s a problem–you don’t have an address on this letter.
An address. Yes, sir, we need an address. You know, where your brother lives.
No, sir, don’t describe his house to me! That won’t really help very much. We need to know where the house is.
Yes, sir. Where it is. You know, like what city it’s in. What’s that, sir? City. What city it’s in. City…it’s like a town, only bigger.
Ah, he lives in the country! I’m not surprised. What’s that, sir? Yes, I do live in the city myself. Yes, I suppose that does make me a city slicker.
But we still need to know where your brother Jeb lives. Tell you what. Let’s start with what state he’s in.
State. You know, what state he lives in. Um, you know, the country is divided into states, see, and…
Yes, sir. Country. Like, the United States of America. Yes, that’s it! America. America is divided into states, and…yes, that’s it, sir. Yes, you are a “Murican.” Yes, I’m sure your brother is a “Murican,” too.
Now, then. We need to narrow down what state your brother lives in, and…what’s that, sir? Ah, I see, you have an American flag on your pen, how nice. I’m sorry? You have an American flag on your truck, too? I’m not surprised. I bet you have a gun rack in it as well, don’t you?
Ah, you do have a gun rack in your truck? Well, fancy that. But we still haven’t–where are you going? No, sir, I don’t need to see your gun. And you can’t bring a gun into a post office anyway.
Beg your pardon? Charlton Heston? No, sir, I don’t know what Charlton Heston would say about that. But I’m sure he and I would both agree that you really, really don’t want to give me a gun right now.
Focus, please. The letter, remember?
We need to find out what state your brother lives in. State, like Texas, or…Texas. Yes, Texas. It’s a state. Your brother lives in Texas? Good! We’re making progress. Now we need…what’s that? How did I know? Lucky guess.
Okay, I’ll tell you what, sir. It’s time for me to leave, but my friend Bob is just coming on duty, so….Hey, Bob! You want to help this gentleman send this letter?
Problem is, I own the company, so there is no Bob for me to give these clients to…
Nooooo, don’t get Bob! I wanna see what happens when you start discussing postage! 🙂
Nooooo, don’t get Bob! I wanna see what happens when you start discussing postage! 🙂
Unfortuatley, it seems we spend majority of our lives holding other peoples hands, and attempting to teach them how to walk on their own.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could have a universal level of language:
Yes Mr. Customer i’ll fax you over that estimate of the tqc w/ the rk, and the bl w/ the el.
sign both copies and fax it back..
(i’m still amazed we have sign here stickers w/ lil arrows.. and believe it or not..i’ve had to use them because they couldn’t figure out that where it said customers signature.. meant them.)
I love your user pic – there are far too few Max fans..
Unfortuatley, it seems we spend majority of our lives holding other peoples hands, and attempting to teach them how to walk on their own.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could have a universal level of language:
Yes Mr. Customer i’ll fax you over that estimate of the tqc w/ the rk, and the bl w/ the el.
sign both copies and fax it back..
(i’m still amazed we have sign here stickers w/ lil arrows.. and believe it or not..i’ve had to use them because they couldn’t figure out that where it said customers signature.. meant them.)
I love your user pic – there are far too few Max fans..
Thanks so much for posting this! I haven’t had such a good laugh in a while!
Thanks so much for posting this! I haven’t had such a good laugh in a while!
*LOL!*
Thanks for this. Very funny. Ah, the perils of owning your own business. Then again, your Postal example was entirely too close to home, as well. I was standing in the Post Office the other day, and there was a woman there who was trying to get them to pay for this mistake she’d made. You see, she was trying to mail this package, and she had erroneously put the destination address in the “From” field, and her own address in the “To” field. Was a tad surprised when it came back to her in the mail, and honestly thought that the postal worker should have been responsible for telling her she had it backwards. Perhaps she is related to one of your clients.
*LOL!*
Thanks for this. Very funny. Ah, the perils of owning your own business. Then again, your Postal example was entirely too close to home, as well. I was standing in the Post Office the other day, and there was a woman there who was trying to get them to pay for this mistake she’d made. You see, she was trying to mail this package, and she had erroneously put the destination address in the “From” field, and her own address in the “To” field. Was a tad surprised when it came back to her in the mail, and honestly thought that the postal worker should have been responsible for telling her she had it backwards. Perhaps she is related to one of your clients.
Bwahahahaha! Oh, the perils, humor and aggravation of tech-support. It’s a good thing you are a sado-masochist. =)
-Vijay
Bwahahahaha! Oh, the perils, humor and aggravation of tech-support. It’s a good thing you are a sado-masochist. =)
-Vijay
Dude – this is why I’ve actually worked hard at playing my professional cyber tech cards so as not to be very directly involved with end-user customers. I still have to do it some, but luckily not often.
It’s easy in cyber-tech fields to forget just how unplugged some people are. We have lots of work to do.
Oh, and don’t knock all of Texas. There’s still Austin, which is way cool… 🙂
P.S. In many ways, I feel that we are the “Bob” to which George W and the kinfolk have been handed.
Dude – this is why I’ve actually worked hard at playing my professional cyber tech cards so as not to be very directly involved with end-user customers. I still have to do it some, but luckily not often.
It’s easy in cyber-tech fields to forget just how unplugged some people are. We have lots of work to do.
Oh, and don’t knock all of Texas. There’s still Austin, which is way cool… 🙂
P.S. In many ways, I feel that we are the “Bob” to which George W and the kinfolk have been handed.
Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Problem is, I own the company, so there is no Bob for me to give these clients to…
Can you charge them a stupidity tax?
For example if they’re trying to do something with a program that you didn’t provide them you charge them extra for having to deal with it? The idea being to encourage them to figure out a mouse on their own or to bother their friends and family?
OTOH, there’s a customer service issue here and if this is what they’re paying you for…. sorry Hun.
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Can you charge them a stupidity tax?
I like that. I like it a lot.
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Actually, I have been known to bump up my rates for particularly frustrating clients…
“OTOH, there’s a customer service issue here and if this is what they’re paying you for…. sorry Hun.”
My business involves dealing primarily with prepress and advertising clients, many of whom work for large corporations which have their own private in-house IT departments. I’m the guy they call in when they face a particularly troublesome, and usually very complex, prepress or technical issue that their in-house prepress or IT department can’t handle.
To extend the post office analogy a bit, I’m the guy who specializes in shipping 5,000 tons of fragile, perishable goods from Kansas City to Hong Kong in three days, not the guy who weighs your letter and sticks a stamp on it.
What’s been happening lately is I’ll get a call from a client who’s having a problem creating, say, a 16-up imposition for a web-fed press that’s being used to print a 244-page catalog, which is a fairly sophisticated kind of job that shouldn’t be approached by someone without a thorough understanding of both computers and prepress (and a good bit of understanding about printing is helpful, too)–and that person won’t know how to install software, lacks the skills to identify what operating system he’s running, and can’t figure out how to use menus and dialog boxes.
Grr.
It’s a bit like walking into a nuclear power plant to troubleshoot a power management problem and discovering that all the employees don’t know the most basic principles of electricity and don’t have the skills to change a light bulb. (Which, given the state of America’s nuclear power industry, might not be a stretch–but that’s another issue entirely…)
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
I hear your frustration but it’s sounding like there’s not much you can do except try to explain to the vendor that it’s not in their best interests (financially) to put that person won’t know how to install software, lacks the skills to identify what operating system he’s running, and can’t figure out how to use menus and dialog boxes on the phone with you.
However, if the vendor insists…well that’s what the stupidity tax is for.
Sorry about that.
Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Problem is, I own the company, so there is no Bob for me to give these clients to…
Can you charge them a stupidity tax?
For example if they’re trying to do something with a program that you didn’t provide them you charge them extra for having to deal with it? The idea being to encourage them to figure out a mouse on their own or to bother their friends and family?
OTOH, there’s a customer service issue here and if this is what they’re paying you for…. sorry Hun.
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Can you charge them a stupidity tax?
I like that. I like it a lot.
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
Actually, I have been known to bump up my rates for particularly frustrating clients…
“OTOH, there’s a customer service issue here and if this is what they’re paying you for…. sorry Hun.”
My business involves dealing primarily with prepress and advertising clients, many of whom work for large corporations which have their own private in-house IT departments. I’m the guy they call in when they face a particularly troublesome, and usually very complex, prepress or technical issue that their in-house prepress or IT department can’t handle.
To extend the post office analogy a bit, I’m the guy who specializes in shipping 5,000 tons of fragile, perishable goods from Kansas City to Hong Kong in three days, not the guy who weighs your letter and sticks a stamp on it.
What’s been happening lately is I’ll get a call from a client who’s having a problem creating, say, a 16-up imposition for a web-fed press that’s being used to print a 244-page catalog, which is a fairly sophisticated kind of job that shouldn’t be approached by someone without a thorough understanding of both computers and prepress (and a good bit of understanding about printing is helpful, too)–and that person won’t know how to install software, lacks the skills to identify what operating system he’s running, and can’t figure out how to use menus and dialog boxes.
Grr.
It’s a bit like walking into a nuclear power plant to troubleshoot a power management problem and discovering that all the employees don’t know the most basic principles of electricity and don’t have the skills to change a light bulb. (Which, given the state of America’s nuclear power industry, might not be a stretch–but that’s another issue entirely…)
Re: Sometimes stupid people deserve something special…
I hear your frustration but it’s sounding like there’s not much you can do except try to explain to the vendor that it’s not in their best interests (financially) to put that person won’t know how to install software, lacks the skills to identify what operating system he’s running, and can’t figure out how to use menus and dialog boxes on the phone with you.
However, if the vendor insists…well that’s what the stupidity tax is for.
Sorry about that.