No really, put down the shotgun now. I mean it.
So, it's been almost three months between this post and its predecessor. What could I possibly do to skip entertaining my faithful audience?
Well, I'd rather spill the beans now.
I quit the job.
No need to have a heart attack, it was known from my very first call that I wouldn't make it that long. C'mon, there's a limit to the amount of "I HAVE NO INTERNET HALP ME NAO I DESERVE IT I'M PAYING YOU etc [Incoherent braying of a retarded goldfish]" calls a person can take.
Actually, I quit the job sometime in late May. I haven't been up to date with reality since that time (gee, I wonder why), so I haven't bothered (read: had better things to do) than writing.
The reasons may or may not be an irresistible urge to get my degree get a decent job, complaints about my behavior (apparently, people don't like when I'm banging on tables and swearing at the phone in a fit of rage), my superior being an asshole, HIS superior being a delusional freak, all of the above, etc.
So... since my supply of call is obviously limited, I shall present my faithful audience (you are faithful, RIGHT?) the top 10 calls which scored over 9000 on the "I can't believe a person that stupid exists and can reproduce legally" meter.
As mentioned in the first post of this boring semi-funny blog, these calls are 100% real. I can ask people who still work there (against better judgment) to pull out the recordings from the archives.
Number 10: "My modem is off"
>TSG: [Opening sentence]
>Customer (female, a cookie if you guessed it beforehand): Hello, I'm calling because my modem is off.
>TSG: * In a fit of shocked awe *: ... You mean, it's working normally, except it's not on.
>Customer: Yes, and I don't know what to do.
>TSG: Turning it on is a good start.
>Customer: But how?
Oh Jesus tap-dancing Christ, there's a nice shiny button on every modem. It's called the POWER button and it... you guessed it genius, it powers up the modem.
I heard of this ancient mystic force. This force infuses its user with the knowledge of the intricate device known as a modem. At least with such arcane knowledge as the location of the critically-important buttons that may or may not power up the modem and give you the "Internets" you so desperately need for watching Mr. Hands or whatever.
This force...
is...
THE FREAKING MANUAL. READ IT. I promise, it doesn't bite. No really, it doesn't.
Bullshit like this is inexcusable. But no, this stupid airhead calls us, disturbing my peace with retardation beyond redemption.
Number 9: I HAS NO INTARNETS
This call is slightly different than the generic "I have no Internet" call. See, the first thing the retards at instruction teach the entry-level TSGs is to reset the modem and/or router. Amazingly, it solves 99.9% of "I have no Internet" problems.
... amazingly 99.9% of calls begin with customers getting a 404 error or "connection failed" and immediately calling tech support.
This can't be a coincidence.
Naturally, this call was different.
>TSG: [Opening sentence]
>Customer (male, mid 20s, IQ<50): I DONT HAVE INTERNET FOR [Fraudulent amount of time here because we DO log activity] WHAT THE HELL IS THIS IM PAYING AND YOU'RE A REPRESENTATIVE SO YOU HAVE TO HELP ME etc.
>TSG: Did you try resetting your modem?
>Customer: What on earth is a modem?
>TSG: I see.
20 minutes later I manage to get this neanderthal to reset the modem.
>TSG: Now try surfing.
>Customer: Still no internet.
I'm paraphrasing because incoherent braying is incoherent.
>TSG: Try surfing to [test IP address].
>Customer: Dude, didn't you understand? I HAVE NO INTERNET GODDAMNIT
>TSG: Shut up and do it you moron.
After back-and-forth "I HAVE NO INTERNET" from him and "Just do what I say retard, you'll have your gay porn soon" from me, he got his Internet. And the world rejoiced. Seriously, is trusting us such an issue?
Number 7: Hostnames are serious business
Prelude: We work with the cable company to provide Internet access over coaxial cables. The cable company in its genius has decided to use dialers. In those dialers you have to write the hostname associated with your ISP.
You'd think "host.isp.com" is hard to write.
Think again.
In between people who simply cannot locate the keys, not to mention the '.' symbol there are also people who lie to you. They say the follow you to the letter but then get a "User stupidity" error and of course blame us.
We could write the host down in an IP address form but...
- It's against company policy.
- The IP is going to change eventually, it has a lease.
- We generally assume people aren't that stupid.
- We are mostly wrong.
>TSG: [Opening sentence]
>Customer (in a think ethnic minority accent): Hello, I get error 678.
At least he knows the error number. Most people just say "I HAS PROBLEM FIX IT".
>TSG: * series of checks to see that the customer is indeed retarded *
>Customer: Still error 678.
>TSG: Maybe it's because you're too dumb to type the hostname properly?
Then it hit me. This guy doesn't know the keyboard layout. I mean REALLY DOESN'T KNOW. Since English is serious business I work my way around it and eventually get him to type it.
...
>Customer: Still error 678.
At this point I had it with him and:
>TSG: Off to the cable company you go, here's their number. Maybe they can fix your IQ.
Seriously now. I KNOW English is being taught at a reasonable level in this stupid country.
10 minutes later a guy I know very well approaches:
>oTSG: Dude this retard you handled just landed on me.
>TSG: And?
>oTSG: He's obviously too stupid to type a hostname so I had him type the IP.
>TSG: But isn't it against all the stupid crap they taught us?
>oTSG: Yes, but at least he can stop calling us.
>TSG: Good point. Are all of [ethnic minority] so freaking stupid?
>oTSG: Oh yeah. At the "Popular customer team" (see earlier posts) we never assign URL hostnames for this very reason.
>TSG: I see.
Number 6: "I can't believe it's my maximum download speed"
Covered in an earlier post but I'll make it short.
- Retard doesn't know basic math.
- Retard doesn't know basic communications knowledge.
- Retard thinks he's entitled to the world.
- Retard calls.
- Retard lands on me.
- I explain Retard that download_speed = Sum of concurrent download speeds and if it's maximal, it's working as intended.
- Retard still doesn't understand, retard wants to disconnect.
- I bid retard farewell (read: told him to go fuck himself in an ironic yet subtle way)
Number 5: The Fucktard
I'll just call this guy the Fucktard because that's what he is. I don't know what went through is head and frankly, I don't want to know.
At 1:30am, on a night shift.
>TSG: [Opening line]
>Fucktard: What the hell is this download speed, I demand a senior to speak with me immediately, this company sucks ass, I'm going to sue its guts out.
In the meantime, his information loads. What do I see? A popup saying "Do NOT serve the customer in any way shape or form. Consult senior immediately upon customer call".
>TSG (to senior): Hey, I got this guy here with this popup, his user is...
>STSG: Oh god fucking damnit, not that guy again! (to himself) God, what a fucknut.
>TSG: Is he really really retarded?
>STSG: You'll see. Talk to him.
>TSG (to fucktard): You DO realize we have to test it, right?
>Fucktard: I don't want any freakin' tests, get a senior now!
>TSG: There's only one available and he's not fapping to gay porn either. In fact he's busy managing the rest of us who work nights so retards like you can disturb our peace.
There was another senior guy whose shift has ended. These two bastards put Fucktard on call center-wide speakerphone and started to laugh their asses off.
>Fucktard: Some guy just called me and made my radio not work, it's your fault and I know it, I'm calling the police.
>TSG: Okay.
>Fucktard: OKAY? WE ARE NOT IN AMERICA MR. OKAY AND IF THESE ARE THE STANDARDS SET FOR YOUR TEAM, I WILL BE COMPLAINING DIRECTLY TO THE CEO!
/hangup
>TSG (to seniors): Well, at least the problem solved itself.
>STSGs: Don't count on it.
>TSG: Why, this crap happened a lot?
>STSGs: Quite a lot, expect a flurry of calls from him tomorrow.
The day after tomorrow I check the user and I see no less than 19(!) documented (read: god knows how many undocumented) calls all ending with incoherent braying of an old senile retard and him hanging up.
This scenario repeated itself every month. Eventually we were on the verge of banning him from our services but for some unfathomable reason he's still our (their) customer. At least I heard he faxed the CEO's office demanding the CEO meet him because of his problems.
Needless to say the fax itself had more spelling mistakes than a dyslexic kid with down's syndrome on a sugar rush. Also needless to say his case got escalated to the chief security officer due to continuous harassment.
But, he's still their customer.
Did I mention I hate penny-pinchers who lick the asshole of every customer just so they won't transfer to another ISP?
Number 4: The "I will sue you" bitch
This case hasn't actually happened to me, rather than the guy sitting next to me. I got to (over)hear the call in it's g(l)ory. For simplicity's sake, he's referred to as "TSG" for this call.
>TSG: [Opening sentence]
>Customer: Okay listen up. If anything, ANYTHING happens to my computer as a result of your "support", I will sue the company and you personally.
>TSG: And you're aggressive because...?
>Customer: Because the last over 9000 times I called, every single troubleshoot resulted in my motherboard going on fire.
>TSG: ... yeah.
Now, imagine this woman is allowed to reproduce. Also to drive and vote. Don't you wish to exterminate 90% of the population?
The call went pretty much like this:
>TSG: You have a virus, I can see it by your outgoing traffic rate.
>Customer: It's your fault, if I didn't get your stupid Internet I wouldn't have gotten it.
>TSG: Or you can stop browsing gay porn sites.
And so on. Eventually, the call ended with the TSG telling her to go fuck herself with a rake, but very subtly.
Number 3: "How do I plug it in?"
Some prelude is required here. In our country, there is a sect of hardcore religious people whose religion I will not mention. This sect is fucked up. Just like any other cult, their behavior is apparent - retarded clothing, moronic education and next to zero preparation for real life because their deity will protect them. Your regular cult, except these morons actually have parliamentary control and they actually hold our government by the balls.
So naturally, these morons are hardly getting exposed to 21st century technology due to the fear and anxiety that it might "offend their feelings" or "corrupt their youth" and some bullshit or another. I can rant on this for ages. Typical technophobic bullshit.
What's worse is that our ISP, at the time, wanted to beat the competition so they marketed specifically designed programs for this kind of customer. Some hand-checked whitelist-filtering programs and crap like that. Think Amish who are just as stupid but do use technology.
My point is. These people don't know jack shit about anything.
>TSG: [Opening line].
>Customer: Hello. I just bought this internet thing and I need help connecting it.
Actually he said it in a very smug and condescending tone, as if he's a better person.
>TSG (sighing to myself): Okay, start -> control panel -> network connections...
>Customer: Wait, what do I do with this?
>TSG: With what?
>Customer: The tech guy left me a box. I don't know what's inside it.
>TSG: Try opening it, I promise there isn't any anthrax or smallpox in it.
The above line was sarcastic, they don't know what either is.
So this retard didn't even open the box to begin with, but immediately called us. What does he expect us to do, open the box for him? Come on, this isn't a case of not knowing, it's about common sense.
Quoth the Dickens: There's nothing common about common sense.
It's like teaching quantum physics to an 8-year old hyperactive ADD kid on a sugar rush. Completely useless.
>Customer: There's something inside.
>TSG: Shiver me timbers! Taking it out is probably a good idea.
>Customer: Okay so what do I do now?
>TSG (realizing the gravity of the situation): I think you have to plug it in. It's called a modem.
>Customer: How do I plug it in?
This is where I snapped. It was a USB modem, that means it had two wires. One is a telephone RJ11 wire and another is a standard issue USB cable. GUESS!
Well, before that I asked the model of the modem.
>TSG: Would you kindly tell me what's written on the modem?
>Customer: I don't know.
>TSG: Maybe READ what's written on it?
>Customer: How do I look?
I mean, seriously now.
>TSG: On the backside of the modem there are two sockets. Their shape is different. With the modem come two cables. Note: their shape is also different. One of the cables is a telephone cable. It's the same cable as the cable on the telephone you're calling me with. Now, this is the hard part. You have to PLUG the phone cable into the hole in the wall where the cable phone goes to and you ha...
* click *
Apparently this moron disconnected the phone he was talking on. To this day, whether he could physically connect his modem is a mystery to me.
Number 2: How do I settled debt?
A bit of backstory. I think it's obvious that you DO have to pay for your services. This includes paying your ISP for Internet access. We have an elaborate system of tracking down debtors and having them pay.
In case we cannot track them down we simply suspend their account until such time when all delinquent payments have been generated.
In extremely rare cases we give out temporary users so this moron can download his gay porn until his normal account is available. The passwords to these temporary users change over a fixed time period in order to prevent abuse.
Guess what happened.
Password got changed, retard got disconnected, retard got pissed, retard called.
>TSG: [Opening sentence]
>Customer: I have no internet, what is this bullshit? I'm not paying you for nothing.
See why I hate people? Is it really this hard NOT to be a complete bitch to a total stranger?
Of course, people assume they're getting their connection magically. After tedious 15 minutes of tracking his user information down:
>TSG: It seems your account has been suspended due to a debt. You can settle it with the finance department.
>Customer: Yeah, so? I still deserve internet from you. Give it to me now.
>TSG: After a brief consultation we've decided not to disclose the password to the temporary user assigned to you. You will be able to connect 1 minute after settling your debt.
>Customer: What the hell is this bullshit? I need my goddamn Internet NOW! I'm a {stock trader, gay porn aficionado, gaming nerd, general fucktard, lawyer, accountant,...} and I can't work without it! You're making me lose money!
>TSG: Which is why you should settle your debt. None of the guys here have permissions to access the billing system because it's none of our business. Naturally, you also called at the time the finance department is closed for the night. Call next morning.
>Customer: Give me your supervisor NOW. I'm going to settle this crap once and for all, it's unbelievable... {moronic rant}
>TSG: Of course. *click*
See, the customer can be Intel or Cisco for all I care. The second I detect a hint of aggression from anyone, the call is over until they change their attitude. No one in the world has a right to be a condescending bitch for any reason. If a person wants decent troubleshooting then they better have the decency to be at least somewhat polite to people who slave away because they are too dumb to solve their own shit.
We can't do magic. We can't "fix" "your" "internet", especially if you didn't pay for it.
Number 1: To be continued.
Yes, I used this miserable cliffhanger. Sucks to be you.
