Must. Bite. Tongue.

[Dips]

This morning I found an email from one of our resellers in South Africa (identifying info was changed to protect, well...me ):

From: anon@anon.com
To: me@mycompany.com
Subject: No Downloads for [Product Name] Available at this Time
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 10:28:33 +0200
X-Mailer: Microsoft Office Outlook 11



Hi,
is there any reason why the subject is stated on all the products download pages?
where can one download [Product name]?

regards,
Anon
anon@anon.com
product support manager

At first I was "huh?" Then I read the subject again. Yup. Mr. Anon, the product support manager at at one of our resellers, was able to copy and paste the words "No Downloads for [Product Name] Available at this Time" into an email subject line without actually comprehending the meaning of those very words.

[PuckishOne]

Refer him to the Department of Redundancy Department.

You will, of course, show the utmost restraint and not reply to him in a brutally sarcastic manner, won't you, Dips? Maybe his coffee hadn't kicked in yet or something.

[friendofjimmyk]

I second the motion that maybe his coffee hadn't kicked in.

[Dips]

You will, of course, show the utmost restraint and not reply to him in a brutally sarcastic manner, won't you, Dips?

It was really hard composing ANYTHING that wouldn't sound sarcastic, even if I wasn't trying to be. I finally settled on a quick restatement of the obvious, couched as an apology, followed by an immediate change of subject to Ordering 101, on the assumption they still want to buy it:

Good morning,

I apologize that [Product] is not available by download. If you would like to order it, please contact <sales@mycompany.com>. Prices (in US dollars) can be found at http://www.mycompanywebsite.com/prices.asp . Please give us a shipping address if you would like a quotation for shipping.

Best regards,

Me
email: me@mycompany.com