I had to call Dell. (Long.)

[technical.angel]

Thankfully, ::knock on wood :: we've had the last of our big problem with the Dells we ordered for US... IT.

We had a bad batch of power supplies that were frying the mobos. Of course, before we realized the problem, we had "tested" the bad power supply on 2 other boxes, and fried THOSE mobos. Then a fourth one went out at the exact same time.

That was one time we did have a tech come out. We weren't sure what all was fried, so we wanted the tech to double check everything while replacing parts. Plus, you know, 4 computers.

[wagegoth]

I got my Dell 5 years ago. It's still a good machine. Only one hardware problem the entire time. I paid extra for top service and it was worth it. Minimal hold times, techs who knew what they were doing or elevated it if they didn't, and spoke English clearly enough (I'm actually pretty good with accents, but mix a very heavy Indian accent with a bad long distance connection, ).

But now I'm off warranty and can't extend it. The only support I can get is in the Philippines and they just read from the Great Binder of Maybe.

Then, I ordered a battery for my boss' laptop and had it rush shipped for a trip. They sent the wrong one. Someone had wrapped it in bubble wrap at some point and stuck the wrong label on the bubble wrap. Then it took three calls to get it picked up, credited, and the rush shipping credited. All of these calls involved women with heavy accents who said their names were Rachel, Daisy and Susan. Yeah, uh huh, right.

So, I'm thinking about whether I really want to deal with that or not, or buy something off Tiger Direct. If I knew enough I'd go with TD, but I'm scared to go without support. This sucks.

[BravoOrig]

Well that was their name, wasn't it? I mean it's written all over their underwear.

I got someone from India the other day. The name they used....


Calvin Kline

[Simply Amazed]

My favorite name I've run into is GBoy, from manilla.

Also, this was great. I had a chinese customer who when I asked him his name said Bob.

No biggie. I understand that there is a far more practical reason for doing this. It's just a lot easier to tech if you don't have to spend time spelling out your name out needlessly countless times a day.

Anyway, I had to call a tech in another oversees call center and hook these guys up. This was a guy from India named Joe. Well Joe gave me the fourth degree about how I had the account holder named Bob but the account name was in Chinese.

I'm like, "look JOE, I don't know how come he is calling himself Bob but he is and there's nothing I can do about it."

He took the call but acted real suspicious like , "So, your name is Bob then?"

I had to laugh. Here was a guy in India using a fake name getting PO'ed because a guy from China chose the same tactic. That my friends is irony.

[Mango]

Um... couldn't you have just shared it from your PC?

I could have, but I have a laptop, which travels with me, which would make them even more annoyed

[technical.angel]

Ah, that would be a different story.

[varmintjane]

Tier 1

As a lowly tier 1 agent, just a friendly reminder that even though an agent may be dumb as rocks they still deserve common courtesy. I'm good at my job but get Sys admins and ITs calling in giving me a hard time b/c I make 10 bucks an hour in a call center. But then these same people overlook basic settings or skip steps configuring their modem/router and insist the problem in on the ISP's network.

It's fine if you've already done all the necessary troubleshooting on your own but don't just rattle of a list of everything that you've done at the speed of light. Or rudely snap "I've already done that". At most call centers, if a customer call in you have to document everything that was done to try to resolve the issue so that means even if the customer has already done "everything" and knows they need a tech, as an agent there are still things you have to ask/verify/notate as far as what exactly the customer has done.

So yeah it might be a little frustrating but ultimately the point of verifying that absolutely everything has been to resolve the issue NOW on the phone (at least at my center) is to save the customer the down time of having to wait for a tech. Techs are sometimes backlogged for days because we get idiots who demand a tech for something simple like plugging in a freaking cable.

[earl colby pottinger]

Double

As a lowly tier 1 agent, just a friendly reminder that even though an agent may be dumb as rocks they still deserve common courtesy. I'm good at my job but get Sys admins and ITs calling in giving me a hard time b/c I make 10 bucks an hour in a call center. But then these same people overlook basic settings or skip steps configuring their modem/router and insist the problem in on the ISP's network.

This goes double if said computer expert is working on someone else's machine.

I run BeOS, my ISP does not support it. So I figured out how to make it work by forcing stuff. Later I am setting up my girl friend's machine. I did the same things as my BeOS machine but after talking to a very helpful tech at the ISP, I realized if I had gone ahead and got it working that there was no way my girlfriend could get any help thru her ISP, she would always have to come to me for any problem.

Worse, if the ISP techs did not know about my hacks they could royally screw up the setup thru no fault of their own, just by doing their normal procedures.

[Fawn]

Later I am setting up my girl friend's machine. I did the same things as my BeOS machine but after talking to a very helpful tech at the ISP, I realized if I had gone ahead and got it working that there was no way my girlfriend could get any help thru her ISP, she would always have to come to me for any problem.

Worse, if the ISP techs did not know about my hacks they could royally screw up the setup thru no fault of their own, just by doing their normal procedures.

Sounds something like what my bf (at the time, now long time ago ex) did when I was just learning how to set up computers. Which then led me into replacing parts and programs because I didn't know WTF he did?!?!

The only brand name computer I ever used were HP computers. My printers have always been HP too. Never had a problem with them. Now I make my own computers and still use HP printers. No problems!