Soldier lost everything in hurricane Harvey and I had to tell him the photos he had saved in his Army email account were gone forever... Tech Support |
- Soldier lost everything in hurricane Harvey and I had to tell him the photos he had saved in his Army email account were gone forever...
- I need the newest iPhone and if you dont get it for me I will be fired!
- My Internets not working and it's all YOUR fault!
- Unlimited replacement IPhones .... NOT!
- Go ahead and delete precious childhood photos, I have copies
- journey, the
| Posted: 09 Dec 2019 03:55 PM PST Back in 2017 I was working as a contractor for the US Army doing general IT support and as part of my duties I helped users with their Army email accounts. Typically we dealt with active duty soldiers having trouble accessing their account or needing to reset their password. Every so often we would get a call from someone who was no longer in the Army trying to see if they could access their account. Typically these calls would end in them getting upset and yelling at us because their access is revoked after they separate from the Army. One particular call I got really hit me hard though. One morning a guy called asking for some help accessing his email account so I grabbed his info and looked him up in our system. After finding the account I started my normal spiel letting him know that since he was no longer active duty the account was no longer accessible. I always liked to ask people what they were looking for just in case I could direct them somewhere else to find that info instead of just dumping them off the call and moving on. When I asked what he was searching for I heard sniffles on the other end of the phone. After a little while he answered that he had just lost everything in hurricane Harvey and he was trying to get the photos his wife had sent him of his son while he was on deployment years ago. He went on to tell me that his son had passed away a year prior and this was his last ditch effort to try to recover some photos of him. He started sobbing while telling me and I couldn't help but start crying myself. I couldn't imagine what that man was going through after losing his son then all of his earthly possessions a year later. I wanted so badly to help this guy out but there was literally nothing I could do. It wrecked me. After finishing up the call I logged out, walked over to my manager, and told her about the call I just had with my eyes still teary. I'm not a super emotional person but after that call I needed a minute. I went for a walk around the building just to collect myself. Calls like that one were a major part of why I left that job. [link] [comments]  |
| I need the newest iPhone and if you dont get it for me I will be fired! Posted: 09 Dec 2019 06:04 PM PST This is a long one strap in. The user is a road sales associate in Kansas. He works out of his home and apparently think pretty highly of himself. He requested a new phone and has a $100 allowance for a phone for his role. He just became eligible for a phone and I gave him the form. This is the interaction that followed. -------Begin story------- Me: I have your request, but i see you clicked "special request by permission only" and wrote iphone 11 256GB. That's not an option for you, please reenter the request and select one of the actual options. User: why cant i have that its what's needed for me to do my job. I had my 7S for 10 years. I haven't broken it and my manager said I needed a new phone! Me: its outside of what available, (tells him the process involving needing legit business justification) ...and the 11 is so expensive it can only be approved by the global CFO in Brussels. I have you as having a 6 and you just became eligible for a new 2 year agreement last week. User: you expect me to get what? An 8? That's like 5 years old and it will be broken before I even get it. Why cant I atleast get a 9 or 9S so it's only like 2 years old. That's still too old for it to be useful, but an 8 is ancient. Me: sir, there is not an iPhone 9. the 8 and 10 are the same generation of phone and came out on the same day that generation was the current generation till about a month ago. User: you are lying! You just dont want me to be able to do my job! You are trying to get me fired by making it so I cant do my job! I am in road sales I need the 11! Me: as I said if you can give me a legitimate reason for you needing it I can reach out to the global CFO in Brussels. User: I need the biggest screen available why cant you understand that! (I contact my boss asking if I can get approval for an 8+ and I get authorization, I start to write out that I've gotten it) User: Fine, dont order me a damn phone. I'll just use this until it no longer works then I'll get fired and it will be your fault, I hope you're happy. Me: okay that's fine, but pleaseonce it breaks let me know and we can discuss what's available at that time as the device availability changes as the prices drop. ....5 mins later... His manager: why wont you buy my man a new phone. He says you are refusing to buy him any thing Me: (tells him what's going on forwarded the baby like response) Manager:...no response... ...hour later... His manager: (walks into my office yelling in his British accent) why wont you buy my man a phone he needs it now! I know you have one here give him what ever he is requesting. Me: sir, I can not. It's out side of what is purchasable and is so high I would have to call brussels and they wont approve that. I am not reaching out to the CFO in Brussels for that And i dont keep phones I order upon approval. Users have an allowance for a phone and he can select any device in that range. It feels like he just wants something no one else has. And after that last email I dont want to order him anything My manager: I got a approval for him to get an 8+ we can give him one of those. His Manager: (calmer) that wont do. what can we get him that will make him feel special how bout an X. That's newer than an 8. Me: I will get him an 8+ it is the same generation as an X. They came out on the same day. His manager: okay that's fine then. you better not be lying! (Me pulls up the announce date on google) My manager: your man was awfully rude, look at his emails (motions to my computer) His manager: can my other man get one too My manager: oh of course! His manager to my manager: why does anyone need an 11 anyway? My manager:shrugs His manager: you better get this ordered today. After reading that last email, I will talk to him about being rude ... (I have received about 10 emails since friday 6 within the hour of his manager walking out of the office at 4:30 (I only get paid till 4), from the user saying "I hear my manager came down and talked to you so when am I getting my 11?" "So im just not getting a phone?" "Is my phone in limbo?" "My manager told me I am getting an 8+ that's still too old, but it better be here Monday") ------end story----- People man, people. [link] [comments]  |
| My Internets not working and it's all YOUR fault! Posted: 10 Dec 2019 01:01 AM PST Just had a customer who had done a software update and when asked what options he had, he could choose from: He then got upset when I kindly told him he can either factory reset his phone so the phone asks him that question again, or he can plug it into iTunes and do a "Carrier Network Setting Check" to update it again with our settings. He told me he is unwilling to do either of those as he's done enough and then told me until we fix his mistake he's going to sue us, and just started to say "You'll hear from my lawyer!" Over and over again. If a customer says the word lawyer more than three times the call recording automatically goes to our legal team who have to review the call and send him correspondence. He then got annoyed when I gave him the address to give to a lawyer to send any correspondence, said he would receive correspondence from us and said we can't take it any further or speak to him about this matter until the lawyers have sorted it out if he's going to sue us. He's just made it 100% worse for himself now as he will get a letter from our legal team after the listen to the call advising no laws were broken and he caused the issue himself, and we will be unable to help him any further on the matter as the pop-up is not controlled by us, it's an Apple feature to make sure you get the right carrier settings. He'll have to wait 3-5 business days for this and until he had received that letter we will be unable to do anything over the phone except read him a script: "I'm sorry an issue on your account is currently with our legal team and you will get correspondence from them within 5 working days. We cannot discuss this account until you have received the correspondence." And then we can either end the call on him after reading him that, or give general advice around our networks products but not access his account. Sorry for format, I'm on mobile. TL;DR: customer gets annoyed because networks have different internet settings, threatens to sue us and ends up locking his account down for 3-5 business days. [link] [comments]  |
| Unlimited replacement IPhones .... NOT! Posted: 09 Dec 2019 06:54 AM PST This story revolves around a site manager at a smaller site out of town. You know the type that I am talking about. He is the king of his small hill and it is critically important that he has the latest and greatest everything (including his iPhone). Now our company policy is that you can ask that your company-owned iPhone get replaced every 2 years, but that is not good enough for our King of the small anthill. Mgr: " I need to replace my iPhone." Me: "What is wrong with it?" Mgr: "Nothing. I just want it replaced with the new model that just came out." Me: (Check his recent upgrade date. He just joined the company last year so of course, we got him a brand new one 9 months ago.) "I am sorry we have issued you a new phone 9 months ago and we only upgrade iPhones every two years. I will send you a copy of the policy if you wish to take it up with your boss." So I basically send him the employee handbook and list the page number and section of the phone policy. This might have been a bad move. ::Fast forward 2 weeks later:: Mgr: "I need to replace my phone and I just opened up a help desk ticket." Me: "Mgr, we just went over this. We can not replace your phone. You..." Mgr: "You don't understand. It is damaged. I accidentally dropped it." Me: "Oh well that is different." (Policy states that the company will replace an accidentally damaged phone ONE TIME for the employee with Regional Manager's approved.) Mgr: "Yes, and before you ask I have already talked to the Regional Manager and he has approved the replacement. I am forwarding you his email." (Well now that was odd of him to give me everything I need abiding by the very letter of the policy. Awfully suspicious. I document everything.) We buy him the new iPhone model. :::fast forward about 45 days::: Mgr: "I need to replace my phone and I just opened up a help desk ticket." Me: "Wait what? You just got a new phone." Mgr: "Yeah I know. I was walking through the rain and ran through the rain coming off the building in buckets and got the phone wet." Hehe, come to find out for the second breakage of an iPhone the employee is required to 1. Pay for half of the iPhone replacement cost. (That is like $500 out of his own pocket.) and 2. Add insurance to their phone that they reimburse the company for every month. In the event of it happening a 3rd time, there will at least be insurance on the phone to handle the issue. He HIT THE ROOF when corporate HR called him directly with the news and set up his paycheck withdrawal. That was about 2 years ago and he has never broken one or asked for a replacement yet. [link] [comments]  |
| Go ahead and delete precious childhood photos, I have copies Posted: 09 Dec 2019 12:33 PM PST I'm a software engineer, so it irks me when my mom says "you work on computers, right? Can you fix some issue for me?" because that's not my line of work, but the answer almost always is yes, regardless. This happened a week ago during thanksgiving. I went to visit my mom, and she of course complains that her computer is very slow and she cant load vacation photos from her camera onto the computer. My first thought is that her hard drive is full, so I download windirstat. Sure enough, 900GB of photos, 99.8% of her 1TB hard drive is full. I show her windirstat (because it has a pretty layout of all the files) and explain that her hard drive is just completely full and simply cant fit her vacation photos, and is also why the computer is so slow. I open up her photos folder and show her how full it is. She opens up the first (and oldest) folder, my childhood photos, and says that these are all duplicates, and I can delete them all. Now, instantly I am suspicious, because I know my mom doesnt back anything up, and she just wants me to delete these photos. I ask her where she keeps these duplicates, just so that I can absolutely be sure these truly are duplicates (because if its true, theres an easy way to get some more space), and she literally opens up the windows 10 photo viewer app, and navigates over to the pictures I have open in the pictures folder, and says "see? They're copied. So I can delete the file and just keep the picture." Anyway, I'll be visiting my mom again for christmas, and ill give her a bigger hard drive, an external one for backups, and I'll also be giving her a better monitor and connecting it via HDMI. Currently she has whatever cheap ancient one dad bought, connected DVI > DVI/VGA adapter > VGA > monitor. Why? Who knows. Hopefully the pictures will look better. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 09 Dec 2019 12:27 AM PST TL;DR We were set on a journey to restore communications. Dunes were needed to be climbed, lakes to be crossed, walls to be circumvented, tunnels to be crawled through. $me: obvious $coworker: wouldn't fit $coworker2: called in from another job $boss: "oh yes, but ofcourse we do that too, wait I'll make you an offer" $building1: on the dam side, has proper internet/WAN connection $building2: in the valley, has #*&^%$# internet/WAN connection 15 years ago $boss: "I have had a meeting with $ourbiggestclient. They are complaining about network speed in $building2. Yes I know these are less than 100 meters apart, but somehow $ISP is not capable of getting decent WAN/Internet to $building2. We need to have fiber between $building1 and $building2." $me: "Exactly how is that going to happen? As far as I know nothing is buried in there somewhere. I don't know of any feedthroughs in there?" $boss: "That is why we are going to make one" Wait wut? $me: "So you mean we are going to dig a ditch and put some tubing in there?" If he says yes now, I'll put in my 2 weeks notice. Definitions of "IT-work" have been stretched before by him but not this far. $boss: "No, you are funny." No I'm not, considering what you have making us do so far, sir! $boss: "According to these drawings there is a small tunnel thingy between the buildings, we should be able to use that." Oy vaye. $me: "Umm the switch closet is on the front of $building1, do we have a path through the building somewhere, since $building2 is located at the back?" $boss: "I was thinking of feeding it under the building" Right, I see a shitty job coming. $building1 is located some 150 feet away from $building2. The pavement on the front is also 10 feet above the pavement at the back, as it is built on the side of a dam. So, we set off. First, finding a way from the front of $building1 to the back. A floor panel is opened up. I see sand. Lots of sand. I go down and crawl my way down about 10 feet over a stretch of 40 feet. Looking back up it is like a dune is in the downside of the building. I see some movement. Great, they have pets too <NSFW>. I reach a concrete wall of the foundation. Luckily there's a hole I can fit through. Onto the next barrier. Another wall, bricks this time. Ah, this is already the outer wall. So far so good. Now find the hatch to the tunnel they were talking about. Ok, open the hatch. I see a tunnel indeed, 4 feet high, 4 feet wide. <NSFW> I also see water. Crawling/climbing my way back. $me: "Kind of moist in the tunnel" $boss: "Pardon?" $me: "At some places there's 4 inches of water in there" $boss: "So? We hang the tubing from the side anyway, what is the problem?" Nevermind, why am I expecting any empathy from you $coworker: "How's everything else down there?" $me: "Tight, dark and wet, it's your lucky day I guess" It is time for $coworker to drill some holes through concrete floors as the switch/server closet in $building1 was conveniently on the top floor of this 5 story building. I cannot imagine what we would look like both having drill-dust and mud all over us. Feed tubing until under the building. More sand-crawling and wet pants later about half-way in the tunnel. (Try and stand for half an hour in a 4 feet tunnel. You'll lose). Another wall. No holes. No hatches. <NSFW> Hmmm wait. What is that near the corner? Looks like that wall doesn't go all the way into the ground, there's some space underneath. Let's see how it looks from the other side. Crutching/crawling back. I look indeed like I have been buried and dug up now. $me: "Found another wall. It's not on your drawing." $boss: "Impossible." $me: "may I invite you to see for yourself?" $boss quickly shuffles out of the way. Not sure because of my muddy state or the expression on my face when gnashing this to him. $coworker: "Now what?" $me: "I think the best option is to see from the other side how is the situation, maybe we are lucky" Cue me going under in $building2 through an even smaller floorhatch. Crawling in the direction where the tunnel should be. This building has an entirely different foundation, concrete pillars with open space here. I'm expecting to hit a wall of earth any moment when I see water. Not a puddle this time. Ground water, some 10 feet wide. Behind that, a wall with space underneath. definitely <NSFW> This is going to take some serious doing. I didn't bring my swimming trunks not to mention it is near freezing point. If we had waited a few more weeks I could have crawled over the ice #&%$&^#%$ Crawling my way back. I explain the situation. $me: "More fun, more water. And it is cold. We need to do this quickly before my hands go completely numb" $coworker: <NSFW> $boss: *stares at shoes* $me: "$coworker, how many standard plastic tubes do you have with you?" $coworker: "I'll check in the van, I have no idea, wasn't expecting this." $me: "$boss, I'll need another guy here. Tell him to bring his boots and wear old clothing" $coworker comes back with 3 tubes. That will do, they are 6 feet each. I put some connectors in between and tape them off thoroughly $me: "Ok, what I will do is try and pry this thing under the wall from the $building2 side, if $coworker2 can pick it up from $building1 side, we can pull the feeding tube through and keep it somewhat dry" Have you ever tried to keep something 12 feet long made of plastic, stable horizontally? I did and I thought I was working for the circus. Later on in my career at this company, it turned out there wasn't that much difference. $me:"I landed the tubes on the sand your end, I'll push it through, whenever you see it, just pull it in" $coworker2: "ok, I see it, here we go, got it!" Thus feeding the feeding tube underneath the wall, under $building2, into the server/wiring closet of $building2, which was conveniently at... the top floor in the middle of the building. Two times lucky though this time: 1) there was an elevator shaft we could use 2) since we were pulling fiber, no risk of EMF interference The rest was rather uneventful, put the fiber connectors on, put them into the switches on both ends, let there be Blinkenlighten. [link] [comments]  |
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