More funnies from work

Customer: let me waddle up here (in reference to going to the other tv)

Customer: It's covered in coffee stains and fingerprints!! (in reference to receiving refurbished instead of completely brand new equipment. I want to know how he knew they were coffee stains. Did it smell like coffee?)

Customer: I'm sitting sideways; I need to get straight where I can see it. (referring to screen or receiver, I think - never figured out what he meant).

An exchange told to me by a fellow agent:
agent:How can I help you?
Customer: I need help logging into my account.
(some back and forth then establishes that he needs help with his bank account, not his tv accout)
Agent: You would need to contact (banknamehere) sir.
Customer: But I called you.
(Obviously, but that does not mean it was the correct choice!)
Agent: Sir, we have nothing to do with your bank account.
Customer: I pay you with the bank account.
Agent: That may be, but we cannot see that, nor can we help you set up online banking.
(This goes on for about 20 minutes or so until the agent convinces the guy that we cannot help him).

Another one. Same agent with (almost) the most stubborn guy in the world.
(Initial troubleshooting questions determine that the receiver is in single mode when it should be in dual mode.)
Agent: What I need you to do it press the mode button on the front of the receiver.
Customer: I don't want to.
Agent: ... Its very simple, all you have to do is press the button.
Customer: I want you to do it.
Agent: .... You want me to come to your house in (state-on-other-side-of-the-country) and press it for you?
Customer: I know you can do it on your end!
Agent: No sir, its a setting on your receiver. You have to press the button.
Customer: Well, we can sit here all night until you fix it!
Agent: ... Ok.
(They sit for about 10 minutes in complete silence)
Customer: Well, I guess you're more stubborn than I am.
(The customer hangs up. )

My New Puppy!

Buddy: Mini dachshund, 6 weeks old, 2 lbs, 10oz.

Puppy!!!!

I'm getting a puppy for my birthday!! Yesterday I was talking to my mom and mentioned that the week after my birthday I was going to the beach to a friend's concert. My mom said that she did want to ruin my birthday surprise.... BUT she got me a 5&1/2 week old mini dachshund (possibly half schnauzer or long haired dachshund), and wanted to make sure that bringing him to me for my birthday would be alright, since I was going on a trip. So I called the hotel and swapped our reservation to a pet-friendly room. My mom says he is super-tiny, so I'm interested in seeing how Jody and Susie are going to react. I don't think Susie will care (I doubt she's going to be afraid of a dog that's a 1/3 her size. I just gotta make sure that Jody isn't too rough with him. My mom has continued the "tradition" and named him "Buddy", (my brother's girlfriend's dachshund is named "Miller" - just think about the connection there). I think Buddy is a cute and simple name (and goes well with me and M's "tradition" of having animal names that end with the "ee" sound). The only bad part about my mom ruining the surprise is that now I have to wait until Tuesday to meet my puppy!

Work can be amusing... sometimes

Here's a few funny (and not so funny) tales from the workplace:

This happened to me personally:
After assisting with setting up a new receiver, the customer asks me if we can ship her another box and label so she can ship us the defective one back. I ask if we didn't ship a label with the new equipment (as is normal procedure) and she says that her goat ate the box and all the papers in it. (That's right, her GOAT!) Now, I've had a little experience with goats, and I know they will eat just about anything, including paper products (however, it is a myth that they will eat tin cans; they will just eat the labels off them). So I send her another box, no big deal, but later I'm thinking, how did the goat get to the box? Usually UPS drops them off on a porch or garage if there isn't anyone there. Some goats are pretty good escape artists, though.

Another one relayed to me by another agent:
A little old lady (think of someone's 80 year old church-going grandma) had spent the last 5 minutes praising God and Jesus that we were always available to answer her questions and we were so helpful, etc, etc. Finally, she finishes her monologue and the agent asks if there is anything else he can help her with. She says "Yes, you can tell me why the hell my bill is so high!" The agent says he just busted out laughing. He did apologize to her, saying that he just never expected her to say that and it was funny. (Apparently, she did not care that he laughed, thank goodness)

Another one relayed to me by a different agent (this is the not so funny):
I'm helping an agent, asking how her calls are going. She says she is never going to ask someone how there day is going again. I ask why. She says because on the last call she asked "so, how is your saturday going?" The customer responded with "I just got back from a funeral. My cousin died. Of cancer. So, that's how my Saturday is going." The agent was speechless for a moment, then stammered out something like "I'm sorry for your loss".

That leads to one of the things I find strange about this job. Some people will tell you their entire life story when all you are do is trying to make small talk to keep from having an uncomfortable silence. I would never tell a stranger anything even vaguely personal about myself. I can only reason that people do it because of the anonymity of speaking with a person in a call center that you will never talk to again. I still find it strange though. Especially when it ventures into the "TMI" area. I once had a woman tell me more than I wanted to know about her recent Cesarean section. Yeah, lady, I REALLY didn't need to know any of that. I really didn't care that you just had a baby, let alone the gory details of it all.