My Internet wouldn't connect early this morning. I called AT&T, spent 55 minutes on hold before being connected to "Samir," who got it working after some fiddling and deleting that leaves me stuck with having it on full-time when the computer's on.
I got home from the walk and there was an icon showing me that Microsoft had installed a Windows update and I needed to restart the computer.
Poof. No more internet. Again.
Another call to AT&T. After two hours and 40 minutes on hold, I got a woman whom I could hardly hear. She took me through a bunch of stuff, then gave up and switched me to the "software staff."
PARENTHETICAL I-HATE-CALL-CENTERS THOUGHT: It was painfully clear that these people know damn-all about what they're doing and can only read from prepared scripts. Any deviation on the customer's part -- such as trying any potential fixes before calling -- throws them into confusion. They lose their places and sometimes simply start over.
Anyway, Software Boy tried a couple of things before advising me he was getting a lot of problems after the Microsoft update. He gave up after giving me Microsoft's customer service number.
The Microsoft rep told me what I could do as a temporary fix, and it worked. For something more permanent (right now, the computer's firewall picks a bogus setting on startup) I get to call back in a few days.
Total time wasted: nearly four hours.
But I have the internet back. And found that I got no emails from people I need to hear from.
The mailbox was empty yet again, too.
I don't know how much more I can take, but I sense the point when the whole mess blows up in my face is too close.
Next walk, I may just keep walking. Everything I've tried to do has turned out to be pointless.
16 comments:
Last night our electricity was off for a couple of hours. It was really strange not hearing the TV or the computer. I'm glad you got it fixed. :)
Not many things worse than expecting...NEEDING...to have a check you are waiting on not come. I'm going through that right now myself, and every day when the mailman gets here and the mailbox is empty just adds to the frustration.
Am glad you got it fixed Mr Scribbs. sending you hugs xx
Uh..... if your circumstances don't kill you, your attitude will. One eighth of the amount of time you focus on how bad things are could be spent focusing on what is good in your life. There HAS to be something.
Anon
Four miles...I am impressed.
I hope your mailbox has something for you tomorrow.
That stuff about call centers is so, too, true...are they all in India?
Have had numerous similar experience with customer "support".
Perhaps the most aggravating is Dell. One calls them usually because the puter is busted and one cannot get on the internet, and one is exposed to upwards of an hour of commercials explaining how much better you could fix yer problem bny logging onto backslash this and forward slash that.
Fin
Different comment, same commenter.
When Fin and Bethany were in New Zealand, they picked up a hitchiker who turned out to have been living for 7 or so years on a 38 foot sailboat which they had sailed to NZ from Turkey.
We were taken aboard, and the reality of life on board a boat of that size was quite different from my romanticised conception of same. For one thing, you can't stand up inside.
Fin
I hate customer sevice. It is like they think we don't have anything else better to do than hang out on the phone. Listening to some icky music and being told our call is important too them. Sure what ever.
Roz
u need to get a big bastard book for those times. or a ticklish featherduster. nah, both. living on a boat in the middle of the ocean, without a knife-carrying crew, would rule. under a space-net connection.. bucket of vitamin C. cute mute woman. but not deaf, ya hear.
Man, that's a long walk! Of course - your area is much more picturesque than mine - walking up and down cement sidewalks looking at nothing but walls and stucco homes isn't exactly my idea of a great view!
We're all pullin' for ya!
I love it! Boat = boat. Nice.
Just a thought: Are you using Zone Alarm? The last Windows Update screws up Zone Alarm, and the work around was to reduce security to "medium" but ZA has been updated itself to fix the problem.
dal -- Funny (or "funny") you should mention that. That's what caused all the problems, slowing my DSL speed to a dial-up-like crawl and generally messing with my head.
The ZA "fix" was a pain. Took two tries (and much time) to download.
Everything's okay now, however.
2 weeks post---concerned about cha! Hope it's just an unexpected tsunami of fresh assignments!
WMC
Where did the "no" go that was supposed to precede "post"? Probably never left my fingertips is what: it's too late to be typing.
Anyway, we're thinking about you!
WMC
Post a Comment