Hello tech support how can I help?
WHAT'S MY USERNAME AND PASSWORD I JUST NEED TO KNOW
OK (goes through some mandatory data protection stuff, customer confirms security question etc.) Your username is Jerk, your password is Wad. Thank you any problems just call ba-
IT DOESN'T WORK
OK sir where exactly are you attempting to enter your username?
ON THE MAIN SCREEN
The main screen?
YES IT SAYS MY NAME AND ASKS FOR A PASSWORD
. . .Sir do you mean your username to log in to the computer itself?
YES WHY WON'T IT WORK
Sir that is your personal log in for that machine, you will have to speak to the computer administrator.
YOU MEAN I'VE GOT TO ASK MY SISTER?!
Er if she is the account administrator for that computer then yes.
(hangs up)


This lady who must have been in her early fifties comes into the video store with Escape To Witch Mountain/Return To Witch Mountain on DVD. Both are on one disc.

Lady: You forgot to give me the other movie.

(I look at the DVD, open the case, no problem here.)

Me: Well, both the movies are on the same disc. I'll put it in the dvd player here and show you how to get to the other movie.
Lady: Can you get it to the other movie so that its there when I take it home?
Me: (Stunned) No, but if you watch what I do you can see how to get to the other movie.

(I skip through the previews, the menu comes up. On the first line it says ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN in big letters. On the second line it says RETURN TO WITCH MOUNTAIN.)

Me: Okay, so when you get to the menu, just press down and then enter.
Lady: So... to press down I gotta press the presser-downer?
Me: Yes, the down arrow on the remote.

(No "thank you" for helping, she just takes the movie and goes to leave. Right before she exists , she asks: )

Lady: How do they hold so much movies on one video?
Me: They just do.

(Lady leaves.)


Customer: "Have you got the party dvd?"
Me: "The party dvd?"
Customer: "Yeah, it was on telly last night, it's a dvd and it shows you how to do all these dance moves and stuff"
Me: "Oh, you must mean Ultimate Dance Craze Party. It's not technically a DVD, it's a CD with bonus DVD, but yes, we have it."
Customer: "No, I want the DVD."
Me: "You get the DVD with the CD."
Customer: "But I don't want the CD, I just want to learn the dance moves."
Me: "Okay, so just buy it and then only play the DVD, then"
Customer: "No, I don't want the actual CD. I only want the DVD. Can I have it half price if you sell me it without the DVD?"
Me: "wtf, um no we can't do that, it comes as a package. That's how it's advertised, and that's only how it's available."
Customer: "Oh, forget it, i'll go somewhere else."
Me: "With all due respect, you won't be able to get it anywhere else in DVD only form. The company who made it decided it was going to be primarily a CD, with a bonus DVD included."
Customer: "You're just saying that so I buy it from you!"
Me: "No, madam, i'm telling you this so you don't waste your time so near to christmas looking for something that doesn't exist. But you know what? You can go elsewhere. You're clearly not listening to me, and I could be helping somebody who will listen to me."

And then I turned to help another customer. Seriously, what the fuck?


I work at a credit card call center. For those that don't know, call centers exist almost exclusively for the stupid people in our population.

These are some stupid questions I get on a regular basis:

: My payment was due three days ago. If I mail the payment to you now, will it be on time? (NOTE: Apparently the mail service employs a time machine.)

: Am I allowed to pay my bill before my due date?

: If the bill says zero minimum due, am I supposed to send you a check for zero dollars?

: Do you assholes honestly expect people to read their mail? (Note: That would be why we send it to you.)

: Do you guys honestly believe it's your customer's responsibility to update their contact information when they move? How come you didn't just call me or write me a letter if you couldn't get a hold of me?

: You guys charge interest? Are you telling me that your company tries to make a profit off of their customers?

: How the fuck do you expect me to know to pay my bills if I don't open my mail!!! (Note: )

: Why did I get charged a late fee? (Note: I get posed this question at least 20 times a day. We are not allowed to say "Cause your payment was late", we have to say "Your payment was due on day X, your payment arrived on day x + y". I just find that the fact that I have to actually point out that to the customers that paying after the due date means that they are late is just stupid.)


I work at Starbucks and I generally spend the majority of my time on till. Now the sheer volume of people I see means I also see a significant number of people paying on debit, and a full third (I counted over the course of a few days) of them are stupid enough to fuck it up.

At my store, the customer swipes their card on the pin pad with the stripe of the card facing me. To clarify, I'm on the opposite side of the card as the customer. I will always say:

Me - "OK, and just swipe the card on your side with the stripe facing me."

Easy, yeah? No (usually at this point I'm writing up their order on a cup, so I'm not watching them screw this up).

Them - "Mmm...it's not working."
Me - "Oh, it's the stripe facing this way."
Them - "Sorry, you said swipe with the stripe facing me."
Me - "Well...yeah, I did. But when I said me, I meant me. Not you. Christ."

So I might not say that last part, but c'mon. It's not fucking hard. If you're talking to someone and they say "Yeah, me and Steve went to the bar yesterday." do you then think and say "Steve and I didn't go to the bar yesterday"? That's fucking right, you don't. Thinking that would be retarded. This wouldn't annoy me so much except it's so fucking common.

The lesson? When someone says "me", they don't mean you.

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