Tech support: The greatest hits 10 Mar 2008

When companies say "Your call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes," that's only partly true. They also record your calls so they can share the funniest ones with their staff and even journalists. David Pogue of The New York Times was given a one of these "Best Of" disks during a visit to a call centre a few years ago. Here's one of the highlights:

Agent:

Ma'am, I can't help noticing that every time I give you an instruction, it takes a really long time before you get back to me. Is your computer that slow?

Caller:

Oh, no, it's just the stupid, stupid design of this computer. Every time I want to click something, I have to unplug the keyboard to plug in the mouse. And then every time I want to use the keyboard again, I have to unplug the mouse. Because there's only one jack.

Agent:

Ma'am, you do realize that there's a jack on the keyboard itself? You're supposed to plug the mouse into the keyboard, and the keyboard into the computer.

Caller:

Are YOU KIDDING ME!? Oh, wait a minute--yes, I see it now! Oh, holy cow. That's going to be so much easier!

Agent:

Just out of curiosity, how long have you been using your computer that way?

Caller:

Six weeks!

Read more over at nytimes.com.