Well, he wasn't a client, but he entered the office...
asking if I knew where his doctor's office was, holding a sheet of paper with the office's name and address typed on it. It was on the next street over, and I told him so. He asked me how to get there. I pointed saying "it's over there." He didn't understand, so I spent the next five minutes explaining that he needed to go down the street we were currently on, turn left until he saw a street on the left and then turn left, onto that street. Looking very puzzled still, he said thank you and left.
( Bitchy Teresa is bitchy, duh., Mon 29 Dec 2003, 18:44, Reply)

A friend...
is using my computer, thinking of getting her own(about 2 years ago). I set a network up, and gave her a username and password for the network. I was making a cuppa and she shouted for me.
Friend:"This username and password you gave me isnt working"
I looked and she was logged on and was on internet explorer.
Me:"But you're logged on"
Friend:"I've tried on Hotmail, Yahoo and AOL now...but it says I don't exist"
It was then I pointed out that this username and password was just for the network. She looked amazed.
(HipToBeSquare, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 18:40, Reply)

we used to call them "the meat"
Ah those were the days...

meat: my laptop won't receive emails when it's turned off?!
me: (in my head) how do you know?

meat: i can't type my password in
me: why not?
meat: it keeps coming up with a load of stars (asterisks)

from my VMS days...

me: type in dir *.dat
meat: eh?
me: type in d i r star dot d a t
meat: star?
me: asterisk
meat: eh?
me: hold down the shift key and press 8
meat: oh right! you mean cabbage
me: eh?
(tompy, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 18:39, Reply)

Just remember, I deal with the same stupid clients you do, only I get them in too-small speedos...
I work as a lifeguard at a year-round pool, and we get lovely bits of stupidity like the following:

-There is a thermometer in the water so we can easily check the temperature of the pool, and a man swims up to me and asks "What's this?"
"A thermometer, sir"
"Is it water-proof?"

-What time is the 9.30 arobics class?

-Two children swimming in the pool and suddenly get a panicked look on their faces, look at me and ask if they are allowed to swim

During the warmer months, we also work at the beach, and I found these to be quite....well...yes

-I'm picking up a dead jellyfish up off the beach, and a lady walks up and gives me a funny look and asks me if that's a jellyfish. I say yes, and she asks very accusingly "Well....were are it's testicles?" ...n-t...big...big difference

-Why isn't the water heated? You should think about heating the water.

-Do you add salt to the water???
(driftwood, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 18:16, Reply)

What have you done?
Why when anything doesn't work perfectly is it automatically my fault? (maybe its paranoia)
The only reason I'm the entire IT department at work is no-one else wanted to do it - then they get annoyed when the mouse doesn't work and I say 'Have you plugged it in?' obviously they say yes.
Who wants to guess how many times they're wrong and its my fault.
Bah Humbug - They're on holiday I'm at work.
( now restart, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:59, Reply)

When I did a GNVQ in IT, I started out knowing knack all about
computers, but after a week at school and playing around on my mum's pc, I got the hang of it.
After six months, I applied for a job at a certain electrical goods retailer (rhymes with vomit) and they took me on just as a regular admin. The tech salesman their knew I was at college and would often throw a customer support call my way to see if I could help.
One lady had been in and bought a brand spanking new P1 33MHZ machine (this WAS in 1995/6) and it was in the days when you had to load everything yourself.
We told her to stick the Win 95 CD in the CD ROM drive and install it following the instructions on screen.
She called back 3 times that day to say it wouldn't install and after a while my coworker got pissed off with her so threw the next call my way.
Turns out that half way through she got sick of waiting for it to install so took the CD out each time when she went to make a cup of tea!
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:56, Reply)

Installing a network
a secretary walks up to her unplugged, uninstalled machine.
Her:"It's not working!"
Me:"Yes it is. We just haven't installed the chair yet; you need to stand up to use it."

5 mins later, her: "no, it's still not working"
( CowJam, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:56, Reply)

Again not strictly a client
But a friend in my uni class back in first year was running into course problems thanks to his fondness for pot. He was talking in the pub with me and a group of friends about how he was trying to kick the habit. "Have you tried cold turkey?" asked one.

"Yeah, I tried having turkey sandwiches, but it didn't make any difference."

To be fair, he wasn't from this country.
(cybersquatter_, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:48, Reply)

Working as a 'Freelance' IT Upgrader/Installer/Troubleshooter in the evenings after work, I have come across some real 'gems'.
One in particular required me to visit a client's home and upgrade from Windoze '95 to '98SE.

When I initially arrived, the mouse was on a mousemat in the centre of the desk. Not too unusual, but when I looked closer, the mouse was 'facing the wrong way', in that the cable and the buttons were facing away from the monitor.

He explained that that was how he was shown to use it when he first got his machine (back in 1997!!), then mentioned how difficult it was to get the mouse to move in the right direction, etc.

I let him demonstrate this 'technique' and, after a couple of minutes of stifled laughter and watching him use BOTH hands to first move the mouse cursor to where he needed it (over an icon, for instance), he would then form his index finger into a pointy-hand, then very purposefully press down on the mouse button!

He was absolutely (GENUINELY) astounded when I span the mouse round 180 degrees and began to use the mouse er 'normally'.

As I left the house, he was praising my IT knowledge and thanking me for showing him a 'better way' to use his mouse!!
(Spockinasock, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:41, Reply)

not really even close to better but...
A kid needed help because he was searching google images for"souped up toyota corolla" and couldn't find anything, you know how google says nothing matched your search for..... etc. he said I didn't spell it right when he did...and this kid is in 5th grade...so in a nut shell he knows nothing bout the interweb, but yet he blasts the marshall mathers lp and says he knows everything about it.........hes stupid
( Killerkitti Like my coffee black, just like my metal, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:25, Reply)

The system admin...
...for the order entry system at my place rang me the other week to ask how to cancel an order.

Sometimes I dispair... It's his bloody system!

and I get frequent questions along the lines of

'Are there any systems issues?'

erm... We have over 10 different systems... Would you care to elaborate?
( beefandcheese, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:13, Reply)

Student Vs, The Floppy Drive
While working in IT support there have been an interesting collection of items I have found in floppy drives left by students. These include;

Money (I have found enough to fund a full-time member of staff i recon)

Smartie tube lids (Yes, I know that only samrties have the answer, No the floppy drive will not make them tell YOU)

Rubber Bands (WHY?)

Half a pen
and in the next machine along, the other half

But the best of all, was the College ID Badge, with student name, picture and ID number.
And the student wanted to know how we knew it was him.

This is by no means a complete list
( Dave - KneHigHbOb talks, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:12, Reply)

Once I was ...
Reading this website, I forget the name, and someone who works in IT seemed to think it was clever to say things like 'depends on what type of keyboard you have' ...
(FortyFour, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:11, Reply)

I work in
a concert hall, so we do a lot of old people music for old people. Ticket prices for said concerts ascend in value relative to the standard of seat. simple. so why do so many moustached old buggers (mostly women) say "can i have a cheap ticket" followed by "is that the best seats/front row/centre circle"? Of course not!! You need parachutes and oxygen masks where youre going!! (i scream to myself). Petty i know, but i've had three yaaars (that's pirate years) of this shit. First post too. Woo yay ...
(daddylovesbeaver, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:09, Reply)

LoWer oR uPpeR ?
What pisses me off lately is when i get a customer on the phone and give him a web address or an email and they always go 'hmmm bladibla.com in lower or upper case ?
So now i reply 'depends on what type of keyboard you have'.
(Bertie, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 17:01, Reply)

not sure if this is stupidity..or just a case of crossed wires..
When working with IT support and trying to talk a homeworker through getting into his brand new pc...
Firstly when we send them out they have a default password, lets say (Tiger1), and a user name (Smith1)...both contain numbers..
This user refused to believe that these were his user name and password as they didn't work..but we'd tested it before it went out...when the problem got round to me this is how it went..

Smith1: I've got my user name in...but it keeps telling me the password is wrong...

Me: Are you sure you using a capital T in Tiger1?

Smith1: yes.

Me:ok..lets try another user name...type in Jones1 in the user name box...

Smith1:I can't...

Me: What do you mean you can't...

Smith1: I can only type in Jones...then it won't let me type...

(This is were the penny drops....)

Me: Were are you pressing the 1 key?

Smith1: On the keypad...where else...

Me: Is the light on where it says NUM LOCK..

Smith1:...errr...no...is that bad..

tosspot!
(maxbeaver, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 16:41, Reply)

search engine ranking
Me : So..... who does your serach engine optimisation?

Cleint : Oh that's EASY! Us of course - all you need to do is include "Britney Spears", "Sex", and "MP3" in your meta tags & you'll get loads of traffic! There's no point in wasting money on this when you can do it yourself....

Me : Really? That's very interesting Mr Pollard.....
(killbot, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 16:33, Reply)

Idiot tech support, rather than a client, but ...
We've recently been 'Joe Jobbed'. Someone is sending out spam emails with a from: address at our company domain. We first noticed this when we started to get bounces to random people who were supposedly at our company (n_rodreguez@, j_smith@ etc).

I was annoyed, but not concerned until we got a bounce from AOL which said that they may start to blacklist our domain. As some of our clients use AOL this would be a major inconvenience, so I rang AOL UK to reassure them that were not sending spam, and can they make sure that we didn’t get blacklisted.

The tech support call got through to an Indian call centre, who forwarded me to an engineer. I outlined the problem to him and after to-ing and fro-ing about whether I was an AOL customer or not he told me that someone must have infiltrated our network or cracked our password. His suggested remedy was to change the password for our email account.

I said that the person sending the mail didn’t care about reading our email, merely that he was sending out viagra-plugging spam with a forged reply address at our domain but using SMTP servers for a different ISP. He then replied that it was impossible to forge an email address, and that the person must have access to our network and that we should change our passwords.

As politely as I could, I pointed out that it is perfectly possible to forge an email address – and more to the point, we don’t have an SMTP server of our own - we use our ISP’s (blueyonder). Even still, he stuck to his guns and repeatedly insisted that, with all due respect, I was wrong and that you couldn’t forge an address, and that if I just changed my passwords it would *click*

*hangs up*

FYI – after a phone call to AOL in the US it turns out that they block SMTP servers, rather than actual domains, so all is okay - though the bounces are still coming in
(jazi, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 16:29, Reply)

Stupid Clients
I was working overtime and as such had to ignore* the helpdesk phone ,This guy couldn't print and asking the usual questions (have you got a printer?, is it turned on? Plugged in? etc) didn't get the bottom of the problem. Where I work most of the printers are networked, I knew the Print queue on the server was happy - so had to fall back on the 'show me what you were doing' ploy to buy me some time to think.
Anyway the guys answer was this (the stuff in brackets explains what the dolt actually meant to say).

HIM -Well I saw these flashing lights (network status) on the bottom of the monitor(taskbar) so I clicked on them, and I saw some really big numbers and something about packets.

ME- OK, so then what did you do?

HIM- Well the numbers were really big and I wasn't sure what to do. Then i saw the buttons (properties, disable and close) and I didn't know how to close the thingy (LAN Staus) box, so I pressed the disable button.

ME- Oh I see - you thought it would be a good idea to disable your network card just before printing to a network printer, that makes sense. ( yes I am a sarcastic bastard )
-makes sharp exit before pointing out 3yr olds can manage to press print without breaking a pc-

* sorry - that should have been 'answer' - I always get those two words mixed up at work. ; )
(Delta-9, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 16:15, Reply)

Working in IT support...
...for so many years, you do end up having a catalogue of these things.

One of the newer ones was

*ring ring* (actually not ring, I purposly have the most annoying ringtone I can find but anyway)

Me : "Hello, IT here"
Them : "IT? Is that IT?"
Me : *sigh* "Yes, can I help?"
Them : "Our dishwasher is broken"
Me : "This is IT. We don't deal with your dishwasher".
Them : "oh"

Seems ANYTHING electrical comes under IT nowadays.
( Fronkle99, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 16:12, Reply)

It's the lying I hate
When I started as a programmer I regularly did support as well, and quickly realised that when people had problems entering data the first question was 'Is your numlock on?'. I still regularly got reassurances that it was, only to find - lo and behold - that it wasn't and that this was the problem, only to be met almost every time with "well it was on, I don't know what happened. Oh it's fixed now? Thanks."
(themightyginge, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:47, Reply)

When my aunt was helping someone to set up a website...
...she told them not to connect to the internet, and await further instruction. When the client told her that they only had one phone line, she said to log on and send her an instant message.

She waited, but nothing happened.

Three days later, she recieved a piece of paper in the post, on which was written :

Ok, I've connected. Now what?
(Nudger - Back on b3ta having been away since '04!, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:46, Reply)

i work in isp support now
me: "could you restart your computer?"
client: "ok"
(after about 5 mins of silence)
me: "has the computer booted up yet?"
client: "oh, did you want us to turn it back on?"
(hnnrs, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:44, Reply)

Posh Sods
I used to work on the Customer Services line of a chain of supermarkets which somehow have a reputation for attracting the more upmarket person.

Once, an old woman called me to tell me she'd found mouse droppings in her sugar. I started to apologise and ask her to send the offending item to us, then she told me not to worry - her husband had died the day before, and he had a terrible habit of putting his spoon into the coffee granules, then into the sugar bowl...

...I didn't know whether to laugh or cry...
(SirPsycho, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:34, Reply)

Built a PC for my dad
which I do at work from time to time for customers so it's *sort of* a client. Certainly stupid anyway.

Built him a brand new computer and as it was Christmas, installed Microsoft Flight Sim 2000 on there. He was made up.

Until the point he phoned me up in a blind panic.

Him: Chris you know on that Microsoft?
Me: What, Windows?
Him: No, the game...
Me: Ah, OK. Yeah?
Him: I've just crashed it
Me: The game crashed?
Him: I crashed the plane into a mountain [/building (I forget)]
Me: Yeeeees?
Him: Look, that won't of damaged the screen will it?
Me: Bye dad
(MrMessiah, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:10, Reply)

The buttons.. They need to be red
"Can You come up stairs please thank you" - MD

"Yes no problem" - Me

"HAVE YOU NOT BEEN CHECKING WHAT PRODUCTS ARE GOING OUT OF PRODUCTION?" - MD

"erm no, we have over 200 products and I'm a programmer" - Me

"SO YOU DON'T THINK IT's IMPORTANT?" - MD

"well yes that's why I created this tool for R and D to update it all" - Me

"DID YOU NOT THINK TO CHECK WHAT THEY WERE DOING EVERY DAY?"- MD

"No, not really" - Me

"This reminds me of the first natives of South Africa, when they first saw a radio they opened it up to see where the little people were....HAHAHAHA" - MD

"HAHAHAha" - Me

"HAHAHAha" - R and D manager

MD walks off

"Did you understand that reference?" - Me

"No not a word of it" - R and D manager

--------------------------------------------

"people will only buy from us if our buttons and prices are red" - MD my company

--------------------------------------------

"Can we do e-commerce?" - Sales Director

"I've built a fair few e-commerce sites, what does you're e-commerce site need to do?" - Me

"Just can we or can't we? no questions" - Sales Director

It turned out he didn't actually want e-commerce at all

--------------------------------------------

"Hello, I was phoning because my PC is asking whether I want to save the copy of my clipboard every time I try and close Word." - Financial Director

"Would you like to copy the files into a different program" - Me

"What do you mean?" - FD

"When you copied some image or something to your clipboard it retained it until the program was closed and then prompted you to see if you still required the file to copy into another application. Just click no." - Me

"But I don't want that message" - FD

"erm, I can't really do much about that" - Me

"Oh for God's sake, you IT types can't sort anything out. I get these kind of message pop up every day and you always tell me you can't do anything" - FD

--------------------------------------------

"you shouldn't have to scroll down the page people don't scroll down web pages" - Marketing Manager

"but we don't know how many products you are going to put on this page" - Me

"well then just make it stretch" - Marketing Manager /laughs at me in a patronising way

--------------------------------------------

"We need to change our corporate presence it's really out of date. so we need to redesign the website" - Marketing

"I designed that content management component last month, why don't you use that" - Me

"We couldn't find anything out about the company every week, or work out what's going on" - Marketing

"What do you want there instead?" - Me

"Make something up" - Marketing

--------------------------------------------

"So I can use the serial of the product as the name of the page?" - Me

"Yes that'd be fine" - Government type

LATER

"what's this serial field doing here? we won't know what the serial numbers are until project's complete" - Government type

--------------------------------------------
( mrbongo sweating like a formicophiliac on I'm a celebrity, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:06, Reply)

I picked up the phone at work
and the person on the other end said "have i got the right number?" followed by a pause.

"Errrrrm that depends what you want" was my reply
( Terry Oblong There's nobody here but us chickens on, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:06, Reply)

Unusual... hmmmm
Bizarre one.

I worked at Time Computer's head office in Tech Support for 2 years (yes, it was shite). We had a few interesting calls. One particularly memorable customer was this guy who kept calling in. I got him a lot of the time.

First call - he kept getting illegal operations. He was convinced, no matter how much we told him otherwise, that it was because he was looking at pr0n and he had been caught.

Second call - He wanted to put a fireball (his words) onto the computer as the illegal operations were now because he had top secret submarine plans on his computer, and the FBI were watching him. He was terrified he was going to get caught.

Third Call - people were speaking to him from inside his computer. He'd convinced himself that there were little people watching him from within the 'grey box' and were trying to steal his plans. It was they who were posting the illegal operations on the screen.

Fourth Call - He began talking gibberish to us about NASA and the way they were trying to get his plans. By now, we were just humoring him. He said 'I really need to go and reboot my eyes'. I could hear his wife crying in the background.

Fifth call - His wife called to enquire as to a refund. I was concerned, so I asked how he was. It transpired that he had decended into insanity and was committed the previous day.

So, so strange.


There are more which I may or may not post, depending on how much work I'm not doing.
(V3lvetPresley, Mon 29 Dec 2003, 15:05, Reply)