The Boston Diaries

The ongoing saga of a programmer who doesn't live in Boston, nor does he even like Boston, but yet named his weblog/journal “The Boston Diaries.”

Go figure.

Thursday, September 29, 2005

“I don't care if you have nothing to do with this, I still want my money!”

The tech support phone rings. I answer it.

“Yes, this is Joe,” said the person. “I just bought a CPU from XXXXXXXXXXXXXX for $105 and I never got it. I tried emailing and calling but no one has responded. I spent a lot of money and I either want the CPU or my money back.”

I felt for the guy, but we're not XXXXXXXXXXXXXX and we don't even host the website in question.

Small digression: The Company partners with another web hosting company (other side of the building) and the data center is jointly run between the two. Yes, we host web sites, but the markets are different so there's little if any competition between us and the other company. Calls to the “data center company” come here.

So while the site is hosted here in the data center, it's actually a customer of the other company, not us. Okay, so back to the story.

“Yes,” said Joe, “I used [a traceroute-like program] and I got XXXXXXXXXXXX [the data center company]. I want my $105 back.” And on and on and on. Joe wouldn't stop talking.

By now, Smirk noticed I was on the phone and not saying much and asked what was up. Muting the phone, I told Smirk what was going on. “Hand me the phone,” he said. I unmuted the phone, broke into Joe's monologing and told him I was transferring him to my manager.

“Hello sir,” said Smirk. “How can I help you?”

Several minutes go by as Joe monologes at Smirk.

“Sir,” said Smirk. “We're a data center. One of our customer's hosts this website—” Smirk is cut short; several minutes go by. “Yes, but we're not … no, sir! Are you listening to me? … We're a data center, and one of our customers is hosting … no, we're just a data center … if you just … let … me … I'll give you a phone number you can call … data center … we have nothing to do with XXXXXXXXXXXXXX … it's a site our customer is hosting … I'm sorry about your $105 but … sir … aw XXXX this,” Smirk said, hanging up the phone.

For Joe, if you ever read this: we tried to help you, but in your anger, you didn't listen to what we were saying as we were trying to steer you in the right direction. Sorry about your money, but tracking people down on the Internet sometimes takes time. Look how long it's taking me to track down someone helpful at The Monopolistic Phone Company …

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[The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades]

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You have my permission to link freely to any entry here. Go ahead, I won't bite. I promise.

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