I have a customer complaining. She's using Facebook. Her friend bought a refurbished laptop from me. I ran multiple diagnostics, replaced parts that didn't work. Reformatted the hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Windows XP Professional. Applied all updates. Installed Flash Player, Microsoft Security Essentials. Both IE 8, and the latest Firefox. Added Ghostery, and Flash for Firefox. Wireless network: WiFi-B. Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage. This isn't the first time she came to me. And that laptop was not intended for her. Her last complaint was the wireless network "didn't work". It turned out she had no clue how to configure a router. I had to go over there and do it for her. She didn't know any of the router's passwords, I had to reset everything. I left with everything working. Now she's complaining it "freezes up". I'm afraid I lost patience and told her it's because of Facebook. But she's unapologetic, demanding I fix it. Again, that laptop was not intended for her. She needs something higher performance. That laptop was intended for the customer to whom it was sold. But now she's using it. Any recommendations? Thanks, Rob Dyck
My first wild guess is she's using some website with a long running script under IE. Still, it's clearly a person problem, not a tech problem. "Sorry, but I can no longer provide support for that computer. If you continue to have problems, you'll need to buy a new one. " Sent from my iPhone On 2013-07-03, at 7:03 PM, "Robert Dyck" <rbdyck2@shaw.ca> wrote:
I have a customer complaining. She's using Facebook.
Her friend bought a refurbished laptop from me. I ran multiple diagnostics, replaced parts that didn't work. Reformatted the hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Windows XP Professional. Applied all updates. Installed Flash Player, Microsoft Security Essentials. Both IE 8, and the latest Firefox. Added Ghostery, and Flash for Firefox. Wireless network: WiFi-B.
Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage.
This isn't the first time she came to me. And that laptop was not intended for her. Her last complaint was the wireless network "didn't work". It turned out she had no clue how to configure a router. I had to go over there and do it for her. She didn't know any of the router's passwords, I had to reset everything. I left with everything working.
Now she's complaining it "freezes up". I'm afraid I lost patience and told her it's because of Facebook. But she's unapologetic, demanding I fix it. Again, that laptop was not intended for her. She needs something higher performance. That laptop was intended for the customer to whom it was sold. But now she's using it.
Any recommendations? Thanks, Rob Dyck
_______________________________________________ Roundtable mailing list Roundtable@muug.mb.ca http://www.muug.mb.ca/mailman/listinfo/roundtable
Many years ago, when I was still messing around with consumers (a no-win proposition), I had to drop customers less problematic than what you're describing. With the complexities of the Web, many browsers, and social networking, things have only gotten worse as to what the consumer might consider you responsible for. Why are you even involved at all, when you never supplied that computer to her. Your only responsibility is to your original customer, not the person your customer supplied this computer to. Your original customer had no issues with you over this computer, right? If this second owner had come to you in the first place as a (primary) customer, you would have had the chance to consult with her, hear her out, and possibly reject her as "not suitable" for you to do business with. She cannot indirectly become your "forced" customer. Hartmut Sager On 3 July 2013 19:03, Robert Dyck <rbdyck2@shaw.ca> wrote:
I have a customer complaining. She's using Facebook.
Her friend bought a refurbished laptop from me. I ran multiple diagnostics, replaced parts that didn't work. Reformatted the hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Windows XP Professional. Applied all updates. Installed Flash Player, Microsoft Security Essentials. Both IE 8, and the latest Firefox. Added Ghostery, and Flash for Firefox. Wireless network: WiFi-B.
Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage.
This isn't the first time she came to me. And that laptop was not intended for her. Her last complaint was the wireless network "didn't work". It turned out she had no clue how to configure a router. I had to go over there and do it for her. She didn't know any of the router's passwords, I had to reset everything. I left with everything working.
Now she's complaining it "freezes up". I'm afraid I lost patience and told her it's because of Facebook. But she's unapologetic, demanding I fix it. Again, that laptop was not intended for her. She needs something higher performance. That laptop was intended for the customer to whom it was sold. But now she's using it.
Any recommendations? Thanks, Rob Dyck
_______________________________________________ Roundtable mailing list Roundtable@muug.mb.ca http://www.muug.mb.ca/mailman/listinfo/roundtable
Since she's paying for your time (assuming this is not a hardware problem, so not covered by warranty), I'd remind her she can either keep paying for you to make a slow laptop work better or buy an upgraded one. Some people don't understand / have reasonable expectations of technology and will waste your time until you make it financially inconvenient for them to not wisen up. On Wed, Jul 3, 2013 at 7:03 PM, Robert Dyck <rbdyck2@shaw.ca> wrote:
I have a customer complaining. She's using Facebook.
Her friend bought a refurbished laptop from me. I ran multiple diagnostics, replaced parts that didn't work. Reformatted the hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Windows XP Professional. Applied all updates. Installed Flash Player, Microsoft Security Essentials. Both IE 8, and the latest Firefox. Added Ghostery, and Flash for Firefox. Wireless network: WiFi-B.
Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage.
This isn't the first time she came to me. And that laptop was not intended for her. Her last complaint was the wireless network "didn't work". It turned out she had no clue how to configure a router. I had to go over there and do it for her. She didn't know any of the router's passwords, I had to reset everything. I left with everything working.
Now she's complaining it "freezes up". I'm afraid I lost patience and told her it's because of Facebook. But she's unapologetic, demanding I fix it. Again, that laptop was not intended for her. She needs something higher performance. That laptop was intended for the customer to whom it was sold. But now she's using it.
Any recommendations? Thanks, Rob Dyck
_______________________________________________ Roundtable mailing list Roundtable@muug.mb.ca http://www.muug.mb.ca/mailman/listinfo/roundtable
Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage.
I'm in the same business. It's impossible to know if it's her, software or hardware, until you reproduce the problem. Ask her if she can reproduce it easily on demand and then take it and do it, or do it while she's present. Then you can hit C-A-D/whatever and tell if it's hw or sw. There's a lot of crap hardware out there (75% of it at least), especially on a refurb. It's very very very (very very very) hard to sell hardware these days if you provide any sort of warranty or reliability standard. You have to vet the brands you sell very carefully and ditch brands the instant they give you trouble. Make up a clear warranty policy in writing saying what sort of things you cover for free. With laptops, the problem can often be overheating due to dead fan (listen for it) or poor TDP design, or bad ram (run memtest) or slow degradation of the mobo due to static zaps, etc. Good luck.
Start charging appropriately. She'll go away in a hurry. -----Original Message----- From: roundtable-bounces@muug.mb.ca [mailto:roundtable-bounces@muug.mb.ca] On Behalf Of Robert Dyck Sent: 03 July 2013 19:03 To: 'Continuation of Round Table discussion' Subject: [RndTbl] Facebook I have a customer complaining. She's using Facebook. Her friend bought a refurbished laptop from me. I ran multiple diagnostics, replaced parts that didn't work. Reformatted the hard drive, installed a fresh copy of Windows XP Professional. Applied all updates. Installed Flash Player, Microsoft Security Essentials. Both IE 8, and the latest Firefox. Added Ghostery, and Flash for Firefox. Wireless network: WiFi-B. Now she complains the laptop is "freezing up". Rather than wait, she powers it down. I'm afraid of file system damage. This isn't the first time she came to me. And that laptop was not intended for her. Her last complaint was the wireless network "didn't work". It turned out she had no clue how to configure a router. I had to go over there and do it for her. She didn't know any of the router's passwords, I had to reset everything. I left with everything working. Now she's complaining it "freezes up". I'm afraid I lost patience and told her it's because of Facebook. But she's unapologetic, demanding I fix it. Again, that laptop was not intended for her. She needs something higher performance. That laptop was intended for the customer to whom it was sold. But now she's using it. Any recommendations? Thanks, Rob Dyck _______________________________________________ Roundtable mailing list Roundtable@muug.mb.ca http://www.muug.mb.ca/mailman/listinfo/roundtable
participants (6)
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Colin Stanners -
Hartmut W Sager -
Kevin McGregor -
Raymond J. Henry -
Robert Dyck -
Trevor Cordes