Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

[gneebore]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

How about when contract customers want you to come out and put toner in machine. Or to remove a paper jam. I tell them there will be a charge for me to come out, then they say "but we are under contract". Then tell them to read contract where it says customer is responsible to install toners & remove paper jams (I added this to contract about 2 years ago after refunding a customer because they refused to do it) gave them money back and told them to "try" and find another company that will do it. Talk to a friend of mine who services them now, they are on a per call basis and pay them to come out to change toners, remove jams, etc.

The best customer I can remember was one that actually paid me to come in on a saturday and teach the office people how to do all of what you mentioned. He figured if they all knew how to do the basics then he wouldn't be wasting a lot of money paying them to not be able to do their jobs waiting for me to get there to do something as easy as clearing a paper jam or putting toner in the machine. He admitted the third time he had me run a weekend class for his office people that he saved more in productivity than it cost him to pay me for the class. They were also open on the weekends anyway so he always had people that needed the training working then. And I always knew when there was a call about jam or some other similar problem it was an actual call instead of someone that had not tried the most basic key operator fixes first. Oh yes my boss also knew about the classes and said ot was okay. It saved my money because he wasn't paying me travel expenses and wasted service time doing what they could have/should have done anyway

[tsbservice]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

The best customer I can remember was one that actually paid me to come in on a saturday and teach the office people how to do all of what you mentioned. He figured if they all knew how to do the basics then he wouldn't be wasting a lot of money paying them to not be able to do their jobs waiting for me to get there to do something as easy as clearing a paper jam or putting toner in the machine. He admitted the third time he had me run a weekend class for his office people that he saved more in productivity than it cost him to pay me for the class. They were also open on the weekends anyway so he always had people that needed the training working then. And I always knew when there was a call about jam or some other similar problem it was an actual call instead of someone that had not tried the most basic key operator fixes first. Oh yes my boss also knew about the classes and said ot was okay. It saved my money because he wasn't paying me travel expenses and wasted service time doing what they could have/should have done anyway

I would love to have such a smart/great customers! Unfortunately there are none of them amongs ours, most worst by far are governmental offices.
They give me hard time asking them elementary questions and I have big headache(because of their general stupidity) after every visit at them.

[roho]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

I was taught to be extra through until i get some time under my belt. so i do this with every call. my manager says speed will come with experience. and he is right! im way more efficient than i was when i first started, and i get the same if not more work done in the same amount of time!! I LOVE MY JOB!!

Sounds like you have a good manager to work for, THAT makes a huge difference in this industry!

[gneebore]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

I would love to have such a smart/great customers! Unfortunately there are none of them amongs ours, most worst by far are governmental offices.
They give me hard time asking them elementary questions and I have big headache(because of their general stupidity) after every visit at them.

Oh yeah been there done that with government employees. Really like the ones with some sort of degree in some weird subject that makes it impossible to work for anyone but the government. Had a few that flat out said " I have a college degree ....... and you an uneducated service technician are not going to try to tell me how to use a printer." When the call turned out to be nothing more than installing the correct toner .

[guitar9199]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Oh yeah been there done that with government employees. Really like the ones with some sort of degree in some weird subject that makes it impossible to work for anyone but the government. Had a few that flat out said " I have a college degree ....... and you an uneducated service technician are not going to try to tell me how to use a printer." When the call turned out to be nothing more than installing the correct toner .

....had one of "THESE" calls at a High School.


A HIGH SCHOOL!!!! ....In the Teacher Work Area!!! ..... I wish I were joking!

[copiertec]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Speaking of probing questions, I swear this just happened today, talk about not asking questions, our sales department had us deliver a table top mono mfp to an existing customer. We get there and put the copier on the table they set aside for the copier, the client walks out and states, "that will not do." I assured them, "that this is a real workhorse and they would love it!" There response to me, " your sales department did not state it was white, take it back, I would prefer a black one as it will match the decor better." I felt like saying, "are you f*cking kidding me, the color?!".... "the color....what the f*ck?" I just loaded it back on the truck and said "have a nice day." Now we are on the search for a "black" mfp. "For the love of god!!"

Apparently, they contacted the sales department and told them they just wanted a small mfp for a particular office, they did not think anything of it as the client only specified they wanted a small table top and agreed upon a price, that was it.

[gneebore]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Speaking of probing questions, I swear this just happened today, talk about not asking questions, our sales department had us deliver a table top mono mfp to an existing customer. We get there and put the copier on the table they set aside for the copier, the client walks out and states, "that will not do." I assured them, "that this is a real workhorse and they would love it!" There response to me, " your sales department did not state it was white, take it back, I would prefer a black one as it will match the decor better." I felt like saying, "are you f*cking kidding me, the color?!".... "the color....what the f*ck?" I just loaded it back on the truck and said "have a nice day." Now we are on the search for a "black" mfp. "For the love of god!!"

Apparently, they contacted the sales department and told them they just wanted a small mfp for a particular office, they did not think anything of it as the client only specified they wanted a small table top and agreed upon a price, that was it.

Been to a few of those types of customers. Real fun one was a long time ago( early 80's) when a customer called and demanded that we do something to make her IBM Selectric typewriter not make so much noise when she typed. The really weird part was the customer was a movie production company making a movie in the area and they were here because of the historic buildings some from the early 1800's. The typewriter was being used to type revised script dialogue. And there could not be such an obvious modern noise in a pre-civil war story. Yes the microphones used to record the actors were picking up the sound of the scripts being typed.

[keithxxiii]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Got a call from trading company that the MFP goes offline and sometimes does not send scanned documents to email.
I called up to speak to the IT, and asked for a remote session. I found out that WSD was enabled, print drivers was not installed properly so I downloaded the correct drivers for him and let him install and change the ports to TCP/IP. I checked the SMTP server and found out that the ports were not correct.
Next day was a callback, he said that the printer goes offline again so I once again connected. When I ran a continuous ping, I noticed that the reply was more that 500ms. Printer cannot be accessed from the browser this time so I asked him to restart the device. To my surprise, there was an IP conflict. What makes it even worse is that he does not know how it happened and that there was no DHCP reservation set on his router.
Then he asked me if I could help him resolve this, (facepalm in front of my PC) you are the IT dude! Of course I know this, and you should know it too. So I showed him how to do it and sent the invoice.

[tsbservice]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

This is probably for the jokes thread but here we go

Customer: My copier won't copy. Come and fix it asap.
Tech: Any red lights or error message on copier screen?
Customer: Nope, panel is black.
Tech: Could you check if copier is turned on, please.
Customer: Nope...ugghh wait a second I will use my phone flashlight to find turn on switch.
Tech: ?! But ...why(the f..k) !?
Customer: There is no electricity in this room.

[kingarthur]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Customer calls," none of our copiers are scanning, "

"if none of them are scanning, then it's unlikely to be the machines, it'll probably be your network, has anything changed on your network"

"nothing has changed on our network, it's the machines, we need you to come out"

"can you test it while I'm on the phone, and tell me what happens"

"it says error deletion- server connect error"

"it has to be your network, if I have to attend, you may be charged"

"but we're on a contract"

"unfortunately it doesn't cover you for network issues, ask your IT if they have changed anything"

Customer rings back "our IT says nothing has changed, they say it's the copiers"

I go on site check and both machines definitely aren't scanning, I have the settings from when they were installed, nothing has changed, "so you tell me they were working on Friday, today is Monday, so something must have changed over the weekend....it's unlikely that 2 machines will show exactly the same fault"

Customer picks up the phone and rings their IT....." they replaced the SMTP server over the weekend........I knew they were doing it sometime, but didn't know when"

[jmaister]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Trouble type: blurry print
Customer type: realtor group
Durables: just replaced. But it would not have been described as blurry.

Me: great..... Who is it this time

Realtor: shows the sample, clearly a copy or worse, from inkjet

Me: please how me how you did it

Realtor: prints a map on a b/w ir adv, then put it in color ir adv cas 1. Then he proceed to print his sh17.

Machine: beebop*, printed his sh17 and everything looks decent.

Me: but this looks good

Realtor: no, its after i copy it. And then he proceeds to copy his sh17.

Machine: *insert classic steam engine sound*, the copy came out just like a copy. Gray looks spotty, text looks inconsistent like the first sample he showed. Whats more, it ressembled a copy of his sh17

Me: but this is a copy, you lose quality when doing a copy

Realtor: NO.... But I always do it this way~

Me: *it seem as if my rage had leaked through the tone of my voice and my face*, i said another technician would say the same.

Realtor: withdrew to his dumbass desk with his sorry ass sh17.

[gneebore]

Re: Probing Questions.... a Lost Art!!

Customer calls," none of our copiers are scanning, "

"if none of them are scanning, then it's unlikely to be the machines, it'll probably be your network, has anything changed on your network"

"nothing has changed on our network, it's the machines, we need you to come out"

"can you test it while I'm on the phone, and tell me what happens"

"it says error deletion- server connect error"

"it has to be your network, if I have to attend, you may be charged"

"but we're on a contract"

"unfortunately it doesn't cover you for network issues, ask your IT if they have changed anything"
"

Got a few calls when we first started selling networked copiers. Worst was when we got a call about three computers won't print to the copier. But then she added the other ones in the office print fine. I flat out told them they needed to talk to their computer techs company since we did not trouble shoot or cover network problems. Yes next morning got a call and they insisted we go out and fix the problem. I got there and printer fine from five different pc's but when I went to the three problem machines no print. And fun I did an ip config and the pc's did not match the network configuration of the others and the copier. Gave the papers to the office manager and explained that her computer service company had to find out why those three had the mismatched ip addresses. Now go two days later she calls back and I explained it was not our problem and if I had to fix a network problem then they had to pay a service fee and would it be possible to have the computer guy there at the same time too. We agreed and I met everyone the next morning at nine. I went in and showed the guy the mismatched ip addresses and he flat out said but they connect to the server and that is where the printer drivers are so your copier has something wrong with the internals. Fine I went and swapped a cable from one pc that printed with one that wouldn't turned it off and on and all of a sudden the pc printed to the copier. Did a quick check and the ip address changed too to match the copier range. So I did a quick check and found the "switch" for those three pc's was actually a router. I turned it off and unplugged the input from the connection and put it into a switch connection and turned it on and had the three pc turned off and on and guess what immediate printing the ip addresses changed to match the rest of the equipment. I handed the office manager a bill and flat out said this is the last network repair we will make here. She found a new company for the computer services as soon as their contract expired. We also dropped that company as a service contract machine too since my boss at the time did not want to get involved with networking and they forced us to do something I was in all actuallity not qualified to troubleshoot.