What is the most unique thing you have seen at a customers

[fixthecopier]

Today I had a ticket to clean a Minolta Di 152 for an accountant. The two people were in their 80's easily and very nice. While I was cleaning the already spotless copier, I was glancing around the room. Next to the copier was a desk with a typewriter on it. Next to the typewriter was laying 2 pieces of paper with copies of prescriptions on it. I glanced at the top paper and then it caught my eye, the name on the script was Elvis Presley. There were 6 scripts and they were dated Aug.4 1976, which would have been the date he did a concert in town. I do not know why they had em, I did not ask.
One time I had cleaned a color machine at a church in the country, and I looked at the preachers desk and saw letter opened with Delta Force logo on top, the real delta force, not the video game. I guess he was about the right age to have been an original member.
Ever hear the Harlem Globetrotters theme song "Sweet Georgia Brown" ? She was a real person. I was helping an artist who does leather rub portraits enlarge a photo in the shop and found out he is her son.

[leroyal]

I saw God after I set a copier on fire with WD-40.

[prntrfxr]

What is the most unique thing you have seen at a customers

Never had anything really famous or spectacular as you've had, but the following are some things that did happen to me that I thought was out of the ordinary.

We had an cable news network for a client. I got to fix a printer in the room where all the affiliate channels are monitored simultaneously. There must have been 100 TV's in the wall and that room was dark. I had to use a flashlight to see the control panel and was told to whisper and keep it quiet.

Could stand behind the cameras in the news room while they delivered the news. Fixed a machine in there. Also had to be very quiet. Made me so nervous I dropped a screwdriver and a security guard gave me a dirty look.

I've been in the VP's office (sports department) of another communication company, fixing the smallest cheapest printer you could imagine. He had a wet bar in there, a living room with sofa bed, a shower, big flat screen TV, and his desk was in front of the windows (huge windows, it was a corner office). He came in and was the most down-to-earth guy. He just loves sports. That's all he was talking about. His secretary shared an office with the secretary of the VP (news dept, I think). They were absolutely nasty to me and each other. I worked on one of their machines and one of them said, "Tell her she needs to pick up her pencil, so it doesn't become a safety hazard." The other one replied, "Tell her to mind her **%$ business and if it bothers her so bad she can pick it up herself." Needless to say I got out of there real fast.

and

how about working on a machine in a nuclear power plant. The security to get in was incredible. Your car was inspected by german shepherds and guys with M-16 rifles. You had to open your tool bag which they searched, go through a metal detector, and your boss had to be called to verify that you work for your company. Your name had to be on a list of people acceptable to pass. When you finally got to see the machine they locked you in a room. You had to stay there till it was finished. To leave or go to the bathroom you used the phone in the room and called the guard desk for someone to let you out of the room. You could go no where without an armed escort and cameras were everywhere.

I thought it was kind of cool to have these clients (although a lot of them were a pain in the backside about things), because there were people who worked there for years and had never been in some of the rooms I got to go in. Ain't our job great!

[Rob Sandberg]

Once at a airforce base in calf I was adjusting 8" single sided floppy drives (long long time ago in a very different life). These computer systems were part of the MX missle program (this is the multiple warhead city killer).

In a trail stuck of by it self was a user that stated he wanted to see the MX tested fully. He stated not just fired but all warheads deployed and used.

That was back in 1982, and he scares me still.

Rob S

[mjarbar]

When I was doing the office furniture installs one of our customers was Panavision who do the cameras and lenses for the film industry. I was installing a desk and filing cabinet in an office and one wall was covered from floor to ceiling in the ideas for different movie posters that were not released along with the films.

How he got hold of them I'll never know but cool none the less.

[Lagonda]

Did get to go to the waterfront property of Mick Doohan the 5 time world 500cc motorbike champion to sort out a fax problem. Didnt get to see his house but I was impressed with his garage. The office was on the mezzanine floor looking over the two helicopters, the motorbike collection, go-karts and jet skis. One wall was full of posters of his major wins and the other wall was a row of lockers containing all the gear to go with the toys, wetsuits, scuba gear, bike leathers etc. Didn't see any cars, they must have been in another garage the other side of the tennis courts. Oh, and the 50 ft cruiser was moored out side.
Mick wandered in to the office and said "Hi", seems a very nice guy. He was wearing shorts and all the scars on his legs showed the price he had to pay for all this luxury! After seeing that I'll think I'll be happy with my tin shed with a push bike in it!

[RRodgers]

Double D's

[CableGuy]

I think I have related this one on here before, but here goes again. At a small airport near Stellenbosch in the Cape, I had to work on the copier in the upstairs office of the club house. On this particular day there was a photo shoot happening and the models were using this office as their changing room. Let's just say it took a while to get that machine working just right.......

[Lagonda]

Funny Business, not your average office

One day I was out in a suburban house that was being used as an office. While I was doing a routine service on the copier my eyes are wandering around the room reading the notices pinned to the wall as I try to work out what sort of business they are running. Just I came to the conclusion that it was some sort of mail order business a woman who looked like a typical grandmother sort walked passed me with two huge vibrators in her hands!
Well after I picked my jaw up off the floor I asked wether her job was that boring she needed to get a buzz out of life she told me that they ran a party plan marital aids business and she was just sending off another order.

She then took me into the next room to show me the display case and what a collection it was! There were things that buzzed, flashed and even squirmed and some of them were so big they made me feel quite inadequate!

[TJ001]

Funny Business, not your average office

I use to service machines at a mine in Rustenburg. The first time i got there i had to sit through a hour long safety induction video.After that i had to write down every last little thing in my toolbag,even the amount and sizes of the screws, my vacuum cleaner(1 black vacuum pipe,2 nozzles,1 electric wire with plugs attached to both sides,one filter and 2 material cloths)It took me half an hour to do all of that. Needles to say the next time i arrived there with a rag a screwdriver and a long nose pliers. I used their vacuum.

[Koosie]

We also service a lot of mines. Security is tight. I also just take a screwdriver. Not allowed to take in a vacuum. At the diamond mines you get x-rayed and searched when you get out. 1 mine you need to attend a mine safety class that runs from 7am to 4 pm, get your blood tested once a year for metal poisoning get police clearance that you don't have a criminal background, specially if you got caught stealing before, then your not going in. And at one place your not allowed to put your hands in your pocket or bend over, because you might just be picking up a small diamond.

[I3FusionGuy]

Armoured Car shop...

..was my client in the midwest. The armoured card would drive in and out, dropping all the money bags off for counting and transfer. The money room has three printers, and I could not take in a tool bag, phone, knife, or have anything in pockets, including my wallet. I took in my ID in my pocket. I was allowed to take in hand tools a few at a time and parts in a small, clear, open box they provided. Past the vault door, into the little airlock, close behind me, open the door in front, etc.

I had just finished installing a maintenance kit when one of the money counters dropped a bag of dimes. I hears a sneeze and then KOOOOOSH. The money room goes into lockdown, and four hours later every dime was accounted for finally. The company actually volunteered to pay for my hourly time in the money room, since I was only allowed to sit at one chair at a desk. No computer, no books, took a nice nap.

[banginbishop]

my old service manager saw on display a gold plated microphone used by prince or squiggle (whatever you call him now)

[paulg]

The first one i can think of is an Embassy although I have been to many Embassies most once your past the security and in the offices they are fairly office like. Many are very friendly and almost family like. The strangest one had to be when at one nations embassy i was led to a room though several doors in the centre of the building then though a Door which must of been all most nuclear bomb proof and looked like the ones in the films with the big wheel on it. Then though another door in to a room with what can only be descirbed as metal porta cabins which inside were self contained offices for one.

What happened in these offices I have no idea but does make me wonder what they were planning or expecting

Another time I found myself in a room in a Police station for a morning while a Murder investigation was played out. It hit the news for a a few months and later i found it very stange when i saw the reconstruction on a TV program. As I heard all about the crime and to see it reenacted was not nice.


I can remeber a guy whose desk near me as i worked in a TV production company tell the various contestants and whoever what would happen in the Live show at the weekend strangly it was suppose to be one of those Live telephone votes on the night

[mascan42]

You haven't seen security until you go to fix a copier at the county courthouse three days after 9/11. You don't realize exactly how suspicious copier parts look until there are five armed guards staring at the x-ray screen. Is that a fuser roll or a pipe bomb?


As for the famous people thing, I never had anything myself, but we used to have a guy that worked out in the Hamptons that would constantly be telling us how he fixed Steven Spielberg's copier, or ran into Alec Baldwin in a deli, or some other wildly improbable story that nobody believed.