After All That

I spoke with a British chap today. I’m used to getting someone outside of the U.S. whenever I need technical support for something, but I usually end up with Panama or Mexico. So it was a little surprising and a little refreshing to speak with a Brit located in Canada. Other than that, today was ANOTHER one of those days. How many must I endure?

The infamous fax machine (which I ruined a dress over and which I had finally gotten back in working order) sprouted a new Issue. The word “Telephone” would pop up on the LCD display. Not “Tel” or “Tel/Fax,” like the manual said. No—it was “Telephone.” And there was nothing anywhere in that manual that told me what to do about it; nor was there anything anywhere on the entire world wide web that might give me a clue. So that was when I called customer support.

Now “Allen” really was one of the best support people I have talked to as far as actually listening to what I had to say. He would “Hmmm” in all the right places. Then he would murmur, ‘So sorry, but I’m going to have to put you on hold; is that alright?” Eventually after we had tried everything there was possible to try (including resetting the machine), he admitted that he had exhausted all his resources and that he “was stumped.” As it turns out, I am (of course) the first one to EVER have reported this particular problem, and as such, neither he nor his managers had anything left to try.

So after all that…a ruined dress, a ruined day, and many hours debating the best recourse... the fax machine is dead.