Stuck in no-man's land of technical support

By Staff
Leada Gore, Editor
The idea was a simple one. Our printer at the office was old. I called our corporate tech people, they advised me on which one to purchase and I placed my order. A few days later, the printer arrived.
All I had to do, the IT people said, was read the manual and hook it up. Simple, right? Wrong. Very, very wrong.
The printer came in a large, heavy box. The machine itself wasn't that large, but it contained enough packing to ship a small car. I hooked it up and called the IT person.
"I would suggest reading the manual," was the advice I received. I read the manual and was able to install it on most all of our computers. And then, I hit a snag.
Not wanting to be told to "read the manual" again, I called the company that made the printer.
After pressing one to confirm I wanted directions in English – something I later learned was a bit of a joke since the person giving the advice didn't speak English at all – I was transferred to two different people.
After telling the final person what my problem was he responded "all you have to do is change it from binary data to Ascii. Anything else?," he said impatiently.
"Don't you think if I knew something like how to change canary data to Aspen I would have done that on my own?" I replied.
He talked me through the problem, but wasn't very happy about it. I expected "just read the manual" at any moment.
Problem solved, I continued with the installations. Then, I hit another snag. With no other options – and the manual was no help – I called the company again.
I went through the whole transfer routine again and ended up with another person to help me. He did speak English, but didn't seem any more eager to help.
"We don't support that platform," he said when I told him my dilemma.
"Don't support it? You have instructions for installing it in your own manual! Why would you have directions for using it if you don't support it?" I yelled.
"You must have an old manual," he said. "Let me put you on hold and I will see what I can do." Before I could protest, he put me on hold and I was confined to listening to an instrumental version of "Muskrat Love."
With time on my hands, I started trying things on the computer to solve my problem and, before I knew it, it was solved. About this time, the technical support man came back on the phone.
"Sorry, we can't…"
"I fixed it," I interrupted. "Don't need your help after all."
"How did you do that?" he asked.
"Can't tell you," I said as I hung up. "I would suggest you read the manual."