(rant warning, you might want to hit
delete now)
Does everyone experience certain
customers of the male gender who will call their wife,
girlfriend or mom (who is usually driving or at work)
and have them call the ISP about a problem but will
never just call directly?
Am I lacking in empathy, and these
are socially awkward dudes whose only social interaction
is playing on the Xbox, and thank goodness for the
Internet? They may have a genuine medical or
psychological condition, but I don’t think it’s an
inability to talk, they are able to call the female
person in their life about the Internet problem.
I am wondering if I’m just being a
dick, having a mental image of these guys sitting at
home playing games while their wife or mom is out
working, and they can’t call the Internet place
themselves. Maybe they are stay-at-home dads trying to
get multiple kids fed and diapers changed while their
wife is out having a fun time and the least she can do
is call and get the Internet fixed.
I suspect it’s biology, or how we
raise girls vs boys, or maybe the insidious effect of
online gaming on social skills or lack thereof.
Yesterday I was at a quite large
house that a family had just closed on, trying to set up
WiFi throughout the house. Mom (high powered
professional who needs Internet for work), dad, daughter
home on break from college, and son. The daughter
handled all the tech questions and decisions, very good
communication skills and decision making. The son
hardly said a word, was just waiting for the moving
truck to bring his Xbox, only concern was Ethernet
connection in the bedroom that was to be his gaming
room, had to be “hardwired”, couldn’t be WiFi. Now
maybe he has autism or something, but it just felt like
the stereotype of young men who can’t talk to other
people IRL, only online.
OK, sorry, this turned into a rant.
And my question is probably rhetorical. I’m pretty sure
you all have customers like this. It’s just frustrating
to try and do tech support when the person who is
actually at the site and experiencing the problem
doesn’t call himself, he calls someone else who is at
work or driving or at the store or picking the kids up
from school. I wonder how outsourced tech support
handles this? Maybe the obvious way – call us when you
get home.
