I am NOT a PC repair man. I will NOT get your iPad working Alistair Dabbs is recovering from the dreaded lurgy, but still none too chipper this week, so we’re happy to let him linger in his bath chair and tartan blanket once again. No doubt his neighbours will be concerned though, if this repeat publication from 2013 is anything to go by. “My nephew bought me one of those iPad things …
Frankly, I'm getting tired of political correctness. You don't like a name? Tough. Freedom of speech. How about I give a "politically correct" term for "politically correct": "emotionally emasculated". I'm surprised some people don't take these old terms and adopt them with pride. The best way to blunt an insult is to turn it into a compliment.
that you fix computers. Then they ask how much you charge. Make it high enough and you won't be bothered much, but when you are it will be lucrative AND they'll accept you coming round when you can fit them in. Or believe you when you say they need to buy a new one. And not bother you thereafter when you tell them you're quitting the business so won't be fixing any more computers. That'll leave just the core 'customers' you'd be helping out - free-of-charge - anyway regardless.
That will backfire on you one day.
I had a client years ago ask me if I could teach her Excel on a housecall and since I am not the most patient of teachers, I pulled a number out of my ass: '$250 a hour'. She says' 'Well, if that's what it costs'...
I truly wish I asked for more.
I'm pretty sure I suffered a minor stroke the Day of Excel Class.... oy... better just to say 'No, they have places for that'.
It does seem like very event I turn up to I get asked about PC problems and I often wonder if Plumbers or Electricians get the same sort of attention. These days I tell them to call me about it sometime which gets rid of at least 2/3rds of them. I am beyond caring if a few people feel I have been a bit short or rude to them, it might surprise them that although I enjoy my job when I get home a lot of the time I just want to forget about work and have fun.
And to those who wonder why I don't know how to do this particular strange thing in Word - I am a network engineer - I do a lot of typing but in Word it 'aint!
And to those who wonder why I don't know how to do this particular strange thing in Word - I am a network engineer - I do a lot of typing but in Word it 'aint!
Indeed. I do infrastructure support, NOT desktops. But you do realise that to most people "IT" is that box they type things into and see pretty pictures on.
My wife still asks me to sort out all of the computers for her family by saying "You're in I.T.". The only problem is that I haven't been in "I.T". since I worked as a producer in a software company in the 90s. Everything I know about the modern I.T. world is entirely from outside of work and due in some part to me being the master of my own fate. I hate asking for help if I can possibly sort a problem out myself. So if my own wife doesn't actually know that I am a financial audit analyst who merely uses a computer to do the donkey work, then what chance do I have? I wouldn't mind but her CV states that she is proficient in MS office. She isn't...at all. She can use excel a little bit and can't write a letter on word to save her life. She has never used Access, Visio, powerpoint or pretty much any of the rest of the suite, but knowing that you can write =sum(A1)+sum(B1) and it comes out with the right answer, means that she has mastered excel.
I currently work for a large international mobile telco. Guess what people's first question is when they find THAT out!
I have a friend who constantly asks me for this sort of help. But then he fitted my new hob for free. But I don't mind spending time helping genuine friends anyway. My brother's mother-in-law who made herself a cup of tea while I fixed her laptop, and didn't get one for me, hasn't had any help since. She's the only time I've genuinely seen this. I asked, "I know this is a stupid question, but is it plugged in?" And it wasn't.
Anyway no.1 friend is a very funny man. He used to do stand-up as a bit of a sideline. And he's done MC-ing and comedy for various events and fund-raisers for well over 30 years. One of the acts he's been doing forever is a magician act. Well to be honest it's a stand-up act. The schtick is that the props haven't arrived, so he tells you how good the tricks would have been - jokes. The magic is basically an excuse to put on a silly italian accent, and wear a cape.
So he's at a party and someonone who's known him as long as me, and has seen this act over ten times, comes over to him. "I'd just like to introduce this chap, he's looking for a magician for an event, and you do that."
He's a cabinet maker/furniture designer and yes, they all get asked for help by friends/acquaintances too. Along with plumbers, sparks, mechanics, doctors.
I wonder if police do? "I've just stolen this TV - would you mind nicking me in your spare time?"
Reminds me of a pal who is a consultant gynaecologist. His reply, when asked for free advice at a social event his reply is:
'I could not possibly answer without making a thorough examination, if you could loosen your clothes and lie down on the carpet I will do what I can'
Despite having the word Software in my job title, I was regularly asked to help with various hardware faults. Having the ability to not give a **** about the feelings of those I worked with, meant I had no problems in saying no.
Persistence eventually worked on their behalf, and I gave in and tried to un-jam a printer. Opened a few flaps, slide out a tray or two... then.. Snap! Amazing how standing next to a now buggered printer with a large piece of it in your hand, saying "Is this supposed to come off?", stops all future requests for assistance.
And no, I've never had a problem removing jams from my own personal printers.
I've been plagued by people asking me to sort out their computers for years. But thanks to the nice people in Redmond, that's all stopped now: I have no qualms in declining anything whatsoever to do with Windows 8. "Sorry, I know nothing about it and cannot use it"
I never thought that I'd see a reason for the world using Windows 8 until the nice Mr Dabbs pointed that out. Funny how unintended consequences have positive outcomes.
My normal trick was to protest vigorously that I am a programmer, that I know nothing about hardware and that I'll probably end up doing more harm than good.
If the person in question then refused to give up after what I felt was a reasonable time span, I'd poke at their machine until it ended up in a worse state than when I started. Two or three completely bricked machines, a couple of beers in apology payments and the odd friendship ruined forever (no real loss - they'd bugged me about fixing their computer) is a small price to pay for relative peace and quiet.
The standard reply I give when asked what PC/Laptop to buy is "Anything made by Apple"; this normally elicits protestations about the heinous cost of the kit. When I merely say "Quality costs", they normally shut up and go away. Seriously persistent people get told all about the marvellous qualities of secondhand Sun kit; they rarely bother me twice.
When I'd just got together with my now wife we were both invited to a house warming party by a friend of hers. I dutifully rolled up for the first time to a new (to me) town, knowing nobody, and being generally referred to at the party as her "new bloke". There were lots of interesting new people to talk to, and lots of beer being drunk.
Eventually someone I'd never met before asked me if I was her "new bloke", and went on to ask if I could have a look at his laptop. I told him I'd just go get my invoice book out of the car; I have *never* seen such an indignant, offended reaction in my entire life. Apparently that was a dreadfully rude thing to say - but he never did bring his laptop, and I continued getting happily drunk :)
I did something similar while crashing at an old friends house and she was introducing me to her new mates (since I knew her anyway).
I, however, did the clever thing and charged in gin.
I still don't remember how I got that laptop to boot up, must have had a Windows disk on me or something, but it was working in the morning. I also got a hickey from one of the lasses there (I'm told - I don't remember). What am I, twelve??
Anyway, context is important. I prefer cash, but booze and floozies works well, too.
Sorry, that downvote was unintentional..I was reading this on my blasted phone, went to scroll down, fat finger accidentally hit the downvote arrow.
'Anyway, context is important. I prefer cash, but booze and floozies works well, too.'
Amen!.
(Though, sadly, I get more booze than flooze..)
Just like fixing their bloody websites... Can you do a website for me (I develop them for a living). Yes, but it'll cost you. How much they say. Well, I don't know what you want, but lets say between 10 and 20 days, so somewhere between, lets say £2 to £5k but could be more. Eeek, that's not like the adverts for One and One on the telly.
Yep, please do.
I do get pissed off as they don't do that for their accountants, lawyers, surveyors and other professions, yet they do do this for us "IT" people. FFS we have to defend our reputation for being overpaid geeks...
I was sat around at home after work, and suddenly had an unsolicited call from someone who had a problem with their laptop.
I swear my reaction was almost one of PTSD, and I refused to take the call until I had more information and had calmed down.
The idea that people may keep calling to ask about any and all problems is an idea of personal hell.
Maybe when I was 14 or so, when I was enthusiastic still about cleaning crap from people's computers and helping them out, but now, embittered by time and work, I don't want to fill up my own time with a stream of petty issues.
I imagine car mechanics have the same problem - so I suppose at least we don't have to climb underneath oily, greasy cars out in the cold.
I do feel sorry for them, because they're usually old and poor, but that makes it worth my time even less, because there's no point me charging a huge amount they won't be able to pay.
Oh, and that anecdote about "what laptop to buy?" is a good one, because you then have to ask them their requirements, because to be honest, any cheap shitty laptop these days is more than good enough unless you want to game. People also get confused when 15.6" laptops are cheaper than smaller ones.
But the best part is, the time you actually consider the question properly, and give a good suggestion, they end up buying some other piece of crap anyway, and wonder why it's not much use.
That said, I've had my advice requested a few times and it has been adhered to, so it's not all bad.
Keeping completely old pieces of crap is another problem these people have - I don't think they realise how old their machine is, and how much better one for less than £300 would be if they just opened their wallet. After all, it saves you time when you're using the machine.
I've seen silly examples where people have spent money fixing/upgrading ancient shitty machines when they would have spent a similar amount if they just replaced it completely and achieved a far superior result.
I'm glad you also touched on inkjets, which are a bloody trojan horse. Don't let one in your home.
A cheap mono laser for printing out your flight passes and instructions and so on, and an online print service if you actually want quality photos produced.
Just think of the fun to be had, when women come to ask you to fix their computers.
'It's probably all of the porn that's on there', you reply, knowing full well that her husband, sons, lover have spent the last 10 years looking at sites that have not been good for the system.
'I don't look at porn!' she will reply indignantly. If she is really certain that it's clean, she'll press you to come have a look at it. If she's not, she'll probably let it drop.
If she's clever, she mutter that she's going to kill «male relative of her who also uses her computer» and ask you to come and perform an exorcism on her machine.
I apologise and point out it wouldn't be fair to charge them my normal rate, given how high it is (contractor for banks - fill in the gaps yourself), especially as I'm rather out of date on home systems, assuming they are not running a cluster of unix servers as their desktop.
I then give them the phone number of a young lad I know, still in college, who only charges £20/hour, plus some travel time if he comes to you.
Most people are unwilling to admit straight out that they wanted it doing for free and the matter gets dropped.
The only person I have often done free fixes or advice for is my father. On the other hand being a central heating fitter when I bought a new place he fitted a new system and only charged me for parts, at trade rates. If someone is willing to offer me useful services in return then I'm more than happy to start negotiating.
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I find that since I stopped using windows, ooooh about 7 years ago, and dedicated my computing life to just using Linux, the slow attrition of my Windows skills has resulted in me not being that useful to the Windows brigade.
"Ohhh , you're not running XP ?" I say. "Windows 8 is way too new and fangled for me" I continue. Before I say "Do you want to borrow an Ubuntu 14.04 disk ?" by which time , with all of the intervening conversation they've got the idea I really don't want to work on Windows, and they should try someone who does.
This strategy works for me very well.
When I meet someone who knows about Linux, they usually know more than me, so I'm the one learning :-D
If they ask me what that means, I tell them about a massive, commercial, computer monitored, site-wide HVAC system I worked on for testing/verification many years ago; in great detail since I did find it fascinating at the time. I'm sure I'll be dead before anybody in the UK gets a domestic HVAC system that needs looking at.
I find it useful to deploy phrases like:
"Tell me the contract details of your support-partner and I'll raise a service-call with them for you"
or
"You need to speak to one of my consultants - let me have your phone number and I'll get them to call you to arrange an appointment. You *are* VAT-registered, aren't you?"
or
"Would you ask the chief-executive of British Aerospace to book you a package-holiday? No - so why are you asking me about your iToy?"
So exactly what lurgy is it you do have ?
And can you swear on your mother's life/grave that when introduced to a doctor at a party you have NEVER started discussing your then current medical problems ?
So doctors and computers nerds share an occupational hazard.
( But at least if you're lucky, nobody will treat you as if you are a character out of The IT Crowd. )
Have you tried turning it off and on again....?
No - Well I would try that right away
Yes - Well sounds like its got X problem, that's normally X hours to put right, Hourly rate is X
Which results in £££ or results in no further questions until the come back to ask why their manufacture or x has used their system restore partition / disk and no all their files have magically disappeared and want to know if they can be recovered.
Like someone else said i never ceases to amaze me that people think because all your doing is pushing button and moving a cursor to make their machine work again it should be free... I find if you lead with how much and then in rare occasions but say but to you mates rate is X, people are willing to pay when they realise there is no free lunch...
and one of the extended family members worked, at that time, in the same office location I did.
She starts whinging about her work PC and my wife looks squarely at her and just says, "NO!"
I'm glad she did, because I was about to go off on her as it was the weekend and they didn't pay me enough to think about that place in the off hours.
I feel for the IT guys who get put in charge of the conference facilities in their companies.
Just because a presentation laptop is connected to the conference system, it does not mean its all IT.
In 99% of SMEs the conference technic goes to either the IT departement or the guy who changes the bulbs and mows the lawn. They hate doing it because it keeps them away from the job they´ve been hired for. What with all the hussle with coke fuelled managers insisting to show their 1024x768 slides in HD.
The companies are blowing out megatons of cash for conference facilities since they want to look posh in front of their clients. Which is often very embarassing, since there is noone there to operate that shit properly. Who gets the blame? The IT departement (since a presentation laptop is involved and the ever failing videoconference system runs over IP). I bet, many IT guys would rather happily fix uncle Herbert´s slow internet then having to cope with systems in their company which are not their field of experties and they don´t want anything to do with.
I salute you and raise a pint for everyone concerned
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