Customer bricked a phone – and threatened to brick techie's face with it Friday is the day the working week goes to die for most people – unless, like many a Reg reader, they're on call to provide tech support at all hours. Which is why we use this day to celebrate those hardy souls with a fresh instalment of On Call – the reader-contributed column that celebrates survival in the face of stupidity, …
I don't know about your "for once" but once upon a time there was a bookie's in East Belfast that was suffering repeated armed robberies. One of our radio alarms was installed. the next robbery there was an almost instant response. The alarm was going straight to the police training centre across the road. It was the trainers who responded. To be precise it was the police firearms training centre.
It could be a brilliant post, with insight from a seasoned IT veteran from days of old, and it will get downvotes here. Petty, judgemental people that think they have a little power... and don't like anybody smarter than they are.
Some of them may be deserved, including for myself, but it's a piss off that there are people that sit here and go "nope, nope, nope"
Mother of SWMBO was driving past the parking lot of a local bar one evening when a patron departing the establishment decided to exit the lot at a high rate of speed, nearly hitting her vehicle. That was the first thing that scared her that evening.
The second thing to scare her was the instant light show as sevetal plain black SUVs with grilles full of barely noticeable LED lights went into "pay attention to me!" mode.
The bar happened to be across the street from a Chineese buffet restaurant. That restaurant happened to be a favorite meal stop for local law enforcement personnel. That moment happened to be right at the start or end of a meal break for a few officers.
Many years ago a friend of mine was waiting to turn right at traffic lights when she was reat-ended by someone who didn't notice in time that she was stationary and signalling, correctly, to turn. She, in turn, was shunted into the oncoming traffic causing quite a pile up.
Fortunately no-one was injured, and it all got sorted very tidily and quickly, because half the cars involved belonged to policemen. It was shift change at the local barracks and most of those involved were going on or off duty.
She was correctly positioned in the right hand lane at the traffic lights, signalling to turn right. The blame lay completely with the driver who hit her, not paying attention to the fact that the lane he was in could be used (and was clearly signposted) for cars wishing to turn. The police involved were either behind him and saw the accident, or travelling safely in the other direction and hit my friend's car when it was pushed across the road into their lane. They were not at fault, nor was my friend.
The reason they teach drivers to keep the wheels straight (in a right hand turn situ in driving on left side countries, and left hand turn in driving on right side countries) is to avoid the problem of the car jumping into oncoming traffic in the case of being rear-ended.
One should turn the steering when making the turn.. not whilst waiting...
Luckily for your friend she was pushed into a slow traffic situation, and survived.
<END THREAD DRIFT>
"The reason they teach drivers to keep the wheels straight (in a right hand turn situ in driving on left side countries, and left hand turn in driving on right side countries) is to avoid the problem of the car jumping into oncoming traffic in the case of being rear-ended."
Do that in the streets around here and you just will not get round the corner: there isn't the road width.
I don't know who you refer to with "they", but they certainly didn't teach me that.
But because I'm a logical and defensive thinker, I often think "what would happen if <x> hit me" and position/orient myself appropriately. So yes, I do tend to keep wheels facing forward in those situations.
Similar with pointing wheels into the kerb when parking on a hill. I was taught to leave it in gear and do that too, but I don't trust either handbrake or engine braking alone to hold 2 tonnes of metal.
That fact that you didn't pay attention when they taught you that, or that you have forgotten that teaching and substituting your own belief in personal superiority of logic/defensive thinking does not make it less of a fact that they teach this EVERYWHERE because cars being pushed into oncoming traffic by a rear end collision is a very common cause of high speed head on collisions.
Maybe they need to stress this more in driver's education since it isn't usual to see someone waiting for a turn halfway into the intersection with their wheels turned. Usually you see that in intersections where there's a green light but no turn light and there's a lot of oncoming traffic - they want to be ready to floor it when there's either a break in incoming traffic or the light turns red and the opposing traffic has finally stopped and they want to vacate the intersection before cross traffic gets a green.
The problem is that when people are hit from behind the shock/surprise often causes them to let up on the brake. If everyone kept the brake firmly pressed when they were hit there wouldn't be all those head on crashes where a vehicle with wheels turned moves into opposing traffic.
Doesn't matter how hard you've got the brakes on, if someone hits your car from behind hard enough, your car will move.
"Keeping foot hard on brake" isn't easy when 3400 lbs going 30mph just pushed your car firmly away from your feet. Last time I got hit from behind hard enough to move my car, I wound up half-reclined in the seat because part of the seat structure bent backward during the impact. At most levels of more than "fender bender" car impact, what your brain wants your body to do doesn't matter until a while after the impact has already happened.
Except that if that's the only thing holding you, it will creep. The main thing stopping the engine turning is cylinder compression - and that leaks down in a surprisingly short time. In the past I've driven tractors with ... poor ... brakes. One occasion, the only way to hold it while waiting for the next full trailer of silage was to stop the engine and leave it in gear. It would very slowly creep, then give a quick movement as it turned over to the next cylinder on compression, rinse and repeat.
Could also make sure the brakes were being held firmly. Was once in stop and go situation on i90 in the us. Was stopped at the time. heard screeching brakes. 4 cars all stopped behind me started dominoing after the rear most was hit. hit each other one by one. knew i would get hit so stamped on the brakes as hard as possible. dominoes stopped with me. just a slight impression of the front license plate from the car behind me on the rear bumper. Lot of people with automatics keep rolling at stop signs or lights. not surprised they get pushed into intersections.
"The reason they teach drivers to keep the wheels straight (in a right hand turn situ in driving on left side countries, and left hand turn in driving on right side countries) is to avoid the problem of the car jumping into oncoming traffic in the case of being rear-ended."
..and why here (UK) you're taught to apply the hand(parking) brake when stationary at lights or in a queue.
Just keep your foot on the brake. Those lights are there for a reason, and that is to continuously signal to traffic behind you that you're stopped or slowing down. They are NOT bright enough to blind anybody.
NEVER use the parking brake while you are not parked.
I disagree. If it was important to display brake lights while the driver is stationary, then the parking brake would put those lights on - if maybe for a limited time, using a capacitor for instance. You're expected to SEE that a stationary vehicle is stationary. The function of the brake lights is to advertise a change of velocity that other drivers need to be aware of. A turn also is possible, and so is a skid.
In practice, the brake light informs other drivers that this driver is operating the brake pedal. This is useful for distinguishing a stationary vehicle on parking brake from one which has just released the parking brake, is operating the foot brake, and, probably, is about to move. If I have just contradicted myself, so be it.
Of course, there are also indicators, but these are lit by repeatedly and dangerously igniting gasoline directly in the indicator cell, which is why most drivers do not use them. At least, I assume the excuse is something like that.
New Toyota's actually have a "brake hold" feature. Push that, and push the brake hard enough, and it holds both the brakes and the lights on. Then press accelerator, and it auto-releases the brake and lights. Great at long traffic lights and railway crossings.
Driving a computer with some wheels on it, really.
"Blind" in this case is not a literal term - you still have eyesight. But sitting with the car in front showing full brake lights, possibly fog lights as well with some particularly retarded drivers, plus potentially high level brake light from the car in front of the one in front, means you see nothing but a wall of red light which does affect your ability to see for a short while after it goes. That's basic physiology of the eye - light bleaches dyes in the receptor which are needed to perceive light, it takes time for that to recover.
Also a problem is the ever increasing intensity of front lights which very effectively kill your night vision for a while after you get a full blast.
Depending on the light levels involved, it can be seconds to minutes to recover from a high light environment to a low light one - in extreme (thankfully rare when driving), it can take 1/2 hour to acclimatise, and only seconds to undo that.
That's a weird thing to teach. They don't teach that here in the US. It makes no sense, because without brake lights it is less apparent to other cars that you're stopped which seems to me to make it less safe.
Maybe in the past parking brakes were stronger than pedal operated brakes, but that hasn't been the case for a long time (though I suppose it is possible some people may keep such light pressure on the pedal that little force would be needed to move it)
>That's a weird thing to teach. They don't teach that here in the US. It makes no sense, because without brake lights it is less apparent to other cars that you're stopped which seems to me to make it less safe.
As Red Sceptic has already alluded just above, the recommended procedure - at least, when I was taught to drive *coughcough* years ago in the UK - is to apply the hand/parking brake if you anticipate that you'll be stopped for more than a few seconds, but - if and only if there is no car behind you - either keep your foot on the pedal brake, or be prepared to pump the pedal repeatedly to flash the rear brake lights if you see someone approaching you in your rear view mirror.
That way you don't blind the person sat stationary behind you, but you also minimize the risk of being rear-ended.
That way you don't blind the person sat stationary behind you
How bright are your brake lights in the UK? I've never been blinded by them or even close to it! I don't recall it being a problem when I've driven there, but I haven't done much driving at night in England/Scotland/Ireland, at least 95% of it was during the day.
Of course, you're correct about the recommendation, but my EV doesn't HAVE a handbrake! At least, it does but engaging it switches the car off - it's entirely "fly by wire", and it assumes that pressing the park button means you're all done. That said, once you're stationary, it remains stationary, unlike an automatic car.
I gave you a thumbs up but i disagree a little.... be aware of what's behind you and be ready to stomp on the brake..... I tend to put the hand brake on and keep my foot on the brake pedal too, till someone comes up behind me, then i am protected, and release the pedal.
I have a friend who is a driving instructor. A few years ago we were talking and the subject of driving standards came up. He was quite clear that the teaching process has changed from the old fashioned "look where you are going, don't hit anything, try not to let others hit you, and generally do the right thing" to "comply with the rules".
Personally I blame the shift to automated enforcement (through the likes of speed cameras) for a bit part of the rot. Once over, getting caught speeding meant a talking to, and the officer could educate there and then - and depending on your attitude (including whether you were cruising in excess of the limit but otherwise safely, or driving like a loon) decide how to proceed. These days, you get a letter through the post, there's no education element, and I think many just see that as an occupational hazard. Regardless of what the official message is supposed to be, the actual message many people take is that "drive like a loon but as long as you stick to some arbitrary number on a sign". I wish I could find it, but apparently the TRL way back when speed limits were being considered did a report that stated speed limits should be guidance for the skilled driver and limits for the less skilled. Of course, the proliferation of "political" speed limits doesn't exactly help their image either.
This is not the first place I've heard that, and it's INCREDIBLY stupid.
It's going to increase your reaction time if you need to move suddenly, and your brake lights will go out, which means you're no longer signaling to the cars behind you that you're not ready to move. You're going to significantly increase your chances of being rear ended.
And at least in most of the US, when you do get rear ended, you're going to get a ticket because doing that on a public street means you're not fully in control of the vehicle, having engaged a brake with a locking function when you should be prepared to move.
Oh, and that handbrake is generally significantly weaker than the hydraulic brakes, and typically only acts on two wheels.
Firstly, if you're not capable of telling if the car in front is not moving, then there's a problem with you being in control of a vehicle. At least in the UK, and barring any other evidence of dangerous driving by the car in front (brake checking or reversing unexpectedly, for example), if a driver rear-ends the car in front it's no fault of the driver in front.
Secondly, there is no legal requirement to move as soon as the lights change (or whatever else blocking the way has cleared) - a green traffic light means 'proceed if it is safe to do so'. Also, the UK has an extra phase in the traffic lights (red+amber) that shows between red and green that gives drivers time to prepare to move.
Thirdly, a driver is considered to be in control of their vehicle unless they are parked with the engine off: handbrakes are part of the control system.
Fourthly, the handbrake has to be strong enough to hold the car on a slope - it used to be tested on a slope of up to 16% gradient but these days is more likely to be tested on rollers - so doesn't need to be as strong as the normal brakes. Even if something rear-ends hard enough to overcome the handbrake, then it's not going to move far. Having had a claim for one car being pushed into another while both were stopped on the road, your main brakes are only as strong as the grip of the tires...
I don't think you'd pass a UK driving test, but I suspect a lot of drivers around the world wouldn't - hell, a huge proportion of people in the UK fail it at least once.
Having two daughters that have passed their UK (manual) tests in the last year, it seems that using the handbrake is now much less of a thing - they seem to be taught to keep a foot on the brake unless they need a hill start. I suspect that they're being conditioned to be able to transition to automatic transmissions and electric drive system that are likely to be in their future.
I was waiting to turn left at a set of lights but the lane I was in was a fileter lane - give way line, but no lights - I was alloweed to turn left no matter what the lights were on, jus so long as I had aclear space to turn in to. I saw a gap and was about to move off, but reconsidered and was waiting for a lager gap. Just then I felt a bump and looked back to see that a police car had moved off behind me and hit my bumper.
I got out to talk to the young female bobby who was driving and inspect the cars for damage. I had no damage other than a scuff mark on my bumper, and she had an egg size depression in her plastic bumper. I said I was quite happy to drive away and even offered to write a note stating that I had no damage or injuries, and I would not be claiming for whiplash. She said that she had to call it in and I would need to remain at the scene until her sergeant and a traffic officer attended. While we were waiting she confided that her colleagues would take the piss unmercifully when she got back to the station.
After about 20 minutes a traffic car arrived and the bobhby in that inspected my car for damage, checking the chassis and inside the boot before agreeing that my car seemed fine. He then took a statement and gave me a producer to take my licence, MOT annd insurance to a local police station (this was in the days before theck could check all this online).
THE WPC's sergeant then turned up and I had to repeat everything all over again - it was over an hour after the bump before I was allowed to leave. A week or so later the sergeant came to my house and asked me if I wanted to make a complaint or a claim. By this time I was feeling sorry for the WPC, who seemed to be a very nice young lady, and insisted I wanted no action take..
A couple of weeks later the sergeant came back to tell me that the WPC had had her driving privileges removed and would hev to retake a police driving test before she could drive her panda car again. Ihad to sign another statement to say I was happy with the outcome and was ok to let the matter rest.
What a rigmarole!
Hahahaha
Tell that to virtually anyone who has been threatened in the UK "it's a grey area" "do you REALLY want to press charges?' "well in the absence of CCTV there isn't much we can do "
Etc etc etc etc
Basically - how to avoid work 101 which apparently is a training unit given how many parrot the same phrasing
Having been assaulted a few times, by being at the wrong place at the wrong time and confronted by a drunk arsehole (or more), I can assure you that assault is most very definitely not a work avoidance scheme, as I'm sure any other sufferer of violent crime would agree.
I think you've misunderstood? Unless I'm mistaken, CountCadaver meant that it's the police trying to avoid work by downplaying the assault, so that they don't have to follow up on it. Not that either the assaulter or the assaultee is avoiding work by it, which is how I think you've taken it.
While the concept as such doesn't exist, in practice, it sort of does. If the victim tells the police they don't want charges brought or are unwilling to take part in a prosecution and there's no suspicion of the accused pressuring the victim into that state, then that weighs heavily on whether it even gets submitted to the CPS and/or if the CPS then chooses to bring a case. If the Police believe it is serious enough, they can, if they choose and believe they have enough evidence, still go ahead with an arrest and the CPS may then still proceed with a case even if the primary witness or victim is "hostile" to the case proceeding. I'm not sure if the US has an equivalent or if it's entirely a case of victim not "pressing charges" means case dimissed.
Yes, by letting him go they're telling him that behavior is acceptable. So he probably pulled the same thing when he went into the other shop, and probably intimidated the clerk there to give him the warranty replacement teaching him that crime does pay after all!
Even when cops were present at and witness to a crime they won't do the right thing! And people wonder why there is so much criticism of cops (and I'm sure this criticism of them will garner the usual outpouring of downvotes from those who support them no matter what)
Gotta love it when timing works out like this.
For a while I was working as a service engineer/helpdesk agent at my father's company. I always made a point of only introducing myself with my first name and never mentioning I was related to him (unless it was brought up of course).
One time a customer was going absolutely ballistic at me, screaming at me how useless I was and that our company was shit and that they were going to replace us etc. etc.
Then my father walked in, she suddenly became super friendly and everything seemed okay.
All I said was "Hi dad". I've rarely seen someone go that pale.
I had a 3rd party support engineer behaving like a little sh1t know-it-all* to me on the phone. What he didn't know was that I dealt directly with, and was friendly with, their customer services director. Apparently he was somewhat surprised to be tapped on the shoulder by said director and basically asked, "What the f*ck are you doing with my customer?"
The engineer wasn't there for very long - I think it was suggested he wasn't suited to a customer support role.
*Suggesting I didn't know what I was talking about and saying, "You don't need to know that" wasn't helpful, especially as I'd been an IT professional since before he was born!
I had a CFO of a client's sub-company screaming abuse at one of my junior team members because of a third party outage.
I took the call over and took the effing and blinding, which was on speaker at the other end.
Three weeks later he was no longer in his job, I was and, more importantly, so was my junior colleague.
We were quoting a contractor for small but key part of a very large project. Because of the nature of our business, we knew the end-user very well and this particular job had been under discussion for years.
Anyway, the contractor secured the project order and moved to place sub-contracts. However, now included were new T&Cs which stated that 'Every invoice will have a 15% discount'.
"No problem", we said, "We'll increase our price to accommodate this discount; i.e. +17.6%."
We were summoned to the contractor offices to meet Head Office 'heavy mob' from overseas, who explained that this was how things were going to be or we wouldn't get the order. And they always get their way......
Our Sales Manager made a quick call to the end-user. We received the order at our original price the next day. No discounts.
Much to the enjoyment of our friends at the contractor, 'Head Office' lost face and never interfered again.
Nothing the public try on when it comes to trying to return goods surprises me. My late first wife worked first in a Consumer Advice bureau, then in debt collection at a major energy supplier and finally in the Customer service desk of a major High Street store. While she had her share of very satisfied customers who gave her nice presents (we saw the live recording of a Maureen Lipmann comedy show courtesy of one client!), she also had her share of customers like that in the story (the Consumer Advice Bureau was in SE London). Fortunately, none resorted to actual violence, but threats happened - at that point, a large male member of staff usually turned up!
One thing that really annoyed her in the last job at the High Street store was that she was directed to let people get away with things that she knew weren't legitimate, in the name of customer relations. She knew they were trying it on, her manager knew they were trying it on, but company policy... She was especially annoyed because she knew the law better than her managers!
Of course, stories about "Karens" abounded in our home.
Working at Sainsbury’s in the late 1980s we had a lady pop in every Saturday afternoon (when the store was at its busiest) to demand a refund or exchange on a bottle of corked wine. Obviously the bottle was empty because she ‘had poured it out for all her friends’.
The first few times we gave her a bottle to get her out of our hair but then grew wise to it. It always struck me as petty and not a great use of their time.
I know of one that survived being run over by a BMW, at the same time an old Tosh suitcase laptop mostly survivied bar a cracked screen - same incident.
If it was like the above, or my first one, I am surprised that he did not wait for the concrete to set and just knock it off with a hammer/mallet. Those things were seriously well built
I had a late 90s Nokia that shrugged off being dropped down several flights of workplace stairs as well as bouncing off numerous metal shelves, other falls similar to the first and the worst damage it had was key scratches to the screen
My dad wrecked an 8210i I gave him after my years contract was up.....he used a paint gun needle to try to pick out metal dust from the speaker and microphone....(He worked in factory paint spraying and shot blasting stuff, he had the phone in a zippered pocket but the dust still penetrated) apparently he forgot about the magnet....
(Sidenote: I got diagnosed with ADHD as an adult a couple of years ago, I sent him some YouTube shorts that explained it in lay terms and I asked him what he thought " well....I saw a lot of myself in them", yeah no shit I've been telling you that since I got diagnosed and it runs in families)
Many years ago a friend had her phone nicked from her car (silly leaving it unlocked) and needed a temporary phone to use until payday came round.
I asked around and was given a very slimy nokia (3310 from memory) that had previously been owned by a mobile catering worker and had been knocked off a shelf into the deep fat fryer.
I spent about an hour dunking it in a bucket of isopropyl alcohol to get the worst of the oil out before drying it out on a radiator. After charging the battery the phone worked perfectly, never did get rid of the oil stain behind the screen or the smell of fish & chips though.
The first mobile phone that I encountered probably would have stopped the BMW. It was integrated in the Jag XJ and had a traditional handset wired to the phone. Mind you, the same model came also in a portable case, which might have stopped the BMW even without a Jag around it.
My first car phone was a Motorola- a huge box bolted under the passenger seat.
On hols in Normandy (1984 D-Day anniversary), I was surprised to find I could use the cells in the Channel Islands from the Cotentin peninsula.
A couple of days later I was amazed to find that I had good reception round the northern beaches, using cells in the Isle of Wight.
I did some testing for a hand-held test equipment manufacturer in the mid '80s.
One of their sales reps had turned up at a potential customer's factory to demonstrate an instrument to a very disinterested manager. Part of his sales pitch emphasized the robustness of the instrument, which was one of its main selling points.
The manager stopped him at that point, "What do you mean by robust?"
Their rep led the manager to an adjacent loading bay and threw the unit across the factory yard, where it bounced off a wall and landed in a puddle, without noticeable effect.
He said afterwards that he had half expected the unit to shatter into a million pieces, but it was the only way he could think of to get the order.
My parents were once buying some china for a restaurant. The salesman said that it was extra tough (Steelite brand IIRC) and to prove it he skimmed the plates across the warehouse floor the way you would skip a pebble across a lake. They survived without a scratch.
They didn't survive quite so well when my dad dropped a trayload on a quarry-tiled floor, though...
A mate worked as a builder some years ago. Always bought the cheapest mobile phones because they usually died after being dropped into cement.
He went to a computer show where a company sold a mobile phone that was supposed to be indestructible. He reasonably assumed “indestructible” means indestructible. He took a phone and just smacked it on a table as hard as he could. It broke. He said “this one didn’t work, can I have another one? “ They refused -:).
I once bought a set of lifetime warrantied drill bits from a vendor at the yearly Ideal Home exhibition. When one, inevitably, broke I checked the warranty and found that you had to send the broken bit back, and pay 5 quid P&P to get it replaced - really not worth it. Imagine the vendors surprise, and dark mutterings, when I returned to his stand a year later and asked the broken bit to be replaced, obviously no P&P required. He grudgingly opened up a new set to give me the replacement. I think it actually worked in his favour, as a few punters floating around the stand saw the exchange and it seemed to influence subsequent purchases.
A story courtesy of a contractor I used to do the odd job for.
He was working as a supervisor on a house build. Nearly three million bucks for the house alone, plus another million-five spread across the 15 acre site. A tennis court. A full sized basketball court.
Then one day he had the project's general contractor out, checking this and that, and the fellow lost his laptop somewhere. He was confident it hadn't been stolen, what with the only people on site being a concrete crew doing the slab for the six car garage, but he couldn't find the damned thing anywhere.
My buddy resorts to making the GC retrace his steps. He'd made some measurements to double check the landscaping, and he'd updated the notes in the laptop for tree selection because it was rather more sunny than expected. Then he poked at the some of the in-progress drywall, to make sure it was on schedule. Finally, he'd gone to have a peek at the sub-floor wiring and rebar in place for the garage pour before knocking off for lunch.
They found his measuring wheel next to what used to be a hole in the ground. They'd poured that section of the garage while he was at lunch.
Yeah. :/
And all his emails, since the beginning of time, were on it and no where else.
He did get it back, but it cost nearly $30,000 and delayed the rest of the pour for nearly a week.
Setting: Plymouth, Massachusetts, USA, Fourth of July parade, 1997 -- hot as blazes plus ocean humidity (not normal for some 'Muricans). I was in a visiting high (secondary) school marching band from the American "Midwest"; I played the almost-as-heavy-as-a-tuba xylophone that year.
In the very middle of the longest parade I can remember, the whole thing comes to a halt. We stand at attention for a good 5 minutes, then "parade rest" (still in marching positions), then were allowed to break ranks. Most of us (all of the drumline) set down our instruments and found shade on the sides of the street. I was still holding my xylophone mallets, standing near the director while he chatted with the locals.
And then a mallet slipped out of my hand... right down into a storm drain, just out of reach.
I had no spares on hand, none in our equipment trailer, and probably none even back home. I had a parade to finish and more in July and August.
After a few minutes of wondering what to do, a couple strong local guys grabbed the grate and lifted it right out. I was able to reach the mallet -- not even dirty.
The parade continued not long after, and boy I was glad when that deathmarch ended.
I have been wary about storm drains ever since (> 25 years on), especially in parking lots when holding car keys.
I would have asked the customer his phone's number and attempted to call it. :)
"See it's still working... The concrete is your problem."
The Nokia analogue (AMPS) phones even in mid 1990s were pretty robust by today's standards although I suspect some today's larger smart phones come close in weight to my old Nokia-638 with the standard battery.
Quite odd to recall these phones didn't even do text (sms) just make and receive voice calls - been pretty much downhill since. :)
(I still have the same number but with with the AMPS (016) prefix replaced with the GSM digital prefix (04xx))
The only time I worked for a mobile phone company was back in the latter half of the 90's doing customer support for One2One
I had a reputation amongst my managers for going above and beyond to resolve customer issues... and turned down promotions to supervisor many times (because it was a dead ened job I new I wouldn't stick around for)
But one day... the funniest CS call I ever had was when a man with a thick Jamaican accent called to unblock his phone by paying his bill. I said I'd be back in a minute as I processed the payment and put the caller on mute.
He must have thought I'd put him on hold.
Because about 5 seconds later... he said in the thickest of accents to some one with him... So (teeth sucking)... you gonna gimme a blow job tonight den!!
It took me about a minute to compose myself... whilst my co-workers around me were wondering why I was almost crying with laughter.
Then are others... like the woman who was in the bath and getting a poor signal and giving me details of how she had to get out, soaking wet and wander around the flat naked trying to find a better signal...
One of the "features' of the old GPO Trimphones that people weren't aware of was that the microphone wasn't in the mouthpiece. It was half way up the handset, and connected to the mouthpiece by a thin tube.
As a consequence, if you put your hand over the mouthpiece while making a comment to someone near you, the person on the other end of the call could still hear you.
This reminds me of working in a small Blockbuster store (one that was converted from a Ritz Video store, for those that remember them).
Our little store had no air con, and no openable windows out the back, We did have a back door, and a front (that was obviously open when the shop was). The job involved a *lot* of physical work, so we got hot. We also sweated a lot.
As such, when it was hot out, we often opened the back door and left a fan near it, so we could get some sort of airflow.
One day, I was working late, on my own, and all of a sudden, a massive cop (at least 6'5") appeared behind me when I was tidying up the counter.. He apologised and explained that he'd just walked in though our back door, and I really shouldn't leave it open.
Apparently someone had pulled out a shotgun at two of our local stores and threatened the staff.
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