And another thing...

Sp p p p p p it it out!

Five minutes to the end of my shift. The phone rings, my last call.

"Thank you for calling the Undisclosed Customer Service Center� my name is blah blah blah..."

I ask the customer for his first and last name.

"Em em em em em em em an an n n n n n uel K k k k k k k k k k k k k ...."
Holy shit! Please tell me the problem is with the phone.

Ok, let's go at this another way. "Could you spell that for me?" He spells it perfectly without stuttering. The phone number comes out flawlessly too. Perhaps it is a sporatic thing.

"And how can I help you tonight, Emanuel?"

No such luck. This man take 5 minutes to spit out that his server is hanging and for the life of me I cannot fathom how I know that is what he said. But when he painfully spit out "do you know what I mean" I paraphrased and he said, quite baffled, "Yes!"

Unfortunately, I would not be the person helping him solve this problem. And he would most likely be talking to someone in India. I cringed thinking about his immediate future.

"Is this causing company wide work stoppage, Emanuel?"

"Y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y e s s s s s yes."

Good Lord! This man is in charge of getting tech support for a company that is losing money hand over fist. Now, I don't think this man has just this second developed this stutter, so what possessed him to call me. For the same reason I do not attempt brain surgery, this man should not be calling in for phone support.

By the time we got to the payment options it was 25 minutes later (typical call takes 4-5 minutes) and I was not going to suffer another minute, by this time I was banging my head on the desk.

"Your in luck, Emanuel, the tool I use to process credit card charges just went down....blah blah blah it's free." Actually I hit the little X to close the window, but that is our little secret.

The sad part is, the techs in India, will not even try and help him. They will figure out a way to pass him around till he gives up. That is their MO.