In our IT store had a few repeat timewaster customers. One in particular though I completely lost patience with. This young man just did not get things. No matter how many times or different ways we explained it. He would keep asking the same question over and over again, I believe some people do this deliberately, it’s a tactic to wear people down until they just give you what you want to get you to go away. Or they don’t like or won’t take no for an answer on principle. This kid did not have that spark, whether the problem was technical or procedural or policy we could explain endlessly why he couldn’t have what he wanted and the only thing he could comprehend was that… he didn’t have what he wanted. It wasn’t even being offended that he was told “no”, it was simply he had a problem, which was very much his problem, and it still wasn’t solved.
So naturally it becomes my responsibility to help with his brilliant new business idea. From our previous interactions he had already lost Customer Service Voice privileges and it was straight to barely restrained disdain.
Kid: “Can you show me how to download movies and burn them to DVD without getting viruses?”
Me, already familiar with him yet still stunned by the audacity: “What? No?”
Kid: “But I don’t know how to do it and I need you to show me how”
Me: “I… you mean obtain copyrighted material through illegal channels to also illegally redistribute? For PROFIT?”
Kid: “Yes”
Me: “I’m not helping you break the law, no”
Kid: “But I don’t know how to do it”
Me: “This isn’t something I’m going to help you with, I’m not going to be complicit in this”
Kid: “But you’re a computer shop I thought you would know how to do this”
Me, stupidly: “Yeah but I’m not going to show you”
As I type this I wonder how much shorter this story could have been if I’d just said none of us knew how. But this kid would absolutely have asked us to find out, in order to teach him.
Kid: “But that means I can’t sell my DVDs”
Me: “Yes I guess it does, so is there anything ELSE you need?”
Kid: “Yeah”
Me: “…”
Kid: “I want you to help me burn movies to DVD”
I won’t bore you with the half an hour we spent going round in circles with this. You’ve all had this conversation with someone in your life. You get the idea.
Eventually he leaves. For like an hour. Then he comes back.
Kid: “I still don’t know how to burn my DVDs and I need you to help me”
Me: “I’m not going to do that for you, I told you all this earlier”
Kid: “But that means I don’t know how to do it”
Me: “Yes that’s right”
In my career I’ve found answering repeated “so won’t you do this for me” questions by agreeing with them surprisingly effective. No apology, no customer service deflection or never say no to a customer approach after the third or fourth orbit on the merry go round. “So I can’t have what I want?” Yes you are correct, I’m glad we are in agreement and we have arrived at this conclusion together.
Kid: “How am I going to sell DVDs then?”
Goddamnit. That usually works.
Me: “I don’t know how many times I have to say this. I’m not helping you break the law”
Kid: “What if you just show me the burning DVDs bit?”
Me: “You’ve already told me what you plan to do with it. I’m not getting involved”
Kid: “I thought you’d know how to do this”
I honestly don’t think he’s bright enough to question my expertise to manipulate me into giving him what he wants. He’s just stumbled dumbly into insulting me.
Me: “Look we are a computer sales and repair shop. We’re not a training center. We sell IT equipment. If you have a problem with your computer you pay us to fix it. We do not teach people how to use their computer, it is not a service we provide”
Kid: “Oh I can pay you!”
MOTHERFU… of god…
Me: “NOT. A. Service. We. Provide.”
Eventually he leaves again. Half an hour later he’s back again?!
Kid: “The guys in the shop nearby (our competitor) says I won’t get viruses if I install linus”
Me: “You mean Linux”
WHY, WHY DID I ADMIT TO KNOWING WHAT HE MEANT?
Kid: “He said you don’t get viruses on linus”
Me: “Ok”
Kid: “So can you show me how to do it on linus?”
Me: “Lin… No, I’ve already told you countless times I’m not going to teach you how to break the law”
Kid: “But they said it would be better to do it on linus because you get loads of viruses from porn sites”
Me: “P… PORN?? The movies you want to sell are PORN??”
Kid: “Yeah so I can sell them…”
Me: “I AM NOT TEACHING YOU TO BREAK THE LAW AND I AM NOT DISCUSSING PORNOGRAPHY WITH YOU”
Skip several more repetitions of this argument I won’t bore you with verbatim.
Me, finally: “Look we’re going round in circles. The answer is NO. You’ve wasted nearly two hours of my time and I’m not entertaining this any more”
Kid: “But the other guys said…”
Me: “THEN GO BACK TO THEM. I AM NOT GOING TO HELP YOU WITH THIS, OR NOW WITH ANYTHING ELSE. IF THEY SAID THEY KNOW “linus” GET THEM TO DO IT FOR YOU. GET OUT OF HERE, I’M REFUSING YOU SERVICE” x3 rounds of raised voices.
Finally he leaves, crossing the road looking back over his shoulder at me with a nasty scowl. After all these years still I remember looking away when I considered if I didn’t break eye contact, he might actually get hit by a bus and blame me for it.
He came back the next day. I simply called the boss over and went on break.
I begged the boss to ban him but he said he didn’t want to get into legal trouble for refusing to serve someone with a “mental illness”.
There are so many, many, many guides online that teach people how to do exactly that. I haven’t had to do it in years, and the last time I did it, I googled it, downloaded some software, pushed a button, and it was done. It look me longer to find my DVD burner than it took to make the DVD.
He’s baiting you, and you keep falling for it. Just say no, and nothing more.
He really wasn’t. I had to deal with him on and off for years. He wasn’t bright enough to be playing games with us or being manipulative. He simply was just rock fuck stupid.
There really are people like this. They’ll just hover around and won’t stop pestering you. They are the real life incarnation of Noober from Baldur’s Gate or Mud from Gothic.
