Top 20 Stupid Client Quotes

I have a part-time business doing wedding photography. It certainly has plenty of clientcopia moments. One clueless bride called during the middle of summer to discuss plans for her wedding in early spring of the next year. Her: I want to get married on XYZ golf course, on top of the big hill so we get a fabulous view of the sunset. Me: Sounds great! But what time is the ceremony and do you have any alternate plans in case of rain? Her: The ceremony starts at 7:30pm and, well, I don't have any plans in case it rains. Hopefully it will be a nice sunny day but if not, we'll just wing it. Me: Well, at 7:30pm it will already be dark by then so you won't see the sunset. Her: sure it will, it's 8:00pm right now and it's still light outside. Me: Yes, but it's JUNE right now and it's still light much later than it will be in early March. Also if it does start raining during the ceremony, the club house is over one-half mile away and you'll have to reserve it months in advance. Her: I don't think you'll be able to do my wedding. I really need someone who isn't so negative. Bye! She's planning to have 150+ people standing outside in the dark with a fair potential for rain during March. And if it does rain there is no place to suddenly take refuge, plus they don't have enough golf carts to haul 150+ people anywhere at one time! Maybe she'll hire somebody 'more positive' so her whole day goes smashingly well...

I was asked by a family friend to edit a photo. Attached in the email she sent was an image of the shoulder and cheek of a man. She wanted me to "un-crop" the photo so she could see his whole face. Claiming she messed up when she took it. Realizing that she had no grasp on photo manipulation I decided to have a bit of fun. I went online and found a similarly lit photo of a man and pasted it in, then sent her the result. The next day she phoned "Oh my god, who is that? I took this at a party I was having but I don't remember him being there! Maybe I sent you the wrong photo." After I told her what I did, she claimed "You're not very good at this then, because it looks nothing like him."

I work for a company who does mobile xrays. Nurses from nursing homes, assisted living and other facilities without their own xray equipment call us to order xrays for their patients. Once we get the order, we send out a technician to come do the exams. Mind you, we service the entire midwest U.S. One day I get a call from a very impatient nurse: her: Hi, I need an xray done stat me: Ok Ma'am, may I have your facility account number? (So I know who they are and where they are calling from) her: I need this xray stat, why do you need all this information? Just come quick okay? *click* me: surrreee.... be right there

For some reason, people do not hear things that are contrary to what they want to hear. Maybe it's the 'Donald Trump' syndrome. I was called by a user in a department who said their PC was completely dead. She asked how quickly it could be replaced because it was vital to getting her work done. Although this is true of many users, I gave her an unpleasant answer. Me: We don't have any spare PCs right now so it will take about two days, probably Wednesday, to get the parts needed to fix your computer. Her: I don't have two days. Can't you understand I am DEAD IN THE WATER!! Me: sorry but I don't have anything that works to use as a loaner. Our budget has been cut so we have no spares and at the moment no spare parts for your PC. I'll have to order the parts... Sound of her slamming down the telephone. My joy was cut short when her boss called just a few minutes later. Him: I just spoke to Lisa and she is in tears! Her PC is dead and somehow you don't want to help her?! Me: No, we do not have any spare PCs and I don't have the spare parts to fix her machine. It will take time to get the parts but as soon as they come in, I'll personally come down to her office and... Him: That's not good enough! Her work is vital to the company! Now when will you have her PC working? Me: Wednesday morning. Him: That's what I need to hear. Maybe the managers undergo some kind of lobotomy that makes such events make sense ... in their own mind. The parts came in Wednesday morning and I stopped by and fixed Lisa's PC. Her vital task? A one-page handout in MS Word for the departmental picnic. ;~)

Boss- Can't you just click a button and have all of our inventory up for sale on eBay? Me- No. Boss- Why not? Me- Because it doesn't work that way, our database is not formatted correctly to import into eBay. Boss- Call eBay and tell them to change it.

From 1980 to 1983 I worked as a so-called systems engineer (they had to stop calling us that) in the HP3000 minicomputer tech-support group. One day when I was on PICS (Phone-In Consulting Service) duty I got a call from a major customer system manager whose HP3000 had just crashed. After getting the usual preliminary information about the system involved, I asked,"So have you taken a dump? There was long silence. After a minute the sysmgr replied suspiciously, "Ye-e-sss, but what does that have to do with anything?" "No no," I replied, trying to stifle my laughter, "a CORE dump." "Ohhhh," he said in obvious relief, "a CORE dump. Yes, I took a core dump!" And so the discussion continued. M. E. Kabay, PhD, CISSMP-ISSMP Assoc Prof Information Assurance Norwich University

A while back i was working in a public sector IT department with around 150 staff. One day a director calls up the head of IT and rips into him complaining about a call he had just had with the support team. Apparently they where too technical for him to understand and they where using far to many technical acronyms. In a fit of rage the head of IT sent a group email around to the whole department ripping into all of us (not just the support team) about how we should respect our clients and not use a single acronym in any communication from this moment on. This email was about 3 pages long and must have said "no acronyms" at least 20 times throught out. Not 10 minutes later the same head of department sent a group email around to all 150 staff full of acronyms. Just as i was contemplating the irony of this chain of events a guy a few desks over sent a response. His response was "could you please explain your acronyms". He is my new hero.

Not a quote, but a story which needs to be told. I used to work as a computer technician in a college town. One day I was sent out to a customer's home to fix her computer. I get lost on the way (her directions were wrong) and ended up being 5 minutes late. I knocked on her door, and an old woman answered the door with a scowl on her face, and she shouted "You're 5 minutes late! You better not be charging me for those 5 minutes." I apologize, and assure her, those 5 minutes were "free", and she lets me in. The first thing I notice is the fog. There was so much cigarette smoke in the house, that you could hardly see 10 feet in front of you. I start coughing, and she asks me if smoke bothered me, and I said it does, and she looks at me, lights a cigarette and says, "Oh, because I'm smoking." The next 2 hours passed as the most uncomfortable of my life, and after I fixed her issue, and explained how it could be avoided in the future, she looks at me, and says "Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your lord and saviour?". When I told her I didn't feel comfortable discussing that with her, she refused to pay the bill. My bosses made me go back the following day to get the check after they called her, and there were 2 guys from Circuit City delivering a new TV. As I walked past them they told me that if I was going to her apartment, I should run away as fast I could. I looked at them and said "You guys don't know the half of it!"

I'm based on the USA's west coast. My location is noted on my website. A gentleman told me he is interested in my webdesign services and would like to discuss it on the phone. Me: Let's schedule a mutually convenient time to talk. Client: I'm American, but living overseas. There's a 13-hour time difference between us, which means there's about a 3-hour window of time that would probably work for both of us. How about 11am your time? Me: OK. Where are you based? Client: I don't want to divulge that information. Me: OK, are you sure you have time time difference figured correctly? Should we double check that? Client: No. I have it right. Me: Well, OK, I'll talk to you at 11am my time on Monday then. Monday morning goes by...nothing. Client (irate, in afternoon, by email): I called you but you didn't pick up! Where the hell were you? I want to pay you good money to design a site for me, but you didn't care enough to keep our appointment!!! What the hell!!! Me: I was in the office beginning at 9am; but the phone never rang. Do you have the correct phone number for me? Client: Yes! You blew me off! Me (confused & checking caller ID): Ah! My caller ID shows you called me at 8am, well before I got into the office. Our appointment was for 11. Client: I called at 11 your time. Me: No, I am in the Pacific Time Zone, and you called at 8am my time. Client: Well, all my friends live on the East Coast. It was at 11 their time! Me: OK, would you like to call me now, or schedule another time to discuss your new website? Client: No. Please cancel plans for the site. You are too hard to reach!!

My first real job after university was learning software support for an engineering company. We had a pretty lax software policy there, since we were running Windows 98 and it was pretty impossible to lock down. A lot of people had games and demos on their PCs - and it was 'overlooked' as long as it didn't interfere with work. Engineer: I need you to come and find out why this communications device isn't working? I can't interrogate these controllers. IT/Support: Sure - have you made any changes to configuration or anything since it was working? Engineer: No - its just not connecting anymore. IT/Support: Fine. *4 hours of trawling through the configuration of Windows and the engineering software, confirming that the hardware is all functioning by connecting up to other computers, and getting generally frustrated with the engineer flapping about* IT/Support: Hmm... was this controller in the installed devices? Engineer: Oh, that... it's just a game controller so we can play some game. IT/Support: When did you install that? Engineer: Yesterday - it's a fun game. IT/Support: So, you installed it between when the comms device worked and didn't work on this PC. Engineer: Yeah. IT/Support: So, when I asked did you change anything? Engineer: Oh, yeah - but its not even plugged in right now, so how would that break it? IT/Support: ach *uninstalls software, removing the lockout it creates on the comms port*

My first position at my company was a bug fixer for a web-based data analysis tool. You could use a database to create tabular reports that you could interact with, analyze (obviously), and export to HTML or PDF. I kept getting small questions from a support engineer such as: Support: What is the default size of the font when exporting to PDF? Me: 8 pt. Why do you ask? Support: Oh, the customer was just wondering. * later * Support: How is the font scaling determined when fitting a report to a single PDF page? Me: 8 pt times the width or height of the PDF page divided by the width or height of the report at 100% zoom, using the largest dimension (width or height). Why do you ask? Support: The customer just wanted me to ask. I finally got a bug sent to me to fix in which the font was too small when exporting his report to PDF with the option chosen to fit it to a single page. I looked into the bug, set up the user's environment, and was amazed to realize that their tabular report contained 20 or so columns and 50,000+ rows, so over 100,000 cells in this report that they wanted shown on one page. I exported it to PDF and couldn't read any text until I was extremely zoomed in. I couldn't see how the user would have used this single-page PDF that they wanted enough to raise a bug for. I tried printing it, and the values were small pixelated blotches, so printing wasn't their use case. Maybe they wanted to have a concise reference for some reason? After some more questioning, it turned out that they truly wanted to view the report on a single page and have it be legible. That was the only bug I was able to close with the resolution: "Logical." And what was the scaled font size according to that equation I sent Support? 0.00072 pt

(all company names and employee names changed to protect the innocent... or well in the customers case... the guilty) This one will take some explaining but is well worth the read if you ask me. I was working as a phone technician for Blorchizon, so for those of you in the know... we get the weirdest of the weird. I had moved up through the ranks and had become a tier 3 agent, handling only the most difficult of issues. One fine day everything was going normal, customers with weird throughput issues, customers in areas with recent flooding and more, when this lovely issue occurred. A tier 2 agent had been working on this call for about 20 minutes and could not isolate the issue. The call had been moved up to them after 10 minutes on the front lines. Needless to say, they contacted me and described that the customer wasn't getting any internet access and nothing they did was changing the issue. So I told the agent to transfer the call to me and this is what transpired: Me: Thank you for holding, my name is Jed with Blorchizon advanced support. How can I help you? customer: Hi Jed, my name is Joe and that last guy was really nice, but we can't fix my issue! Me: I'm aware of that Joe and I'm really sorry. It seems like something out of the ordinary is going on here and it is my job to find it and get you back up and running. Joe: Excellent... see I have a top of the line computer and it is new, so I know it isn't the computer. It has to be your service. Me: We'll see Joe. At this point, I proceeded through basic troubleshooting to see how well he would listen. This guy gave me all the correct answers to anything I asked. For example, I'd direct him to the Control Panel and then into the TCP/IP stack and he'd tell me everything was there exactly as it was supposed to be. So we continued: Me: Joe, I have to admit this is really strange, everything seems to be exactly how it is supposed to be and you should be getting internet access. Joe: Yep! That is what I've been saying. You know this all started... Joe was disconnected right there. At first I thought to myself... Sweet! It works now, no more issue. However it was our policy to try and contact customers back if they were disconnected to make sure everything was ok. So I grab the number from my caller ID and call back. This is what I got: *ring* Lady: Thank you for calling Happy Meadows Mental Hospital, how can I help you. Me: Um..... maybe I dialed the wrong number, but do you have a Joe there? Lady: Well... nobody on staff here is named Joe. We do have a patient named Joe. Are you a relative? Me: Uh... no ma'am I'm with Blorchizon Internet. Joe and I were on the phone, apparently he is having trouble with his internet. Lady: That isn't possible sir! He doesn't have a computer, and we don't have internet access in our rooms. Me: O....K..... Lady: *urgent voice* I better go check on him! I sat on hold for a few minutes, because now I was intrigued. Eventually the lady came back. Lady: I'm very very sorry sir. Joe had gotten a hold of a newspaper and had found advertisements for Smell Computers and for Blorchizon DSL. He has some boxes set up on his desk and thinks it is his computer. Me: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *yes I really laughed on the phone* After a few minutes of explaining the issue to this woman, stating that Joe had given me all of the answers I needed for everything, she told me that Joe was very smart and had probably learned all the answers to give when asked those questions by calling previously. I checked the note system we had, and sure enough Joe had been calling in since 3:00am that day and had talked to about 30 technicians. I can still imagine it to this day, a guy sitting in a hospital gown in front of a bunch of cardboard boxes on the phone trying to get his internet working... absolutely fantastic. Thought I'd share.

Just got a call from a female customer for whom I recently configured remote desktop access to one of our terminal servers (on a desktop computer, connected directly to the dsl modem via cat 5 cable). She demanded that I uninstall the connection. me - "Shure, I can do that, but may I ask why?" her - "Both me and my husband are overly sensible to electric-what-you-call-it - this wireless thing you installed is making us ill!" me - "But there isn't any wireless equipment in your house, it's just a piece of softw..." her - cutting me off - "Yes! There is, you installed it, and ever since you where here, we both feel that the power coming from the computer has been much greater! Take it off!"

I was working on a new and cheaply manufactured pc that a customer had sent in for us to load and configure our software on it. The owner of the company happened to walk in. I showed him how the customer had sent us a new pc that he obviously never even tested (he was supposed to) because the keyboard's connector could not fit through the opening on the back of the computer to plug into the corresponding port . The boss puffed his chest and explained that I had to get a Dremel and drill out the hole on the back plate of the computer so the connector could be slipped through and then be plugged into that port. He further explained that it was vital that I lay the computer on its side when I drill out the hole, otherwise the metal dust produced by the drilling operation would destroy the components inside the pc. Once the hole was big enough, I must use a high powered vacuum cleaner to suck out the metal particles. After this lecture on Moron Boss Dynamics, I waved one of my techs over and explained what the boss said. After he raised one eyebrow in amazement, I grabbed a screwdriver and loosened the large and plainly visible screw that fastened one of several metal plates to the base plate that served as the back of the computer. I moved the that covering plate over about one-half inch, until it was no longer blocking the port.

I was making a website template for a guy, and he showed me a template online that he wanted it to look like. So I made it roughly similar with a few of my own creative tweaks. He says, "No, it needs to look more like the one I showed you." Alright. So I copied the color scheme and redid the logo to be near-exact, but obviously different from the template he showed me. "No, it isn't what I want. I showed you how I wanted it to look!" He yelled. So I went to the website and bought the template he showed me for $20. Then I gave it to him, as-is, and he says, "Thanks" I was paid $250 for this job. I love freelancing for dumb people.

Another case of people only hearing what they want to hear... One of the managers at work is having problems with our telephone system. To reconfigure their department's problems meant the telephone system would have to be rebooted and that took 30 minutes most of the time. When discussing this, the bright manager asked if we could also move some telephone connections around in her area and we quickly agreed. On the day in question, everyone in her area had gotten an e-mail discussing the telephone outage. The manager, bless her soul, went around to all 40+ employees reminding them of the downtime and urging them to do non-telephone work. She then went to her receptionist and told her the telephone guys would be placing some ladders right outside her door to move some of the wiring ... *while* the phone system was down. The receptionist apparently ignored the e-mail, the personal visit and even the warning about the guys with ladders blocking her doorway. During the outage and while the work was going smoothly, the receptionist was heard to yell: "Somebody get these ladders out of the way! My phone isn't working and I've got a lot of important calls to make!!!" When I saw the manager standing not far from the receptionist's office, she and I looked at each other, rolled our eyes in unison, and quickly sped away while leaving the receptionist trapped and unable to communicate (other than yelling).

I worked for a small housing financing company as a communications specialist. One of my responsibilities was to manage the development of new and the maintenance of existing content on the firm's Web site. I had been working on a new area of the site, where Joe Public could go to locate special-needs housing units (apartments, mostly). As I had prepared the pages on the dev server and was ready for internal "testing" for u]look and feel, etc., I had this brief conversation with my boss: Boss: I like this very much. Me: Thank you. Boss: Now I'd like to see if we can get this translated into Spanish as there is a great need to be filled among the Hispanic community here. Me: Sure, that's a good idea. But have you considered first hiring one or two Customer Service Reps to take calls in Spanish? Boss: *silence* Me: I'll go and get this ready for "go live" then.

Him: "You said your sites were 'search-engine friendly' but I'm not #1 in Google yet! And no one has bought anything from my web store!" Me: "Well, against my advice, you asked me to remove your Paypal-integrated webstore and replace with a .doc downloadable order form, which you expect people to mail to you along with a check. Also you haven't updated once since I sent you extensive documentation about how to log in and create new pages with the WYSIWYG editor. And you told me you didn't want search engine optimization because $300 was too much to pay for it. What keywords were you interested in anyway?" Him: "I thought you were going to put buss [sic] words on the site! How many words are on the site, anyway?" Me: ........

I owned a software company and was the chief scientist. If a support person had a call they couldn't handle, they escalated until it got to me. The client complaint: "When we print our end-of-month reports, the printing is really faint - and all the letters and numbers are reversed." The support team went through the "old ribbon" thing (this was back in the days of fan-fold paper and matrix printers). Ribbon was fine and, anyway, that wouldn't account for the "everything reversed" problem. Three levels of support had come up empty so it got to me. I called the client and said, "Lisa, tell me again the problem." She did, virtually word-for-word. I said, "You haven't burst the reports apart yet, have you?" She said she hadn't. I said, "Turn the stack of paper around." She said, "OH, that's much better". In case you fan-fold paper was before your time, she was reading the report through the back of the very flimsy paper. All the printing was faint -- and all the letters and numbers were backward. No one could make this stuff up.

(I get a call at 7:59am with a client who is frantic because their server is totally dead and they have an office full of patients and can't access charts or xrays) Client: So I came in this morning and the server was working fine, I sat down to read the newspaper, I heard this awful grinding noise and then all of a sudden the server stopped working. Me: So you actually checked the server this morning before you called? Did you see any error messages? Client: No I just set down my newspaper and coffee and started to read before the staff showed up and now the server isn't working. Me: (puzzled look) Is your server in the breakroom where you were reading the newspaper? Client: Well, yes. Me: And you put down your newspaper and coffee...on top of the server? Client:... Me: Because if that's the case its possible... Client: Look, I only spilled a little through the vent! Maybe an ounce, tops. Is this covered by my warranty?