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January 22, 2000

Jungle Book

It is back; my computer is sitting meekly on my desktop doing its job. It is feeling rather sheepish I am sure. You see it behaved beautifully in front of the Repair Guy, one week, dozens of telephone calls, two trips to the Authorized Service Dealer and one service charge later. I am not pleased with the Warranty Center. The technician I talked to at the Warranty Center knew that the computer had booted and advised that it should go in for servicing. The Authorized Service Dealer booted it several times (which we knew would happen) and declared it fit and sound. Based on the fact that the computer booted at startup it was deemed "no fault found". They didn't look at anything else; they didn't find anything else. A minimal service charge therefore applied, which I had to pay. The hard drive is still dying, now I know that it will have to fail completely before the warranty can be invoked.

My next call was to the Warranty Center. A friendly young man eventually connected at the other end of the line. I explained that I was unhappy that I had been advised by the technician to take the computer in when it should have been obvious to him that "no fault found" would be the likely outcome based on what I had told him. The friendly young man explained that diagnosing problems over the phone could never be guaranteed. I told him that it doesn't take a lot of skill to tell a customer that if the computer starts up sitting on their desk, and it does it again at the shop, it will be a "no fault found" visit and a service charge will have to be paid. This is not rocket science. He was very sorry but he could not help me. My next step is to write the company with documentation and suggest that it would be in the best interest of customer service relations to reimburse my money, instruct their technicians to exercise a minimum of thoroughness and offer me an apology. I have an active fantasy life.

Yesterday was a day to forget. I was off to a bad start first thing in the morning. I drink a lot of water in a day. I use a Brita water jug. It was missing. After searching for nearly an hour, it was nowhere to be found. GRRRRRRR... The next event was the call to pick up my computer and the resulting service charge issue (see above). GRRRRRRR... Then, as I had just finished reconnecting the computer the telephone rang. I had forgotten a specialist appointment and they were calling to remind me. I made it, but late. This inconveniences the people at the specialist office; I don't like doing it. GRRRRRRR... Three a day that is my way, usually frustrations and the like come in threes.

At 3:00 p.m. this afternoon our home became the center of activity for "The Teenager" and her friends. They arrived in twos. The music has been loud. Every so often the laughter drowns out all other sound in the house. She made dinner for two of the boys who had to leave early for hockey practice. From time to time they congregate around the computers, laughing while they talk to each other on the chat lines and surfing the web as a group. They are all good kids. It is like being in an exotic noisy jungle with bright parrots in the trees. At least it is not humid and there are no mosquitoes.