<story><title>Show HN: Fun tool that cut my family and friends tech support time in half</title><url>http://itsupport.grammable.me/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>koliber</author><text>Regarding the &amp;quot;is it plugged in?&amp;quot; question. A great anecdote I heard was that the support person on the phone asked if the power plug was clean. The user was confused. The support person told them to unplug it, blow the dust out of the holes, and plug it back in. This fixed the problem!&lt;p&gt;The issue was that the power plug was in the socket, but too loose to connect. Somehow, the support person figured this was the case (prior experience?) and knew that if he asked &amp;quot;is it plugged in?&amp;quot; he would get a &amp;quot;yes&amp;quot;. Taking the power plug out and putting it back in ensured that it would be in properly. But just asking the person to do that can be faced with push-back or even a lie that they did it (since the power plug &lt;i&gt;obviously&lt;/i&gt; was already connected).&lt;p&gt;I always chuckled at the story but did not think it was true. I worked tech support while attending university. One time, I had an on-site where the monitor just stopped working. We went through the standard question on the phone, including asking if it is plugged in, and of course it was. Could not get it fixed over the phone. Once on-site, it turned out it was a loose power cable.&lt;p&gt;I could have avoided an on-site had I only asked them to blow the dust out of the power cable. Maybe this should be added to the questionnaire.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>okreallywtf</author><text>I used to work as an installer for a wireless-isp and we supported some very rural areas as well as an urban area. I typically did the urban area but I grew up in one of the very rural areas so I could appreciate how badly people wanted their internets out there.&lt;p&gt;At one point I had to service some of the rural areas when the installer for that area quit and had one service request that I was &lt;i&gt;sure&lt;/i&gt; would be fixed by a simple power cycle but wasn&amp;#x27;t. &amp;quot;Are you sure you unplugged the right thing?&amp;quot; I asked, and &amp;quot;If I come all the way out there and power cycle it and it works I&amp;#x27;ll have to charge you, do you understand?&amp;quot; I warned, he understood but wasn&amp;#x27;t worried because he knew that wasn&amp;#x27;t it.&lt;p&gt;After a nearly 2 hour drive out into the utter boondocks, I go inside and check the POE injector, unplug it and plug it back in. 20 seconds later I check his internet through his own router: golden (or as golden as you can be over a waverider 900Mhz link). He had just been unplugging his own router and plugging it back in over and over. In retrospect I could have made him physically trace the power cord but there was still a good 10% chance the unit actually had a problem.&lt;p&gt;People in the rural areas were really nice about everything though, being on 56k until 2010 makes you appreciate whatever broadband you can get. He just laughed and got his checkbook, in the city people complained when you told them the bill an hour after telling them what the charge would be over the phone.</text></comment>
<story><title>Show HN: Fun tool that cut my family and friends tech support time in half</title><url>http://itsupport.grammable.me/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>koliber</author><text>Regarding the &amp;quot;is it plugged in?&amp;quot; question. A great anecdote I heard was that the support person on the phone asked if the power plug was clean. The user was confused. The support person told them to unplug it, blow the dust out of the holes, and plug it back in. This fixed the problem!&lt;p&gt;The issue was that the power plug was in the socket, but too loose to connect. Somehow, the support person figured this was the case (prior experience?) and knew that if he asked &amp;quot;is it plugged in?&amp;quot; he would get a &amp;quot;yes&amp;quot;. Taking the power plug out and putting it back in ensured that it would be in properly. But just asking the person to do that can be faced with push-back or even a lie that they did it (since the power plug &lt;i&gt;obviously&lt;/i&gt; was already connected).&lt;p&gt;I always chuckled at the story but did not think it was true. I worked tech support while attending university. One time, I had an on-site where the monitor just stopped working. We went through the standard question on the phone, including asking if it is plugged in, and of course it was. Could not get it fixed over the phone. Once on-site, it turned out it was a loose power cable.&lt;p&gt;I could have avoided an on-site had I only asked them to blow the dust out of the power cable. Maybe this should be added to the questionnaire.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>StavrosK</author><text>Apple did that on the iPod manuals. They wouldn&amp;#x27;t say &amp;quot;make sure the lock button is unlocked&amp;quot; (because duh, of course it&amp;#x27;s unlocked), they would say &amp;quot;turn the button to the lock and then the unlock position&amp;quot;.</text></comment>