Why can't people just listen!

[Slayer]

I got rid of any friends I had and I don't have much to do with the family except ma and pa kettle. I do revise her ESet and Similair on occassion but we're pretty much on a barter system. I used to tutor many years ago when the Amiga was very young but I had no mind for business, I didn't believe some should charge so much for something just because they know and others don't, I still believe that but anyway, I gave up when people stopped using there machines and having valid problems which were interesting to answer and became people who haven't even taken there computers and monitors out of the BOX!

Hmmm, no one calls me because I don't know anyone LOL


All your time is your own, been like that for many years. That is why I am 45 and look 30. Think about it ;-)

 

[ShambleS1980]

Even if you do manage to fix it, the machine now appears to have magically acquired a lifetime guarantee, so that they can bring it back to you if it needs fixing again.


:double

Thats the truest thing i ever heard..

 

[AmiNeo]

I know the feeling, I get this a lot myself.

I have a friend who actually went out and bought a PC after me offering to build one for him which would have been much better and probably saved him some pennies. It was about 5 years ago now, but he ended up with a HP machine with a Celeron D and some standard graphics from PC World when he could have had a top end CORE2DUO and an SLI board with a 260GTX or a HD4870 for the same price. icard
Worst thing is every time he sees me he's like "can you come over and take a look at X for me, I need help" :double Why ask for peoples help if you don't trust them to get you a better deal on a purchase?

Some people will never learn what's good for them. :nuts:

---------- Post added at 11:30 ---------- Previous post was at 11:29 ----------

Even if you do manage to fix it, the machine now appears to have magically acquired a lifetime guarantee, so that they can bring it back to you if it needs fixing again.


:double

Thats the truest thing i ever heard..

Key thing is, charge them, even if its only a small amount... It will make them think twice about coming to you again needlessly.

 

[Harrison]

My parents always have little problems, but normally its simple things like not knowing how to do something in Word or an email not opening its attachments. My Mum however has been doing my head in with her printer. She had an old HP all-in-one that started to print a bit distorted (slightly offset angle to the paper), so she decided to buy an Epson wireless printer so she didn't need to plug it into her laptop. Ever since she can never get it to print what she sends to it. Discovered she still had the HP installed and sending the files to that instead of the Epson.

I don't mind helping them out though as they have supported me a lot over the years, I always get a free meal out of it when visiting to fix anything.

 

[Bad_Ad84]

My parents always have little problems, but normally its simple things like not knowing how to do something in Word or an email not opening its attachments. My Mum however has been doing my head in with her printer. She had an old HP all-in-one that started to print a bit distorted (slightly offset angle to the paper), so she decided to buy an Epson wireless printer so she didn't need to plug it into her laptop. Ever since she can never get it to print what she sends to it. Discovered she still had the HP installed and sending the files to that instead of the Epson.

I don't mind helping them out though as they have supported me a lot over the years, I always get a free meal out of it when visiting to fix anything.

I just installed Hamachi on their machines so I can remote desktop in or transfer files and fix stuff.

Much prefer not needing to leave my house to fix something dumb on the parents machines.

 

[ShambleS1980]

i have a huge problem charging people for my time lol..
unless it needed hardware il usualy just call it free.

I just think. any one should be able to do these things.. to me its like charging a blind person because i read out a warning notice to them.. Kind of immorrall lol.

 

[Wolfy]

Even if you do manage to fix it, the machine now appears to have magically acquired a lifetime guarantee, so that they can bring it back to you if it needs fixing again.

"But... you fixed it last time..!"

:double

I had one of these clients, old man, lonely, miserable, really not a pleasent human being, always complaining, the service was never good enough, the software (pirated) was broken (read... I installed the pc with win7+loader... he went off and pirate bayed all the warez he wanted, tried installing them but er, never put on the cracks/patches etc so it was pretty much a reinstall every other week for 3 months, every time "your machine is perfect, I have installed everything right (cs3 etc), don`t install or do anything to the system...
Low and behold 2 weeks later it would be back, complete with moaning old sod.

In the end I ran DD on his drives, gave him back a blank machine, a dvd containing windows7 and a post-it note with vague instructions... and a smile
"If you want to admin your own system, have fun"...

Miserable ******* never even offered to pay me for all my time fixing what he broke, it was all my "fault" for selling him an "inferior" system, that he had gone and purchased the parts for himself, all I did was put it together and install windows.
(phenom hexacore, 4g ram, 5x500gb drives, machine was for video transcoding)

Nowadays I have a nice client base, not much ££ but also no stress

 

[Bad_Ad84]

i have a huge problem charging people for my time lol..
unless it needed hardware il usualy just call it free.

I just think. any one should be able to do these things.. to me its like charging a blind person because i read out a warning notice to them.. Kind of immorrall lol.

I used to be like that.

Then I realised (a long time ago) people just take advantage of you. No one thinks you are doing them a favour, you often get no favours back - you are just there to be used when they see fit.

Pay me or I am not doing it. Simples. They soon realise they are better paying you than PC World. Ive had people tell me I was overpriced, then 2 hours later get a call back saying PC World tried to charge them £100 for something I quoted £40 for an hour.

 

[djos]

I used to be like that.

Then I realised (a long time ago) people just take advantage of you. No one thinks you are doing them a favour, you often get no favours back - you are just there to be used when they see fit.

Pay me or I am not doing it. Simples. They soon realise they are better paying you than PC World. Ive had people tell me I was overpriced, then 2 hours later get a call back saying PC World tried to charge them £100 for something I quoted £40 for an hour.

On the now rare occasions I agree to do IT support for friends and family, they know my requirements are a really decent feed (my wifes German friends rock at cooking) or a bottle of wine or some good beers.

 

[SaviorX]

i have a huge problem charging people for my time lol..
unless it needed hardware il usualy just call it free.

I just think. any one should be able to do these things.. to me its like charging a blind person because i read out a warning notice to them.. Kind of immorrall lol.

<shrug> everyone should be able to clean thier own house too, if they don't want to be bothered to clean it they can leave it dirty or HIRE a maid service....

likewise they can leave their computer broken or pay someone else for their time...if THEY haven't invested the time to learn how to fix it...that's their own lookout...

i ran my small business for 10 years and when i gave it up..i had nothing to show for it...why? because i routinely charged 1/3 of what i should have virtually every time...

problem is...my landlord never gave me 2/3 off....nor did the electric company ...or the phone company...or the grocery store.....

 

[Harrison]

I definitely think charging for such services is acceptable. We have spent years gaining our knowledge and they are paying for this knowledge. Something we could fix in an hour might take them a whole weekend of Googling and trial and error, and even then it might not fix it.

With friends and close family I never say it will cost anything as I know they will normally offer me something for my trouble that more than covers the time taken... so I'm fine with helping them out.

And anyone who takes the **** and expects continuous free IT support don't stay friends for long, or their emails/texts never seem to reach me.

 

[AndyLandy]

i have a huge problem charging people for my time lol..
unless it needed hardware il usualy just call it free.

I just think. any one should be able to do these things.. to me its like charging a blind person because i read out a warning notice to them.. Kind of immorrall lol.

A noble sentiment, but alas a flawed one, I feel. I really wish I could find a plumber who felt that way!



These days I only do free computer repairs for the immediate family. The last one I did for someone else was charged at £35/hour and the next one I'm putting my prices up!

 

[ShambleS1980]

probably a big reason why i dont really repair computers any more lol.
I simply cant justify "to my self" how i can make money off of it lol..

With the whole xbox thing its diferent. i can justify a small mark up on most of the hardware because if something dosent work "hard disk excetera" then i have to send it back and get it replaced.
The consoles them selfs i use mx-2 compound on. use up iso prop cleaning them.
have invested in mod chips which i had to buy in bulk. kaynar wire excetera.
so i can actualy justify a small % proffit here and there on those because at the very least i have to get more stuff like solder, and make sure i can cover return postage excetera..

one thing is starting to get at me now though..
out of all the boxes i have done i have 1 woman.. She destroys xboxes..
she contacted me because she had previously gotten 2 xboxes els where which she managed to kill in a week..
the 1st one i sent her she killed it.
so i replaced it. Then she managed to ruin that one. so i fixed it.. "no idea what she does to these things."
Im covering the delivery and return charges because i never had any one like this before..

I just said F it. replaced the hard disk. the psu. all the wires. all thc heat sinks and clips, replaced the fan.
tested the damn thing for 24 hours with a game running. then 24 hours playing films.
The system is solid.

But something tells me shes going to send it back again in a month or so..

Now what i really want to know. is why she thinks i have a life time guarantee on xboxes i sell, when they never had that from new.

any way this was the last time.
I even sent her a new hard disk to fix her broken xbox when she bought one from me for free..
I think that was a green light for "take advantage"

i should take note of serial numbers and stuff on the components. its way to easy to replace a psu with a faulty one. and then send the dumb thing back to me..
I cant remember what psu or hard disk i installed in to which xbox.

Ok thats turned in to a rant il shut up.icard

 

[Wolfy]

<3 new clients...
30 a week (covers dogs), lift a week for shopping, take dogs into office, get fed!!!

Actually feel appreciated

When you get the serial system breaker it can really really drain all passion for the art the is IT!

Shambles, I`d tell her no more kit, sorry, no other client has these problems and just leave it there, why the hell are you going to personal expense for someone elses stupidity and greed?

 

[AmiNeo]

i have a huge problem charging people for my time lol..
unless it needed hardware il usualy just call it free.

I just think. any one should be able to do these things.. to me its like charging a blind person because i read out a warning notice to them.. Kind of immorrall lol.

I'm exactly the same, I've even gone put of pocket to help people out but don't you find people take advantage a bit? I'm constantly harassed these days by 'friends' who I never hear from unless something's up with their computers.

I'm feeling the need to become more 'professional' about how I help some people. A line has to be drawn somewhere

 

[Wolfy]

Just learning to say "No... Sorry, I cannot help you with that.." was the most proffessional move I made...

 

[johnim]

+1 to amineos comment as i get that too and need to move on

 

[slk486]

Most people actually understand that "it's not because I don't want to help you specifically, but I simply can't and won't spend all my time with other peoples computer problems, so no, I can't help you".

And if they don't? Sod 'em

 

[cosmicfrog]

I`ve stoped worrieing about it and let em get on after all if they want a difficult life and not take advantage of other ppls experience thats up to them so when they come back crying its the old I told you so but you thought ya know better and not a lot off ppl can handle been told that.

"But... you fixed it last time..!"

I get/got similar, you built it so u must know whats in it, yep I might have done when I built it but that was years ago and I`ve done stuff since then.

Now I just keep my mouth shut and only help ppl who really appreciate what you do for them even if its just the time you spend on the problem.

 

[DutchinUSA]

@ Shambles

Next time she breaks it just tell her no more or give her her money back, it's not worth it

@ All, don't I know how you feel

Though one excuse I usually use is that I deal with computer problems at work all day so I don't feel like messing with theirs .... and then I go and mess with my own stuff !! .. LOL