Echo chamber..

[jonjel]

Hello! Is there anybody there?

Asking for absent friends...

[excoriator]

Hello?

Sorry, still wrestling with Amazon. Grooooaaaan!

[jonjel]

Mar 10, 2021 18:57:37 GMT excoriator said:

Hello?

Sorry, still wrestling with Amazon. Grooooaaaan!

What have they done to you? My Amazon highlight was a new wheel for my barrow that arrived yesterday, and this time, puncture proof! Half an hour in the works and I have a nice new axle of the right size fitted as well?

[excoriator]

My account got hacked a few days back. It took me two days to sort that and a new bank card. I opened a new Amazon account and tried to buy a gift voucher as a birthday present. No chance! Acount put on hold. Another day on the phone resulted in it being lifted but guess what happened when I tried to use it? Yep. On hold again.

This took an hour to resolve, and I printed teh voucher half an hour after the post had gone! Grrrrr!

Meanwhile, I am trying to get my copy of Flight Simulator running which stopped working after an update. This was supposed to provide real-time weather across the world - it didn't work before the update. Now it still doesn't work as I can't even get as far as an aircraft!

I know from bitter experience that wrestling with Microsoft is not for the faint hearted. In support, it is not user friendly. In fact, user brutal would be nearer the mark. "Can you recall your first landline number and yout National insurance number? - No? - I'm sorry you have failed security. I have to terminate the call" (sobbing from caller)

[jonjel]

I am with you on this Exco. I treat the PC as just bag or tools. And I have issues every single day. Today my friend I watch rugby with warned me it was the last day to renew my season ticket if I wanted to benefit from the early doors discount, the same seat and also to get credit for all the games we have and will miss this season off next years ticket. So I went on line and renewed, and find they have debited me ALL the ticket price. £415:00 which is more than I chose to randomly give to the rugby club. I telephoned and will await results. Or not.

[jonjel]

Well, my telephone is obviously more effective than yours Exco. My money has been refunded and they have made adjustments so that I am now being credited with the games I can not attend! Past and present.

[excoriator]

I think my problem is an enormous hydra-headed beast like Microsoft. You get passed on to a new chap, and have to go through the whole security performance again. Would you believe they ask for your permission to record the message, telling you in some detail what the recording will be used for and in what countries. You respond and they then tell you what your response is and what the recording would have been used for (whether you agreed or not)

This happens every time you are transfered.

Then there is a litany of security questions. "Can you give me the third letter of your password?" Its a phone conversation. Why for gods name do I need a password? Which one? I have thousands of the bloody things. This all takes about ten minutes and then you have to go through the details of teh problem until they decide there's a good excuse to pass you onto someone with an American accent so strong you can't understand them half the time.

Do you know what version of windows you have Jonjel? I bet nobody in their right mind does, but not to worry, they will steer you through how to interrogate your computer and find out, except Oh dear! I don't get the window you expect when I try to follow the instructions. "Type gffl;gdwfkhjg into the command line" Whats the command line and can you spell that please?

And so the misery goes on, hour after hour after hour.

[aubrey]

The Command line thing isn't helped by the way the seem to keep changing where you can access it; just now it's under Windows System in the programmes you get from the start menu; it looks like what computer monitors used to look like, just a black screen with a flashing prompt (it's also called Command Prompt).


I hate the way windows changes its settings after each update; and the way the files in the download folder always revert to groups. I don't want groups; I just want a list. Tough, it says; I like groups.

[excoriator]

One of its most entertaining features is the guides written to tell you how to navigate the wonders of Windows "Press accept and you will see a window with "Choose App" as one of teh options!"

You don't see this of course. You see an add for Microsoft Office, or a demand for a password. You are buggered!

An accurate guide probably was written long ago, but although the software is changed and updated all the time the guide never is.

Another day wasted talking to microsoft in an attempt to get flight sim off the ground. Hours of operating by remote control trying to make sense of it all. It has culminated in the download of an update which is 155GB long! The actual downloading of it is fast enough. I have a 200Mbps connection, but it comes in chunks which have to be decompressed before going on to the next and that takes time. Hours of it.

Oh, and I have to access it with an email that is not mine as it is 'associated' with this email and all the king's horses and all the king's men cannot change this!

I can't go into the chaos that results from an extreme Californian accent, combined with a noisy line, combined with incomprehensible acronyms and instructions, combined with a longish delay causing both parties to talk across each other.

"Have you looked in your community folder?"

"My what?"

"Your community folder"

"I don't have one, to my knowledge"

"Everyone has one. It's installed by the App."

"Well I'll look. Where is it?"


(Extended period full of mistakes until the folder is found)


"Found it"

"OK Open it"

"Opened"

"Whats in it?"

"Nothing!"

"Is that the problem?"

"I don't know"



And so it goes on, and on, and on, and on.......