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Got a call from an old customer who lost my contact details after moving house. Her Vista computer kept crashing so he she got a computer engineer in and he charged her £90 to fix it. He put simply put Windows XP Pro on it and didn't even back any of her data up. She has now lost all of her data, has an ilegal copy of windows and the original hardware fault is still there.
I have not looked at the computer yet but I imagine this going to cost her another £50-£100 to put right :(. Not only did he not fix it but charging £90 for installing an ilegal OS is well over the top.
I hate these situations because although the customer will trust me it is always hard to tell them they now not only still have the original fault but an ilegal operating system.
I am not claiming to be the best tech in the world, far from it but I am still learning all the time and I aim to be one of the best techs in the world by the time I have spent my £1000's on Microsoft exams.
It upsets me because I spent three years at university and have been fixing computers since the days of a none booting windows system could be fixed by editing the config.sys file yet my local news agents windows are full of adds offering reformats with no contact address or phone number.
I am going to do this job tomorrow so I will report how bad it is then. I also intend to find out what the actual fault was/is.
I suppose every industry is the same and I am sure plenty of sparks/gas fitters/joiners etc have had to repair a lot of damage by other people. Some of my DIY is border line Frank spencer but I don't charge people for doing it that is the difference.
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so
just like i used to put when the oil and filter was changed on a serviced car on the air filter a sticker with mileage
you can put your name company details phone number sticker on their computer
simple isnt it
cost 3 new pence.....
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oh and put a professional card in the paper shop window with all your qualifications land line number and the services you offer
cost 40 pence per week
fight fire with fire
ive seen lots of businesses follow my business plan over the years,they have blown ,im still here and just today a repeat customer walked in
so why worry about cowboys or the fact your customer went to the competition first
their mistake
tough
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Yeah I might have to do something like that, for now I think getting some old fashioned business cards may work well too to replace the ones I have lost.
I would say people in the street come up to me about once a month saying they have lost my number so it is a bit of a problem.
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How about advertising on the side of your car? Magnetic signs don't cost much now.
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>> for now I think getting some old fashioned business cards may work well too to replace the ones I have lost.
Why not also get yourself a website? Makes sense if you're repairing the very thing that they're using to surf the net with. If you get yourself a name people will remember then regardless that they've lost your number they could track you down by googling the name - providing of course they had another PC to do the searching on.
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I do have a website but it needs updating. I've created the new CSS layout and the front page I just get stuck on the rest. I never know what tense to write in it. The problem is I don't want to decieve people into thinking I am a big company when I am not at the same time I don't want to write it in the tense of "I".
On the other hand maybe personalising it to just myself could work well.
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"I do have a website but it needs updating"
Not much of an advert for your business! If you don't know what to include or how to word it take a look at similar business's sites - a quick google found this which looks professional. Don't undersell yourself!!
www.bitss.co.uk/Prices.html
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>> ......... this which looks professional. ............
>> www.bitss.co.uk/Prices.html
>>
With that standard of English in their website I wouldn't touch them with a barge pole. I hope Rattle's is better!
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>> I think getting some>> old fashioned business cards may work well too to replace the ones I have lost.
>>
>>
Vista Print do 250 cards free of charge except the postage. Just be very careful as you go through the options and make sure you click what you want.
tinyurl.com/39jyux4
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>> you can put your name company details phone number sticker on their computer
>> simple isnt it
Might be a good idea to put their legit windows code on the sticker as well, same as Dell etc do, that way they can't lose it.
At least if you are putting back to vista or windows 7 the drivers for most things will already be there, at least enough to get online to download any that are missing.
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It will have the sticker anyway on the machine. It is a few years since I have seen this machine but I remember setting up for her when it was new, Vista had just come out at the time I suspect it was around late 2007.
Before I do anything with the OS I need to see if I can recover her old photographs, it should straight forward enough.
I have a feeling the covery partition is on the hard drive itself, but the numpty may have deleted the partition or more likely the hard drive is on its last legs anyway.
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Print yourself out a sticker for the back window of your car to replace the dealer one.
Print 2 and I'll put one in the jeep.
Oh, and by the way, Rats. Why does my cursor go all wobbly sometimes and get a life of it's own until I move the mouse and stop it ?
It's not a problem, just interested...wireless mouse, no mousepad used.
Ted
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Goodprint Rat's is an OK company.
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>> Oh, and by the way, Rats. Why does my cursor go all wobbly sometimes and
>> get a life of it's own until I move the mouse and stop it ?
>> It's not a problem, just interested...wireless mouse, no mousepad used.
You wait till the trams start rumbling by, they you will know about wobbly mouse syndrome.
You have fluff and hair up your hole, turn over and blow it out.
Last edited by: Zero on Wed 14 Jul 10 at 09:19
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Ere, Zed....I'm not that supple !
I tried it with mouse as well, so I'll see how it goes.
Ted
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Is the surface completly level? Also if it is a bit shiny it can cause problems with the laser.
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..or you are using an optical mouse on a dark, perhaps patterned surface.
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Cowboys going round again - Giving us all a bad... - Bellboy
