Last week I threw a bit of a hissy over people who use cheap and horrible cordless phones. I have a few other occupational pet peeves, too. For instance, if the tech rep mentions several times that they can't hear you, you should pick up the handset - your speakerphone bites ass. If the tech rep tells you that your voice is fading in and out, remember that you are in the United States, where cell phones SUCK. So ask if you can have a case number, hang up, then call back on a real phone.
The tech rep can only help you if they can understand you. To that end, try to be clear. Please for the love of god at least try. If you are asked for your domain name and it isn't spelled the way it normally would be in the language you and the tech rep are using, for heaven's sake say so. Do you have any idea how much time, patience, and goodwill you lose if you make me do a great Internet wild goose chase after crazycats.com when your domain is kray-zee-katz.net??!! Do you think these are going to be the same, somehow?
Give as many details as possible about what you want to do, to be on the safe side, especially if you are a non-techie using techie jargon. For instance, if you ask something like "How do I point my domain to abulajabura.com?" I will give you a solid reply. If you follow my advice, then people who type in your domain name will indeed be led right to http://abulajabura.com. Hope that's what you wanted. Because if, instead, what you REALLY wanted was for visitors to your domain to wind up at your new HOSTING ACCOUNT with a certain hosting company CALLED abulajara.com, you are going to be abysmally disappointed, because you didn't tell me that. All the visitors that ought to be winding up at your brand spanking new website will instead be viewing the main page of your hosting company. Pointing to a domain and pointing to a hosting account can be two radically different things, so you had better be very, very clear. It's not my fault if you are not.
If you need to learn how to use a piece of software, oh say for instance FrontPage, go take a class. Get a fourth grader to show you. Ask your granny. Buy a book. Don't call me - I'm here for when your server breaks or your email clogs. I'm not here to tutor you. You don't get your plumber to teach you how to take showers. You don't get your auto mechanic to teach you how to drive. Your webhosting company is not here to teach you to use a computer.
Whew, I feel better now. Really. Actually, generally, I love my customers. I like building a rapport and it works really well most of the time. It's just been a freaky-ass week.
