My life summed up in two comic strips

[gothikmaus]

These PHD comic strips pretty much sum up my life.





Source: here and here

The last panel? That's me every other day. I'm not a teaching assistant but I have to fight with students and parents (especially parents) to have all the paperwork we need before the deadline. The latest case was a girl who took ages to make up her mind and decided to enroll after the final deadline. We usually have a couple of weeks of flexibility, but that means families have less time to complete the application.

When I created her account and sent her username and password I specified that she only had two weeks to do everything and I wrote the deadline in bold. I got no reply, so I called them to make sure everything was okay. The mother told me they had everything and they would start working on the application the next day. After a week the application was still completely blank (we can check the status), so I called again, I spoke with the student and she said they had gone on holiday, but she would start working on the application asap. Two days before the deadline, I got an email from the father saying they never received username and password. I saw red. I called them asking why they didn't tell me before, since we spoke on the phone three times. I said I would send the username and password again but they had to hurry up because they only had two days left. In the email I pointed out again what the deadline was.

And you know what? The mother complained with my boss because she "didn't like the tone of my email". Which had been read and approved by my boss before I sent it, by the way.

This is what I have to deal with every day. This and people who come up with the most ridiculous excuses to avoid paying us. The richer they are, the worse they behave. Excuse me if I'm stressed out.

Comments

[polarforscherin]

Another *extrabighug* for you. That's why I'm scared of getting a job that involves dealing with customers.

I think you'll already know this but watch it over and over again until you feel better: http://youtu.be/qnydFmqHuVo

[gothikmaus]

I tend to be too harsh with such people, I know I shouldn't and I usually can restrain myself, but I've had to deal with so much rubbish in the last months, I've reached the point where I really don't care anymore.

I saw that video just a few minutes ago, it's hilarious! :D

[polarforscherin]

Too harsh? Do you really believe they never got that information? Emails don't vanish anymore. They either tried to hide their carelessness and blame you for not doing it on time or were just too stupid to do it. I don't think being angry about it is being harsh. Maybe they are not able to do it but that doesn't make it better because they could just ask on time.

Even if I try hard, it's impossible not to laugh. XD

[gothikmaus]

Oh, no, I didn't believe a word. I mean, emails are sent automatically, when they said the first email wasn't there, I just hit the send button again. They received the second email just fine, so they must have received the first one too. They probably deleted it or it might have ended up in the spam folder (I suggested to check it, but I'm sure they don't even know what a spam folder is).

When I say I'm too harsh I mean that I'm not polite enough, you know, in a "the customer is always right" kind of way. I'm sorry, but I have a hard time being polite when people are clearly trying to blame me for something I didn't do.

[polarforscherin]

As a customer I expect good service but at the same time I treat staff like I'd like to be treated. Something is wrong about "the customer is always right" because some customers deserve it and others disqualify themselves. There should be a "if you behave like a jerk you're not right and the staff must be allowed to tell the truth" policy.

Normally the nice ones are always nice and the jerks are always jerks so I suppose that the jerks will never change as long as they learn that it's okay to behave like they always do. It's just not right that people get away with bad and offensive behaviour because companies are too afraid to lose them as customers. It's not right that staff has to take all the abuse and feel miserable about it just to keep some idiots happy.

[gothikmaus]

Luckily there are also very polite customers who tell us how nice and professional we are. But negative comments and behaviour tend to stick in your mind longer than positive feedback. *sigh*

[polarforscherin]

That's right. Sadly my mind remembers unpleasant things always much better than nice things. I hate that.