I’ve been having fun and games for the past few days from someone who mailed me on Friday. Louise has discovered that one of her folders was missing from Outlook Express and has entirely blamed us for the loss of her folder. I explained that Outlook Express retrieves POP3 mail, therefore it’s her responsibility to backup and restore her machine.
No use. She insisted that this was all her fault and that I should put her through to the legal department in Microsoft. So these mails have been going back and forwards, she’s been getting more irate and the emails I’m receiving have been less clear.
“I am speaking with regards to my important sey folder that has gone missing from my outlook express folder which is required legally to be retrieved asap. All the information was safety secured and saved in this particular folder, there was no reason for it to go missing.
I am speaking to the legal department at Microsoft UK.?
I am very busy and this had caused me problems in replying back to business and company issues.
It is an order not a question my business is important to me and the information must be kept safe and secure.
Get back to me asap, with this information, I have people waiting for information, documents and replies, and you people at microsoft are holding up my procedures which legally I can sue for delaying the processing of information and the extra money that I have spent communicating with microsoft and HP in bringing back these documents, this is why I have kindly asked you to put me through to your legal department; with holding information is a crime. The software owners at microsoft are causing problems which are required to be resolved ASAP!”
I asked her to call me so I could explain that the folder has probably been deleted and would need to be restored (or retrieved from the deleted items folder). Still no use. I had a brainwave. Perhaps someone else was using her machine and has created a new folder? Perhaps it was a profile issue?
I finally got the phone call, very irate indeed, saying I was obstructing her rights to talk to the legal team. Her sister HAD been using her PC but would NEVER delete an important folder like that…
I gave her the switchboard number, and the rapid response team called me a few minutes later for the whole strange story. They’ve got a response engineer to call her and try to calm her down and explain about backups and the fact that the folder may be hidden on another profile in Outlook Express.
It’s the most bizarre email trail I’ve ever received, but not as weird as one of the questions she asked.
Mid way through complaining about how we had to get this folder for her she said “Are you related to Gordon Brown?” (Out of date website link by the way – Tut tut…)
That stopped me in my tracks. Users eh?…
Eileen's Digital Technology 