Fixing PCs

I no longer deal with family PCs/Friends, I've been bitten in the past. I can spend a whole day reformatting and setting their PC back up only to be moaned at a month later when something goes wrong (Caused by them.) My family are worse "You always fiddle around with the PCs, why is this not working?" blah blah blah :mad:. Fiddling in their eyes is scanning for spyware and updating definitions etc.
 
It's amazing how quickly a few favours for family and friends can turn into you becoming the 24hr helpdesk service for all of them and their friends and their friends relatives.

I had to stop it, self preservation kicked in. If anyone asks I charge £50 per hour unless it's a close relative or it's a she and she's hot :)
 
My wife done me in here......

Wifes friend "my comp is fced"

Wife " no problem my hubby is good with comps let him fix it"

Friend "great when? now ? yesterday?"

Wife "i'll just send him round when i get home".

Me "how much is she going to pay"?

Wife "darling she's a friend".

Me "yes your friend". Oh all right.

And off i went, five hours later phone rings.

Wife "wtf".

That was my first time.

Now a few years later, the funny thing is i want to get paid even from friends, but my wife still wants me to do it for nowt, as long as i don't take too long.
 
This is annoying as hell. I get people expecting me to do it for free. I say no. I am payed for my time and assistance.

Before I even start the job I say it will cost, normally just charge between £20-£50 depends how long the job takes.

People just think I don't have a life, I work with IT in a college 8.30 till 4.30 and sometimes I come home and work from 5.30 till 1.00 and then have to be up at 7.30 for work again.

What I do now is say, I will fix it at a cost in my own time. What I hate is when people ring you up and they think they can ring you up anytime no matter what your doing and expect to drop everything to help them.

I was clubbing once in Newcastle and I got a phone call at 1AM to help get rid of a virus, told them to eff off and hung up (I was really drunk at the time).

I am 24 now, people who are between 14 and 18 who is reading this post and enjoy it as a hobby I gaurentee now if you ever have a full time job you will understand how hard and frustrating it gets when this happenes. Let this be a warning to you people.
 
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optitech-uk said:
This is annoying as hell. I get people expecting me to do it for free. I say no. I am payed for my time and assistance.

Before I even start the job I say it will cost, normally just charge between £20-£50 depends how long the job takes.

People just think I don't have a life, I work with IT in a college 8.30 till 4.30 and sometimes I come home and work from 5.30 till 1.00 and then have to be up at 7.30 for work again.

What I do now is say, I will fix it at a cost in my own time. What I hate is when people ring you up and they think they can ring you up anytime no matter what your doing and expect to drop everything to help them.

I was clubbing once in Newcastle and I got a phone call at 1AM to help get rid of a virus, told them to eff off and hung up (I was really drunk at the time).

I am 24 now, people who are between 14 and 18 who is reading this post and enjoy it as a hobby I gaurentee now if you ever have a full time job you will understand how hard and frustrating it gets when this happenes. Let this be a warning to you people.
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Do you have any friends left.

We ALL have computers now you know.
 
Usually don't mind fixing for close friends but anyone else has to pay me. If it's seeming to take a while to sort it i'll tell them that it's severely broken and unlikely to be fixed without needing a new computer. They soon chill out when i drop it round a few days later fully working again.
 
I'll do it for free for neighbours, and they do other stuff for us in return.

Family, I'll give some advice to on what to buy etc. Pretty much all my friends know what they're doing with computers anyway so I don't get bothered by them too often.

Occasionally the wife will offer my services to all and sundry she knows - I just ask for payment via a bottle of whisky a pop, go see them or take their machine home and sort it.

The one thing that REALLY gets my goat though, and I utterly refuse to do it, is being the on-call helpdesk for people - family or not. After working with computers all day, the very last thing I want to do is spend an hour or more of my own time trying to talk them through things. If I can't have it in my hands, you get a 10-minute brief on what could be wrong. I WILL NOT spend my evening talking you through fixing it!
 
I'll fix close friends and familys pc's, what really frustrates me is when i get phone calls at stupid hours asking stupid application based questions. GOOGLE it u dumb ****! -.-
 
I don't do it any more it isn't worth the hassle ANY THING that goes wrong from after you leave they blame you. In fact I am wearing my "No I will not fix your computer" t-shirt today. :D
 
At work im an IT techie and what really, really does my head in is when friends at work messege me on facebook, basically using it as a laptop helpdesk after hours and at weekends. It gets my blood boiling when some nice looking girl that never gives me the time of day only wants to speak to me when her email isnt working. Insta-delete! Bye bye.

My mum is the worst though. She tells all her friends and my sisters friends what i do for a living and then get volunteered to go and help them out. Ive told her from now on if anyone asks where i work to just make something up. My last job was setting up someones wireless internet. I was then called back to install an internet radio and then again to attach an Xbox 360 and PS3. Annoying as hell.
 
Steve2000 said:
Absolutely no more. Got fed up in the end of people (even my brother) taking the ****. When it breaks the second time, it always comes back to me as "I was the one last inside it so I must have broke it".
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Did you not know about the unwritten 12 month warranty that gets applied to every pc you fix for free ;)
 
I'm starting to get more and more work, with fixing PCs for friends and family, but I do make a bit of money from it now.
 
I will only help good mates who are in a real pickle or I would want something in return ie beer or some ££.
 
Hopefully stopped doing it now. If someone you loosely knew was a bricklayer you would not ask that they come and build you a small garden wall on their saturday afternoon would you?

I like to help out but the final straw was a family member who gave me the address of one of their friends who was having trouble and said "oh well I said you would go round now".
People making requirements of your time on behalf of someone you dont even know and I totally agree with the you do something good and then become completely responsible for maintaining it thereafter.

Some people should not even be allowed computers, I have heard from a friends mother that they "have the BT broadband but its not working". Go round...no modem, no wireless router, no cat 5 not even any ADSL filters. The line was activated and that was about it, I had some spare kit lying around and gave them a linksys adsl wireless router and dongle (A good £60 worth of stuff) , been round about 3 times after to 'fix it' again.
The best is the I cant get on the Internet thing and you go round and there are no network card drivers installed, how can you download them then?

If you want a quick get out I have learnt a quick road block of asking them to drop the base unit round to you usually gives enough inconvienience that they dont bother or if they do at least you have the net and everything you need on hand rather than trying to make polite conversation with someone you dont know whilst trying not to gag on their terrible coffee and manky biscuits!
 
I try and avoid it now and since moving 2 hours north it has became easier. I still get badgered when I'm back down visiting though.
 
Feek said:
Get one of these...


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Only really works if you've got that nerdy look about you:p
 
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