The 12 would make more sense if midnight were 12pm.


PairTheBoard

That phone call was epic...I listened to the whole thing.

That Verizon phone call...I just alternate between laughing hysterically, staring at my computer in disbelief, and wanting to stab somebody.

[QUOTE=PairTheBoard;14497048]Like the salesman who gets you comfortable answering yes to questions before going for the close, I might have tried ratcheting it up.

Q. What is my charge for 1 kilobyte?
A. .002 cents[quote]

They actually said that the charge for 1 kilobyte was "two tenths of a cent." And then they said that .002 cents was equal to "two tenths of a cent."

I actually loved w/ the first guy and then the 2nd person (woman):

Do you recognize a difference between 1 dollar and 1 cent? (Both say 'yes')

Do you recognize a difference between 0.5 dollars and 0.5 cents (Guy struggles, woman says 'yes')

So, what about 0.002 dollars and 0.002 cents? (Both have epic fail!).

It's like their brains just returned a buffer overflow error.

i think that guy did an excellent job of explaining it to them, he baby stepped them through it 10 different ways, they just weren't having it.

i think his big flaw is that he took too big of steps. imo he should have said "is there a difference between 2 dollars and 2 cents? is there a difference between .2 dollars and .2 cents?" etc. he made a conceptual leap that, while it seems mind boggling that anyone couldn't get it, was too big for the people on the phone.

Totally disagree with everyone expressing this and similar sentiments. The big problem, as mentioned in this thread already I believe, is that the customer service people do not acknowledge the possibility that they're wrong. So, even though the line of questioning "Is there a difference between....?" really drives the point home well, the customer service people don't see the connection... they think the guy is just playing games with them. And of course it doesn't hurt that they're clueless to begin with.

When the supervisor gets on the line the conversation basically goes like this (edit: also in post #30 above, sorry for repeating):
- "Is there a difference between 1 dollar and 1 cent?" "Yes"
- "Is there a difference between half a dollar and half a cent" "Yes"
- "Is there a difference between .002 dollars and .002 cents" "No"

I mean I guess he could have said .5 dollars and .5 cents rather than "half a", but clearly the first rep isn't in the position to deal with the issue and the supervisor is just a complete idiot ("What does .002 dollars look like?" But I guess .002 cents is easy, or something. Godammit lol that phone call is frustrating).

I disagree that the 12 on the clock should be a zero.

Yeah, me too. Cultural conventions always trump logic anyway.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/...raspforfigures

Winnar imo:

The Original OP said...

Hate to break the news to everyone including that anonymous caller, if they did in fact need at least a 2/3 vote...

They actually need 138 people, not 136 or even 137

What, do they round down? 2/3 of 206 137.33333 or just 137 & 1/3.
137 out of 206 is under the 2/3 mark

The clock thing has me thinking of Metropolis now... Why not 140?

My own story: counting money, counted 4 20s and 5 10s as $90. Did that, checked it, checked it again, never got it. 4x20=$40 imo

THANK YOU...I couldn't for the life of me remember exactly where the lottery ticket story was.

No, they'd need >137 since they need 137.3...which means they round UP and need 138.

Because when 2 more people vote in favour it will be 138 to 68 as 2 less people have voted against.

The mental shortcut I think you're using involves changing the number of voters, not changing the votes themselves.

When she finally said "you are going to have to pay the bill" is when I would have lost it.

This stuff is just meh. Obv you don't know that -6 is > -8 because if you did you wouldn't be spending your money on lottery tickets.

Read my post, thats exactly what I'm saying, I say they need at least 138.

The comment "what do they round down?" is based on the fact they decided they need 137.


I just think its hillarious that the OP starts of this story with an anonymous caller explaining that .66 isn't a true 2/3 and somhow comes to the conclusion that 137 is at least 2/3 when its not. Everyone in that story fails.

huh? I am pretty sure Arronw gets why the story in the OP was a fail

Ah, okay then Dunno why I read it otherwise...it was pretty clear when I look at it again.

I don't think he means AaronW, I think he means that the story has several people failing. An anonymous caller calls and also fails by saying 137. It is also funny that (.6666)(206) = 137.3196, so it should be rounded up to 138 but the anonymous caller says 137. In a way the anonymous caller is even more dumb than the accountant, at least the accountant rounded .66(206) = 135.96 up to 136.