Printing PSA

[bellatrys]

I don't really think most people reading this will have these problems, it's just been that kind of day already...If you walk into a print shop intending to have something printed up or photocopied, or at least to find out how much it would cost, and the person at the desk asks you

Comments

Well, both the local computer shops

[bellatrys]

have tried to (and in one case, succeeded until we caught them and took them to task) substitute non-spec parts and charge the same, claiming they were just as good, when I tried to get upgrades with them.

I could say "I wish build-to-order computer stores wouldn't lie about what parts they have and try to fob off unsatisfactory goods on the customer," but I don't have enough evidence to say that this is universally so, as I only have 2 samples to go by (2 instances each) which isn't enough for me to say that this is routine in the business.

I know there are incompetent printshop clerks, I've worked with some. --Although I've also been in the position of trying to figure out what someone wants, when they haven't explained it clearly enough, or have been using entirely the wrong terms, rather adamantly, and eventually it turns out that by "spot color" they were meaning that there were going to be spots all over the page, but since these spots were rainbow-hued, what they want is NOT "spot color" at all but *full* color, even if it doesn't "fully cover" the page. Which customer then goes away grumpy and convinced that I'm stupid, as well as trying to overcharge them.

But since at three different outfits over a course of 10 years the Absolutely Clueless and Totally Unprepared Customer has been a Series Regular (even if 3 appearances in one day is a little out of the ordinary) I feel entitled to make the wild generalization that there are a lot of people who set out to buy print for commercial purposes who haven't troubled to think five minuts about what they are doing before they start, and one has to wonder if they go through everything in life this way, and how they ever managed to get a drivers' license, if that's so.

Re: Well, both the local computer shops

[ronin_kakuhito]

I feel entitled to make the wild generalization that there are a lot of people who set out to buy print for commercial purposes who haven't troubled to think five minuts about what they are doing before they start, and one has to wonder if they go through everything in life this way,

Indeed. And if they are endemic to the population, they will be endemic to the pool of workers as well. Which is pretty much what I was pointing out. Incompetence isn't the sole prerogative of the customer no matter what geek humor would have us think.

By the by, I would say that I've known more build to order computer places that were dishonest/incompetent about that sort of thing than were otherwise. It is a rare joy to find a computer shop that doesn't cut corners. (And why I generally build my own. That and the hugely lower cost of diy vs local computer stores.)