What I'm about to tell you is true.
100% entirely fact, non-fiction, sincere, authentic, genuine, accurate, and in general,
non-bullshit.

Back in the day when I was working for an internet provider in New Zealand, relatively
often users would send in their computers for us to have a look at.
Our helpdesk provided an informal "Fix-it" service for users for a little extra cash on
the side for the business (And, often, it could use it).
Nearly all of these repair jobs involved reinstall of Windows components, or now and then,
a complete reinstall of the badly holed Operating System. (Windows is reliable like that,
the longer and harder you use it, the more broken it'll end up)
However, one such time we had a rather unusual fix to contend with.

One of our helpdesk people had received a phone call from a customer who was relatively
irate.
They had used our online signup form and chosen to use a credit card to seal the transaction
and have their account set up immediately. This happened to be our most popular setup option,
I suppose that 'Pay them now, and worry me with it later' attitude and intangible technology
go together.
However, this particular user had decided that his computer was now broken, and due to the fact
it had broke while he was setting up his account, well, it just had to be our fault.
No matter how much the technical support guru argued with him over this point, and explained
to him that our signup page just can't break your computer... Well, it just wasn't getting
through and eventually the helpdesk dude gave in and resigned to a 'Well, alright, send it in
and we'll look at it'.

Sure enough, two days later, a computer case arrived in the mail.
It wasn't a bad computer, not terribly recent, but it had a working Windows installation and
seemed to run okay.
In fact. It seemed to run just fine.
Try as he might, the helpdesk dude just could not for the life of him work out exactly what
was broken... He assumed that if it was so obvious as to blame us, it must be related to, say,
the modem hardware... Or maybe the Dial Up Networking software... Or...?
Nada. Not a sausage. The machine worked fine.
The helpdesk dude gave in his search and decided to head to, invariably, the source of the problem;
He gave the user a call.

Now I had been flitting in and out of the helpdesk area during the day to see what was going
on, I know plenty about hardware and fixing computers and was unable to spot anything myself,
and so my curiosity was piqued.
I happened to hang around for this call, which went something like this:

"Good afternoon Sir SuchAndSuch, its HelpdeskDude here and, well, you've got me stumped. I
just can't find anything wrong with your computer. Exactly whats the issue?"
A pause... I leaned in to hear what was being said.
"You can't put disks in anymore? And... Hmz. Well, alright. I'll look at it"
While the helpdesk dude was putting his phone down I had already made it over to the computer
sitting alone by itself on the workdesk and picked up a random floppy disk set down near by, and
poked it in... But it didn't quite go in.

Now I've also had a lot of experience in pulling apart disk drives, cleaning them, fixing them,
and even swapping parts between drives to make a working model. All good Geek things to do.
In fact I once had a friend whose sister would jam floppy disks into the drive upside down,
and somehow - don't ask me - would manage to shove them with so much force that they would have
the disk latch cover (That little metal thing at the end of a disk that slides back and forth)
pop off inside the drive.
I assumed something like this had happened previously.

Unfortunately, as I peered into the drive using my pinky finger to prop open the drive door,
this wasn't the issue.
I could see what was the issue. And I was mortified.
I shuffled through the tools strewn about on the desk and pulled out a pair of needle-nose
pliers, inserted them deftly into the disk drive, and removed one VISA card.

Apparently the gentlemen seemed to be under the impression that a disk drive also functions as
a credit card reader, although it is quite honestly beyond me as to how anyone in their right
mind - Or even their wrong mind - would make such a mistake.
I decided, while holding the credit card in the pliers grip, that I was not going to ever
deal with this customer. I handed the card to the helpdesk dude, slapped him on the back,
showed a big grin and said 'Gee, I'm sure glad you get to talk to these people'.
And then I promptly wandered back into the Network Operations room and buried myself in
something vaguely logical hoping never to meet the computers owner.