Another Kinko's Experience

Yesterday evening was FUN! A volunteer and I were ready to start printing 900 bulletins last night at about 5:00. It went well for about 70 copies, then after a routine jam in the printer, the whole entire thing locked up. Every paper tray was locked and would not budge. Even the lead minister was out there on his back shaking this thing to pieces and taking stuff apart, with no luck. So, we tried our other big color printer... but it would only print on one side of the bulletin. Two hours later, we made the painful decision -- our only option was to take the job to Kinko's.

Every experience I've had at Kinko's, especially at this Lindbergh location, has been bad. The people are just plain idiots!

So at 7:45, already late for our small group meeting, Jonathan lugs a huge box of papers in to Kinko's for me and I explain the job. I pull out a DVD I'd made (there were no CDs available) with the file on it, and the girl put it in the computer. She stood there puzzled for the longest time, because the computer wasn't recognizing the disk. Finally, it occurred to me that I had given her a DVD-- and perhaps she would need to go to a different computer to read it.

"Um, that's a DVD I gave you, if that makes a difference."
"Oh, we don't have a DVD writer."
"You mean reader?"
"Yeah."
"Like on ANY of your computers?" I look around at the 20 computers in the room.
"No. We could outsource it if you want."
"No, no, no. OK, then can I email it to you tonight?"
"Yeah, you can do that."
"What's your address?"
"onlineprint.kinkos.com"
"That's not an email address."
"Yes, it is."
"If it were an email address, it would have an '@' in it."
"Well, this one doesn't."

I roll my eyes. Finally she yells back to the African guy in the back and he explained that what she gave me was in fact a web address at which I can upload my file.

To top it off, they wouldn't let us keep that huge box of paper there (do you not see the poor pregnant lady who obviously can't lift this stuff?), so Jonathan has to go with me when they open this morning to take it back.

Fun times.

But seriously, WELCOME TO 2007! People who are supposed to be technologically-savvy should have DVD readers on their computers! Right?!