About nine months ago I hired a personal assistant from GetFriday in India based on a recommendation in Tim Ferriss’s can’t-miss book The 4-Hour Work Week. (As I told Tim, we were both speakers at the CommunityNext conference last year, his book really changes the way you look at life for the better. Seriously, if you haven’t read this book yet, stop reading this post now and go buy the book at Amazon. Or ask me next time you see me, I usually keep an extra copy or two on me to give out; it is that good. But be sure to come back here and subscribe if you haven’t already.)
I have actually had several assistants through GetFriday since I started with them, a seamless transition between assistants is part of the service, and for the most part they have all been great. My current, and probably best, assistant is Patrick. He has done a fantastic job on everything from obscure market research to tracking down a Nintendo Wii in San Francisco for me over the crazy holiday shopping season.
One of the favorite things I use Patrick for is making calls to various 800-numbers to make changes to my services (phone, cable, etc.) and ask questions so I don’t have to sit on hold for hours. This has worked out great every time, until my most recent request:
Hi Patrick:
I have a new task for you. Please read this discussion thread.
After you do, please call Verizon Wireless and ask them if there is any way to allow the @ “At Sign” in SMS messages as the post from the Twitter representative says. Also, please confirm when my contract with Verizon expires while you are on the call. [[I really am ready to get my new iPhone, but don't want to pay a ton to break the contract since I am so close to the end.]]
You should have my Verizon Wireless account information on file from a previous correspondence. Just in case, my phone number for Verizon Wireless is xxx-xxx-xxxx.
I believe that this task should take no more than 2 hours — depending on hold time with Verizon.
Thanks,
Todd
That’s it. Short. Descriptive. Yet I completely fail to get the point across apparently. The gist of the response from Patrick is:
The Verizon representative says that you can use the @ sign in your SMS messages by pressing Function button and “D” on your model phone.
Oh well. I can easily take the occasional message lost in translation for the improvement the service has made in my life. Patrick, without request, has even taken over my self-affirmation. Here is a message I received Monday morning:
Dear Todd,
Have a cool morning and a rocking day out there!!!
“When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” - Helen Keller
Please let me know if I can be of any help to you today, we at GetFriday go to any extent of legitimate means to make your life smoother and better.
It’s a new day and YOU are a NEW MAN!!
Cheers,
Patrick
I guess Patrick had been keeping up with the takeover/layoff craziness at Yahoo! over the previous week. And while the entire MyBlogLog team is intact, it has been a bit of a nightmare to deal with. This definitely helped to kick the week off on the right note. Thanks Patrick!
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