Techie reported to management for failing to fix a stapler:
On Call The seasons turn, the tides ebb and flow. Just as regularly, each Friday The Register delvers another instalment of On-Call, our reader-contributed tale of another sad constant: IT people being asked to do amazingly dumb things.
This week, meet a reader we'll Regomize as "Phil" who shared a short and sweet tale of his time as a senior systems engineer.
That grand title reflects the skills and qualifications required to tend a sizable fleet of virtualized servers and their respective operating systems.
Which made the support call we recount today all the stranger – because it came from an executive assistant who needed help to fix an electric stapler.
[...] This machine was not even located in the facility wherein Phil toiled. Instead, the call came from another office several states away.
Phil nonetheless tried to help, starting with the – pardon the pun – staple tactics of asking the user if the device was plugged in and then requesting it be turned off and on again.
When that proved ineffective, Phil asked the executive assistant what he felt an IT person hundreds of miles away could do to repair the stapler.
"It plugs into the wall, isn't that what IT fixes?" was the non sequitur reply. Phil's response was to suggest the user contact their facilities department and order a new stapler.
For offering that sensible advice, Phil became the subject of a complaint to corporate that labelled the IT team "unresponsive."
What amusing things have you been asked to do which were nothing to do with your job? For those of you who have worked on help desks, what are your most amusing recollections of problems you have been faced with?
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 15 2022, @07:15PM
If you work in a small company I think it's kind of normal if you end up doing all sorts of stuff that's nothing to do with your job. Deliver gift hampers. Help buy stuff for the office pantry. Fix all sorts of broken stuff.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Tork on Saturday October 15 2022, @07:21PM
I wish I had been around when that happened so I could apologize to them. I mean I understand where her confusion came from, but I bet that person will be sharing that story.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 15 2022, @08:13PM (1 child)
Was this FatPhil, of SN fame?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Sunday October 16 2022, @04:01AM
This seems more like the backstory of Phil, Prince of Insufficient Light [fandom.com], ruler of Heck and punisher of minor misdeeds and petty faults.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by quietus on Saturday October 15 2022, @08:36PM (1 child)
Microwave oven, satellite dish. The base rule is that, if it got electricity, has a problem and you're known to be an IT guy, you'll be asked to fix it. Golden rule: do not try to explain what you're doing, or they'll try it themselves afterwards, immediately, with predictable results.
Comedy gold: a small business owner who'd lost his accounting data. I recover, but make the mistake of showing him how to make a backup, "so you'll be safe next time your windows crashes". The very next day he's back with an enthusiastic expression on his face and "I've done what you said but now I can't find my data back".
To test, he had reinstalled his windows os, and formatted all drives, including the one with his backups, in the process.
But the funniest one had nothing to do with fixing things, instead they tried to fix me. Government institution, 15,000 clients, I'm responsible for the network: and someone in management got the brilliant idea of doling out stickers to cluttered desks. After 2 big red ones in short succession (and a hand-written note, if I remember correctly), somebody decided it was better to skip the IT department for the rest of the campaign.
Whoever implemented that idea clearly wasn't fit for higher management: but you've got to admire the courage of doling out these stickers to desks on the highest floor of the building.
(Score: 3, Touché) by fliptop on Saturday October 15 2022, @10:16PM
External drives too?
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Opportunist on Saturday October 15 2022, @09:02PM (1 child)
Next time, drive over to the other location, fix the problem, then bill the time and travel expenses to the department.
Rest assured, that dimwit won't stay in the company for long.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 16 2022, @06:10PM
"It plugs into the wall, isn't that what IT fixes?"
Next time, tell them they should have bought a Swingline.
(Score: 4, Funny) by vux984 on Saturday October 15 2022, @11:39PM (4 children)
Back in the 90s...
Branch manager logs a ticket, "Internet is down", at a branch office, 2 cities away (about 90 minute drive from head office). I was unable to remotely determine the cause over the phone with said branch manager (he was unhelpful, useless, and insisted on eating his lunch in my ear while talking to me - but unfortunately he was also the only one there for the day) so I decided to just head out to see what it was.
Get onsite, and it was obvious. Even though we'd gone through checking all the equipment, checking all the lights were on, rebooting everything over the phone, confirming the the connections. It was pretty bloody obvious that the ADSL modem was powered off... the lights were off the and power cord was dangling off it unplugged.
Prior to the internet going down, the branch manager had gone into the back room where the IT equipment was all mounted, and unplugged it to plug in his cell phone charger.... which was still sitting there, just off to the side, charging his Motorola StarTAC.
(Score: 5, Funny) by inertnet on Sunday October 16 2022, @12:31AM
Similar thing happened to me, only it was the cleaning lady who unplugged our power adapter to plug in her vacuum cleaner 3 nights in a row. According to the person on the phone the next morning, everything was plugged in and powered up. Turned out that they didn't even bother to check and just told us to come and "fix things". The third time I insisted to check the power adapter before driving all the way there again. Sure enough it was unplugged again, but they were so unhappy with our service that they quit and went to the competition. Good riddance, I hope that cleaning lady is still working there after all these years.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Opportunist on Sunday October 16 2022, @07:37AM (2 children)
No problem, write an onsite service report, cause of incident "someone thought it's a good idea to unplug the ADSL modem to plug in his phone charger, phone's inventory number is #####", bill it and hope his successor is smarter.
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Sunday October 16 2022, @05:17PM (1 child)
Sounds good on paper, but sometimes you work for a tech company where the customer has a support contract so they can call any fucking time for any stupid shit (been there, dealt with it)!
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Sunday October 16 2022, @07:47PM
Then drive there and run up a bill, and if someone complains, tell them to tell marketing to stop handing out crappy contracts like that.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 16 2022, @02:00AM (1 child)
I got an emergency consulting call one evening, drove 40 minutes to "fix the sound on the computer". Volume icon was showing muted. Click the icon, United, all better now. $150 service call, my rates were too low, even for 1995.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by driverless on Sunday October 16 2022, @07:45AM
Friend of mine has a saying, "don't get angry, get billing". If a customer is being excessively stupid, they get charged for it. A lot.
The only notable failure of this, which in this case wasn't a customer being stupid but him wanting to spend time with his kid on a weekend, was when he ran out of bogus additional charges to add to the callout and the customer was still happy to pay so he had to go anyway.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by tbuskey on Sunday October 16 2022, @02:16PM
My family owned a HVAC repair company. There was one restaurant that always tried to fix things themselves. It always made the problem worse.
Most places charge a fee. Patch a wall, fix a flat, deliver something. IT tends to be an internal to the company thing and doesn't have a fee.
I've been called because there was a fire in a cubicle from too many things plugged in. A week after the previous fire. This time I took power cords away.
And told them to call facilities to find lab space w/ enough power.