Just another day in IT land...
Posted by Main_Quote3604@reddit | talesfromtechsupport | View on Reddit | 86 comments
I work in IT support, which basically means I'm a mix of tech therapist, cable wrangler, and general panic button for anything with a power button. Today was a special flavor of chaos:
Morning kicks off with a manager emailing me to say the conference room mic is "making echo" and DEMANDING a new one with noise cancellation. No questions, no troubleshooting, just a royal decree. Sure, let me just requisition a NASA-grade mic from the void.
Next up, someone asks me to disconnect her monitor and printer because she’s getting a new desk. Unplug everything, move it out. Two minutes later she calls me back — turns out the desk install isn’t even happening today. So now I’m a reverse moving service.
HR/Admin manager misses a call from a top exec and blames it on her desk phone “not ringing.” Turns out that she spend most of the time in the lounge area. She's now convinced it’s a hardware fault because of course she is.
And the best part: CTO calls in, saying emails aren’t going out and it’s “probably something serious.” I remote in, check Outlook, and... he’s got one giant email stuck in his outbox. I delete it, and suddenly everything else sends just fine. Mystery of the century solved.
I'm not saying I’m a miracle worker, but at this point I feel like an unpaid magician.
Ill_Cheetah_1991@reddit
Try doing it in a school!!
Reception class was the best - only place the amp for the sound (no that wasn;t my idea) could go was beside the interactive white board
i.e. in reach of the kids
anything wrong in that class was always due to a kid fiddling
which isn;t too bad
I worked ina big company for many years
I thought users were bad
but you should see teachers!!!
p.s. I was also a teacher for half my career - so I really mean "some teachers" (i.e. not me - although I refuse to give the name of the IT technician at the school where I used to teach in case he tells tales!!)
but the percentage is WAY too high for a profession that requires a degree!!!
Fuligin_Cosplay@reddit
I did IT for a school district (and the town offices, police department, fire department, recycling facility, etc.) (with a total team of four people) and it was miserable. Most of my tickets were either from students or teachers breaking things and claiming "I don't know how this happened!" as they hand me a $300 docking station whose cable had been destroyed after only a couple months of use. I left because even though it was a very wealthy district, the superintendent decided that we were we never getting salary increases, and was looking for ways to cut our budget. Now I work for a company with a lot of older users and it's a whole different type of hell, but at least the pay is better.
My favorite memory was when administration had us test out Chromebook cases to see what would best prevent students from breaking them. We got to take a couple out-of-commission Chromebooks, put them in the different cases the admins gave us, and drop them. In the end we told them that none of the cases worked, and that there was nothing we could do to stop a kid from breaking his Chromebook if he/she really wanted to. That was somehow our fault and were told we needed to "figure it out". I left a couple months later.
Ill_Cheetah_1991@reddit
to be fair anyone with a kid knows that there is very little in this World that can stop a kid breaking something if they "have a bad day"
I mean - tank armour is pretty good but I am not sure it would work with some of the tantrums I have seen in schools
a brick wall was certainly not good enough!!!
so any computer device is vulnerable
There was a gorilla that the zoo keeper trained to use a computer - not a touch screen and apparently his keyboards didn;t last long
but at least the screen could be behind very strong glass
kids may not be a strong as a gorilla - but they are cleverer - well mostly at least, in theory
any school that wants a Chromebook to be totally kid proof is not safe to be allowed to look after kids - in my opinion - as they do not understand them
Harry_Smutter@reddit
Why not just shift the amp up?? We don't have any in reach of the students. They also really never have to be touched by the teachers, sans powering them on after a blackout. But yeah, the stuff I get working K12 tech makes me lose braincells.
Ill_Cheetah_1991@reddit
I did ask site manager for put a shelf in higher up
but in school things sometimes move at a glacial pace!
Harry_Smutter@reddit
You're not wrong there, haha.
Andrusela@reddit
Before I worked with Doctors and Nurses I worked with Teachers.
It's hard to say which is worse.
Although I only had to deal with the medical staff over the phone.
I was there in the flesh at the School District, so I guess it was worse in that respect.
Ill_Cheetah_1991@reddit
Sending sympathy!
InteractionHairy6112@reddit
As someone who is/was a Jack of all trades for far too many years, get into a specialism, do what it takes, get accredited, do it outside of work and make sure it's one of the ones that pays a sh#t load for doing one thing, otherwise you'll be expected to know everything forever while being paid less that the specialists who know about one thing and don't get dragged here, there and everywhere when someone screams.
gamersonlinux@reddit
This is my story!
Every job expected me to bend over backwards and support everything in the company. At one job I was actually handling facilities and purchasing. Tickets were submitted aobut ceiling leaks and I would have to call building maintenance or janitorial services. I would also have to go to the accountant for the credit card so I could purchase equipment. The CEO even asked me to mop the server room.
14 years later... I've switched jobs 7 times in 7 different industries. IT & Technology are a huge mess. I've been at my current job (Sr. Support Analyst) for 2 years and all we do is data entry for OnBoarding/OffBoarding. I rarely do anything support related.
For the most part, end users think we are support, maintenance, janitors, accountants, web developers, facilities, plumbers, electricians, etc. They think we do it all! Sometimes we can, but is that really what the company is paying us for?
williamconley@reddit
Familiar. Wow. But one day the boss told me to fire everyone else (cuz I was head of department). Oh, and "one day" was the day we came back after Thanksgiving. Christmas was on the horizon. And I was expected to tell seven guys that my little family was important, and they can all suck it. (and make them see how sad I was to fire them, of course). Boss said he could afford ME or some of them, but not if he kept me. I shook his hand. Walked away. Opened my own shop. Specializing in the one thing he paid me A LOT to learn. He was a customer for many years. Retired this month. Still have a few servers running for residual income. But all that stuff I learned for all those bosses came in handy, when it was just ME and one or two employees. Because some of those customers were (in fact) willing to pay my exhorbitant prices (for my specialty) if I could just please fix this almost related thing that was clearly not my specialty. So I became well-versed in "yep, I gotcha bro" and call someone, pay them half what I was getting, and make the customer ecstatic that I could just fix their problem. As it turns out: If you're NOT an employee that stuff is golden. If you ARE an employee, everything is on the same level as cleaning toilets. Go figure.
gamersonlinux@reddit
Wow, you win! I want to honor you for leaving instead of firing the team! That took courage, faith and sacrifice.... I would love to have more managers like that! Thank you!
I've thought about creating a company but it's so hard to know how to find customers. My family still need my work benefits at this point, but I have grown tired of companies handling technology poorly. We end up jumping through ridiculous hoops, wasting time and money.
I'm living this strange phenomenon where I love the job I have and get laid off... then I hate the job I have and can't find a new one. Just feeling really stuck.
Thanks for listening!
williamconley@reddit
i learned ONE niche program that was open source well enough to use it to make my boss happy (and make him look good to his peers). turned out that this particular software was quite popular. built a company on simply maintaining/installing/customizing it.
Turns out that in the OpenSource world, that's not so hard to do. Also turns out that liking to hear yourself talk (which resulted in my staying on the forums and helping others, since that forum is how I got the software working in the first place) can result in learning a whole lot more. If I didn't know an answer, I dug into the code and FOUND an answer. That applied to other software cuz I had to learn the languages involved.
Find a piece of software. Learn it so well nobody can honestly say they know more than you do. Free support on their forums ... paid support off their forums. Or take that knowledge and build a piece of missing software, or just re-create one that works better (or even make a better interface for one that already exists). Forking an open source project is not theft. Be sure you credit the origin package and delineate what you wrote from what they wrote.
Companies that use open source software are NOT usually willing to wait for "free suport answers" on a forum. They will pay for Right Now support.
Ninja_feline@reddit
HR/Admin manager was a wetware fault.
AnDanDan@reddit
From one IT Goon to another, keep calm and have you tried restarting the users?
syntaxerror53@reddit
Restarting the Users?
"Flatliners" springs to mind.
Don't know if it will do any good though.
faithfulheresy@reddit
We can do that?
Does it involve a thump to the head? Please say it involves thumping.
meitemark@reddit
You can reset them to factory settings. Just insert a pen in their left ear, press it in about 4" (10cm) and wiggle it a little around. Remove the pen, wait 3 minutes and rub your knuckles over their sternum. That should reboot them.
If the user does not reboot, it might have been a NPC or a homegrown unit and those may not have proper return to factory buttons. Just put the user in the recycle bin and get a new one.
grantij@reddit
I've read that this type of fix can cause issues with future OS updates for the user. Possibly preventing them entirely. Instead of a hard reset, have you considered just flashing the user? This method can reduce future requests.
meitemark@reddit
All my attempts on flashing users has lead to them running away screaming. Some attempts using some of my PFYs has worked better, but have damaged the PFY.
harrywwc@reddit
maybe one of these?
Stryker_One@reddit
Or Adenosine.
waldoiowa@reddit
"less paperwork exhale" Excellent
ttlanhil@reddit
Stick to the good old clue-by-four - if they see you use anything electrical, managers will want the most expensive version available to show off their power
jobblejosh@reddit
And also any time it fails to function, guess who'll be called to support it?
meitemark@reddit
"I think it is fixed now, powering up, hey manager hold these things and tell me when you feel anything."
anubisviech@reddit
Percussive maintenance might get you in trouble if applied to users. Even if it does seem to work at first, it might create a feedback loop that makes everything worse.
faithfulheresy@reddit
And there's the downside. :(
oloryn@reddit
Maybe they'll make a very satisfying thump when they hit the door.
intellectual_printer@reddit
At least you didn't have the 500mile email bounce issue 😅
OppositeStudy2846@reddit
An actual real problem, which is a rarity.
williamconley@reddit
Is it though? I mean it is technically an "actual problem" when they plug the USBA cable into the RJ45 jack on the printer and swear it's in the right slot. After my wife drives an hour to the farthest north service center to fix the printer and finds it, it was an actual problem. Was the problem ... mental? or Too Tired? or ... someone unqualified plugging in a printer after the state came in to upgrade it but didn't bother plugging it in when they were done? But I hear you. So often it is just "oh, I have to hit Submit when I'm done? But I didn't see a submit button ... oh, way down there. Hm. Bad design."
williamconley@reddit
Another use for an oldie but goldie:
We the unwilling
have been doing the impossible for the ungrateful for so long,
we are now qualified to do anything with nothing. (immediately)
nenekPakaiCombatBoot@reddit
Nah, the electric janitor.
LVDave@reddit
How about a "Windows janitor"?
Safe_Place8432@reddit
My favorite user calls are when they call saying "my computer don't work" then you ask them for details which they can't provide, then they say they have a meeting and can't fool with this right now. An hour later they call again asking why I haven't fixed their computer yet. I reiterate my need for access or details, radio silence, then another hour later I get a nasty email with their boss, the ceo and Jesus on cc.
evilyncastleofdoom13@reddit
Not Jesus! 😭😂
K1yco@reddit
Me: Go ahead and bring my your system
Them: But I can't be without it for hours
Me: Well, you just told me it's not working period and keeps shutting off, so I you don't want me to work on it, you're technically going to be without it for days now.
meitemark@reddit
To low. "In god we trust, everybody else needs a ticket"
jamoche_2@reddit
Last time someone told me they were getting echos, turned out they had an extra window open on the same stream, and somehow it was just a bit laggy.
Shazam1269@reddit
I had a user physically in the room that was hosting a Zoom meeting, and she had her laptop joined to the meeting and of course was using the mic on her laptop. The reverb was epic.
jamoche_2@reddit
Cringing in total sympathy here.
meitemark@reddit
"Adds random distortion, reverb and tremolo effects just to keep IT in a constant battle ready panic."
1978CatLover@reddit
"Problem was that user dropped the bass. Recommended fix: user attends a rave this weekend."
meitemark@reddit
Meh, we don't have money for a rave, but we can feed him these random pills we found in the garbage cans after talking about drug tests, throw him in this server room that does not have a way to open the door and turn on the 120+ dB fire alarm over the weekend.
EruditeLegume@reddit
the BOFH approach!
xenogra@reddit
Last time I had an echo in a meeting, it's because someone was in a tiny room, taking the meeting using his laptop speakers with mic unmuted. The previous time, it was the same cause. It's always the same because the guy's on my team and refuses to use the provided headset or mute himself after speaking...
Zombie13a@reddit
My favorite is when Devs put a ticket in saying "App is crashing, I think the server is down" and include their error message that says _explicitly_ "FileNotFound: /path/to/app/config/file". The best part is when you look, _they_ didn't put that file in place 3 months ago when the app went live; its just been running this way and they finally noticed it.
Like, dude, its _your_ app, config file, and error message, I can't read it for you....
PatrickWTTV@reddit
Helpdesk guy here. Always pad your lead times, ETRs and just about everything else by 30 percent. This way you can look like a magician when it is necessary without breaking the norm too much.
Fred_Stone6@reddit
Watching a colleague spend 2 hours on a printer issue because he failed to read the error when opening properties from print management. Driver not installed.
Seppi0630@reddit
Have you tried rebooting the “users”
chessplodder@reddit
The problem with being considered a magician is that a magician doesn't need training, or budget, or tools, or reasonable expectations, so you only need a magician. Also, a magician is unqualified for anything else, so is also unpromotable.
floutsch@reddit
And to be even more precise, you need only as few magicians as possible. "Speak your spells faster, dammit!" :D
meitemark@reddit
"I cast Magic Missile"
rocketmunkey@reddit
Some days I'd prefer to cast "iron". Nothing fixes stupid like a skillet to the skull.
brelywi@reddit
GODDAMMIT DOUGHNUT!
Stryker_One@reddit
Do you ever feel that "FUEGO!", would just solve ALL the issues?
tslnox@reddit
Yes! Or at least a little bit of Ventas Servitas to throw some people around would suffice I guess.
Elegance_Incarnated@reddit
What's "fuego!"?
NoobieOne@reddit
Its a reference to the series Dresden Files. The main character uses the word "fuego" when casting his fire spells. He is also known for blowing things up that get in his way. One of the books had a starting line "The building was on fire and it wasn't my fault".
saruhime@reddit
If a call is placed to an office phone and no one is around to answer it, did it actually ring?
Bakkie@reddit
5 years ago, when we went into Covid lock down, all our desk phones were configured to have the calls forwarded to our cell phones. Great while we were working remotely.
Flash forward 4 years. I left the company. They eventually used my old desk phone number for a new hire who was given many of my old accounts. All of a sudden, I star getting call at odd hours from my old contacts. Nice to hear from them but WTF??
Seems that someone forgot to reconfigure the call forwarding to take my cell phone off the system.
paulcaar@reddit
I work in VoIP support. Oh how I dislike call forwarding from hardware level. They always say there isn't a forward, yet there always is.
I'll stick to the call routing plan by the PBX, that way I can actually see at a glance when the forward takes place
Strazdas1@reddit
Its the opposite here. they told us (users) to configure the forwarding. Sent us instructions, etc. The issue is, half the office uses different phones that do not in fact support forwarding. It was not a happy day for our IT. Now we got work mobile phones so they always find you.
paulcaar@reddit
Oh boy. Yeah that seems like a great way to turn IT against you. Just send everyone a vague instructions that you don't know will work for everyone and have IT support fix the fallout.
JTD121@reddit
Bah, I call us wizards.
meitemark@reddit
Wizards can cast fireball without care about how big the room is.
ducktape8856@reddit
One of my buddies is 130 kg of pure ~~muscles~~ Gummibears with a full beard. He used to run around his company with a fairy stick (similar to this) his niece gifted him. Everytime he solved a problem he touched the PC, screen, printer or user with his fairy stick, mumbled some stupid "spell" and went off.
Main_Quote3604@reddit (OP)
UPDATE: 1. The manager with the mic problem has now a new nick name - The Remote Manager. After wasting an hour of our time for troubleshooting, the problem was on his side. His Teams somehow bugged with 2 loggings on the meeting, but 1 was ghost, in the background. 2. The one with the new desk is the CEO sister-in-law. She has no adequate education but works as a low-level accountant, but she thinks that it is her father's company. 3. The HR wanted to hide her mistake by blaming that the desk phone wasn't working, but after 1 hour wasted for testing, the phone works fine and I reported it to my supervisor. Today she is nowhere to be found, hiding in her office whole day.
musicnerd1023@reddit
Just remember: the dumber they are the safer your job.
iEpic@reddit
This entire post reeks of AI generation. Key points include overuse of "in line quotes", an em-dash, and shock value, along with the weird explanation of what an "IT support" person does. Newsflash: you are in a subreddit dedicated to that very topic.
Cimanyd@reddit
I remember when "Every account on reddit is a bot except you" was a joke.
(And now you're being downvoted for pointing out obvious AI slop!)
To add to your list:
"No x, no y, just a z" as a stand-alone sentence. This feels like a sign of AI too. I have nothing to support this feeling.
Strazdas1@reddit
statistically most of what you see online is bot generated now. Bots account for >52% of internet traffic.
Strazdas1@reddit
plenty of software such as word automatically creates em-dash from regular dash when typing out sentences with it. if he wrote the story outside web browser first then this is likely.
rinyre@reddit
The emdash thing is a false sign, especially for a single one. It's usually really heavily used, not when used correctly. Shit, I use them sometimes and would be pissed to find someone accusing me of that.
That said it's more the weird intro format, odd circumstances, and the odd summarizing final sentence that gets me going hmmm.
iEpic@reddit
That's a very fair point, in retrospect. I mean, I also use them, so pointing out a singular use of it is a bit of a stretch. Here's the video I was basing my comment off of.
AngryCod@reddit
I hate playing the diagnosis game. Like, I'll tell you what the problem was and I'll document it in the ticket. If you wanna argue with my boss and your boss about whether your desk phone was actually ringing, that's on you. I'm not going to allow you to throw me under the bus.
Elegance_Incarnated@reddit
Professionally stated.
s-mores@reddit
Please tell me you only work with tickets and keep track of your work.
lincolnjkc@reddit
One of my favorite client contacts is often required or requested by their (powerful) end users and (as powerful) leadership to pull rabbits out of the hat. Part of the reason I love them is I am frequently the one conjuring the rabbit and it's always something different than I would normally do
We were lamenting the fact that those who benefit from our magic never seem to realize how, erm, challenging some of those asks are.
"We've become very adept at pulling an endless supply of rabbits out of the hat"
"Yes... So far they've all been live. One of these days we're going to pull a dead and dessicated rabbit out of that hat and no one is going to be happy"
Also FWIW: If your (l)user is hearing an ecp it is a problem with the audio configuration of one of the remote ends. Even if you had the NASA miracle mic it wouldn't solve the problem.
Newbosterone@reddit
I’d like to find a diplomatic way to say, “your job is to bring the problem, my job is to bring the solution”.
Andrusela@reddit
So glad I'm retired.
Still have PTSD though, so I got that going for me, which is nice.
HappyGeigerClicks@reddit
I'm calling myself a cable wrangler now.
Sigwynne@reddit
There's a reason why at one job IT was called the Tech Wizards. They were efficient and polite and had to deal with upper management (who were notoriously smug and often wrong) and had a closet of spare parts, because heaven forbid the VP needs to wait for someone to run to the store and pick up what he needs.
Certain_Silver6524@reddit
Sounds like the CTOs mailbox was constipated...
StarChaser01@reddit
Have you tried removing and re-applying the runes?