We should probably clarify helpdesk is for IT issues.

I had something similar in the mid 2000's. Some guy kept calling for help formatting excel spreadsheets. Stupid things like color coding columns, formulas, pivot tables, etc. My manager had to call his manager about the time this guy was wasting because he didn't know how to do his job....and it was more to suggest excel training classes or something along those lines. The guy ended up being let go a few months later.

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AStrandedSailor@reddit

Really? Let go? I thought incompetent idiots who can't do their job, usually got promoted. At least that's what happened in my last company.

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Langager90@reddit

"We need Steve to do a better job." Could technically be understood as "Steve needs a better job to do."

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SeanBZA@reddit

Management likely was full already......

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realgone2@reddit

Yeah, I have teachers all the time ask me how to do things within the software they use to teach the children. I have no idea. We have a whole separate curriculum department for that. You need to contact them.

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come_ere_duck@reddit

This, I have no idea helping someone with excel formula concepts (because for non IT folk, some of them can seem quite daunting), but when it comes to repeat offenders, I either issue them with a web page full of useful excel info or inform their manager they need to stop bugging IT.

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Ricama@reddit

You had one job Steve!

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Ricama@reddit

You had one job Steve!

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InterestedObserver99@reddit

If it plugs in, it belongs to IT. I was once asked to adjust a refrigerator. It wasn't cold enough.

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Spacesider@reddit

I was once asked to tape down some cables in some other office because someone was concerned it was a tripping hazard. Like that is somehow IT's responsibility.

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DCourtney2@reddit

I’m sorry, our policy only allows for 7ft Ethernet cables, I’ll just go ahead and remove these 30ft cables and put a ticket in to the wiring team so they can send you a quote for a network drop closer to your equipment. Have a nice day.

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realgone2@reddit

I've done that!

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DCourtney2@reddit

Me too. 😁

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realgone2@reddit

Here are some one I've had:

Microwave in the breakroom won't turn on

AC isn't cold.

Heater isn't working.

Florescent bulb in classroom is blinking.

Part of the fence in the back of the school got knocked down by a tree limb.

Teacher asking for more paper for her printer.

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PanTran420@reddit

A small clinic I worked at for a while would regularly get tickets for microwaves and coffee makers. We even got a plumbing call once. Not sure why calling facilities never crosses people's minds.

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jmjedi923@reddit

once someone called facilities for an IT ticket. then they printed out the rejection email they got from that and handed it to next it person to "figure it out"

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Squickworth@reddit

Because buildings and grounds resolves their tickets in geologic time. #absolutelyglacial

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joe_attaboy@reddit

I worked in a military drug testing lab for about three years. The lab used all manner of sophisticated scientific equipment - all of which had plugs and, obviously, receptacles into which other things were connected. Whenever a new tech or chemist was hired, usually within the first few days, when something went awry and it had any kind of plug or screen or spit stuff out to a printer, the newbie always assumed IT would fix it.

I got a call one day from such a person. I walked into the lab and she stood pointing to something on the counter. "This isn't operating correctly," she said. I looked at it - she was pointing to a Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometer. I just chuckled a bit and told her GC/Mass Specs were not in IT's wheelhouse.

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rhoduhhh@reddit

Medical research IT here. If I had a dollar for each time that I've said "you're gonna need to talk to the vendor about that" when I get asked about fixing the fancy expensive equipment, I'd finally be able to buy a house. 🥲

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Solarwinds-123@reddit

I did end up fixing the ice maker in the freezer, but that's mostly because I wanted ice.

I was once asked to fix the electric window blinds. That is not what I meant when I put Windows on my resume!

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pockypimp@reddit

I've gotten tickets about fans not working in the warehouse, someone who thought "setting up their office" included us hanging their pictures and clock, and a request about a coffee machine.

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TheLadySlaanesh@reddit

At my very first IT job, one of my coworkers fielded a call where someone asked if we could help with getting rid of possums underneath his mobile home.

Another much more recent one was where a lady was convinced that only I could rid her house of the voices that only she could hear. She left me several tear-filled messages, insisting that I had to help her, and that she wasn't crazy.

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Floresian-Rimor@reddit

The vast majority of accounts disabled/deleted I dealt with was because hr couldn’t fill in their own forms properly, so…

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realgone2@reddit

Yup, same here. Wrong names, missing names, only the first name, wrong job title (which causes problems with which group they are in for access).

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atombomb1945@reddit

Had a ticket once from a secretary who had just been hired. She puts in a ticket during a busy week stating that she needs helps with a spread sheet. It's just before lunch and I am near her area on calls, so I stop by. When I get there she starts yelling at me "My God! How long does it take you to respond to a ticket? Here's the data I need it in this spread sheet before the Dean gets back from lucnch in 30 minutes." Then she walks out of the office. I called out to her, telling her that I don't do these things. "Oh honey. Yes you do. Now get it done."

I saved the spread sheet with one entry "Your secritary put in a IT Ticket to have one of us enter the data." And saved the file. She emailed the file after she got back from lucnch, and was fired about twenty minutes later.

Turns out, she had come from a job where she was getting the IT guys to do all of her work. She knew practicaly nothing about using a computer of office work in general.

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creegro@reddit

knew practicaly nothing about using a computer of office work in general.

Oddly this is so common even nowadays, people just don't know shit about computers even though they use them daily and require them to work.

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atombomb1945@reddit

We are in the Third Decade of the twenty first century. It boggles my mind that people have no idea basic computer skills. Even typing is painful to watch

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realgone2@reddit

I had a secretary that didn't know the name of the icon she clicked on EVERYDAY to get to the internet. For some reason we allow them access to Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. After emailing back and forth, I had to go to her desk and have her point out the icon to me. It ended up being Chrome.

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atombomb1945@reddit

We have a running joke in our office "Page 7"

I took a VPN call during COVID, user was trying to install the VPN on her home PC to remote work. She was stuck and couldn't even answer basic questions like what problem she was actually having. Her answer for any question I asked was always "I'm on page seven." She ended the call, never even knew her name.

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realgone2@reddit

HAAHH

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laplongejr@reddit

Given that modern personal usage is mostly smartphones, I feel computer skill is something that should be taught rather than assumed.

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realgone2@reddit

I agree. My department has been trying to get the district to have mandatory basic computer classes for staff. They refuse. It's embarrassing how little teachers and staff know about basic computer functions.

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bob152637485@reddit

That is so golden, I would have LOVED to be there during the pre-walkout meeting...

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nicksteron@reddit

I love this.

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Short_RestD10@reddit

I get this from time to time at my work. Once its clarified that there is no IT issue, just that they want us to do part of their job for them - I mention that if they feel overwhelmed by their workload they should reach out to their manager/HR for training or assistance (would you like me to reach out to them for you?). That usually results in “oh no thanks, I’ll figure it out”.

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realgone2@reddit

I had a teacher the other day come to me in secret because a student took a photo with their phone of a test he was giving. He left the test up on his laptop and wasn't paying attention to the class (he's an awful teacher). The kid was rumored to be emailing the screenshot to other students. He wanted me to find out if the kid had actually emailed the photo. I told him nope. He needed to get the principal involved because it's a discipline issue. He said in an annoying tone "never mind". I told the principal. Hah.

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MilkshakeBoy78@reddit

No, thanks I guess have to do my job now.

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realgone2@reddit

Ever did IT for a school system? We get some of the most bizarre tickets.

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speddie23@reddit (OP)

No, but from what I have heard on the Reddits sounds like.......fun

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NewUserWhoDisAgain@reddit

Yup. Seen a couple of those come across my desk. most are understanding others go "Well you are the Helpdesk. Help me."

Sure sure, let me cc your manager that you dont seem to be able to complete your wo- Oh the ticket has been closed by the user. Hmm.

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creegro@reddit

Similar,,recently I had someone ask me about a website at one of my sites that I'm the field tech for.

Well buddy I don't do any websites and never will, I mostly answer questions about windows and setup hardware.

"But you're IT right?"

Yup, but that doesn't mean I do every damn website you guys use here.

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kagato87@reddit

Website isn't even IT. Maybe managing the server that hosts it, but often even that is just an OS level thing. As long as Apache or iis or whatever can start, we done.

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creegro@reddit

Correct, so it was just silly why he'd even ask me. And it was a guy I rarely even seen before I wasn't even sure he knew who I was...

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RayEd29@reddit

Had very similar calls myself working on the support team for a certain ERP software. Mary called to ask how she should book an entry. No problem with the ERP software, she just needed guidance on which account to book a journal entry to. Being a former CPA, I actually had the background to give her the help she requested but I told in no uncertain terms to NEVER request accounting guidance from tech support. The other members of my team were wildly unqualified in that area and she would find herself in a deeper hole if she kept that up.

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ridjfoencid@reddit

Interesting career transition! What led you to make the switch?

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RayEd29@reddit

I majored in accounting with a minor in computer science. Just made sense to me at the time to pair the two up since accounting was perfectly suited to using computers. Got a job at a local accounting firm and worked there long enough to figure out that wasn't what I wanted to do with my life. From there, went to Big 6 (it was Big 6 then at least) Consulting where they had me using both accounting and IT with the federal gov't. From there, I followed a friend over to a manufacturing company to work as a cost accountant for a few years. That was where I discovered it only took a change in leadership to turn a "I can't believe they pay me to do this" job into a "I hope somebody runs a red light and puts me in the hospital so I don't have to go in there" job.

Met the guy that got me my current job there - back in consulting but it's a much better company than Big 6 was. That's how I wound up working in Finance Support for the ERP software. I was the only true accountant on that team. Everybody else came from a technical background and learned a little accounting working on the finance modules.

The recurring theme in my career is that I'm multi-lingual. Just not in the traditional sense. I can speak debits and credits with the accountants then switch over to indexes and keys with the technical people. Same in accounting - I translated between Fed-speak with the civilian lifers in Defense Accounting and traditional accounting lingo with Navy Audit. Got pulled into so many meetings I didn't really belong in because I could translate between the two teams that needed to communicate.

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Sensitive_Hat_9871@reddit

For a period of time in the 90's the senior management of our state government office decided to rename its various divisions. What was formerly the "Information Technology Division" became the "Information Services Division".

Once the name change became public our office began to recieve countless non-IT related requests for general information that had nothing to do with our overall purpose. Our poor harried phone screeners were taking calls from citizens who thought they'd finally stumbled onto a magic answer machine. After all, they were calling "information services", weren't they? They needed "information".

It took about a year before management renamed the division back to its original name.

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Rainthistle@reddit

Vaguely related: Our HR department ended up on the verge of needing law enforcement support because a handful of homeless sorts decided that Human Resources meant "free resources for humans." They kept showing up asking for food and clothing, and getting mad when there were no resources for them to take.

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Arietam@reddit

Also vaguely related: I worked for my country’s national Child Support Agency. One day a woman called, verified her that we were “the child support agency”, and went on “great, I have urgent appointments, I’ll be dropping off little Joe-Kate-Amberleighh in fifteen minutes…” No, lady, not that sort of “child support”.

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derson78@reddit

That lady was playing with fire.

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TheArmoredKitten@reddit

Honestly I think those guys have a point. Where the fuck are my resources?

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Dom_Shady@reddit

I mean, they are human beings, right?

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TheArmoredKitten@reddit

I don't believe in pod people, but they work in HR if they're real.

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iac74205@reddit

No no no ... You are the resource

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frymaster@reddit

I work for a very old University. The title of the head of Information Services is "Chief Information Officer and Librarian to the University". Because the library provides an Information Service. It does actually make sense

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itenginerd@reddit

Glad to see the old orang-utan got a promotion. Not sure what he knows about computers, but good for him. Take him an extra banana and give him my best, would you?

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AStrandedSailor@reddit

+++ Out of cheese +++

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efahl@reddit

ook

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No_Negotiation_6017@reddit

eek

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deeseearr@reddit

Imagine the kind of calls you could have received if someone had renamed the department something absolutely ridiculous like "Inspiration Technology".

Good thing nobody would ever do something that silly.

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LeeRyman@reddit

I'm sure there was an opportunity in there somewhere to quote "You want Information Adjustments. Different department."

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UnseenUniverse@reddit

Our number is one of the few listed obviously on our website (college) so I'm often transferring calls to other departments. Easy calls at least lol

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bdtomcat19@reddit

No joke..

We've had "Sink is broken," "toilet won't flush,"....

People..our Helpdesk staff might have their minds in the gutter half of-- most of the time, but that doesn't mean they're plumbers as well.

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pocketpc_@reddit

We have a canned response in our ticketing system to redirect people to the Facilities department because this kind of stuff happens so often.

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bdtomcat19@reddit

We do too for the incoming email requests, but the only time that they'll actually use the web dashboard is for stuff like this. They never use the dashboard for things like checking on their ticket status without having to call in, but for this, they will figure out how to get to the dashboard. Some are cheeky enough to classify the ticket as a hardware issue.

We assigned these tickets to the director a few time and had a good laugh.

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Kant_Lavar@reddit

I've gotten those. I've also gotten requests to replace a light bulb, requests for a key to a filing cabinet, someone saying I needed to remove a dead duck from the parking lot (in an office in another state, mind), I've been told that I need to go down to the front desk (again, I was not even in the same state as the office this call was coming from) and escort a vendor to the networking closet, I've been asked to help put air in the tire of a fleet car, and, my personal favorite, I've had someone call in and get through the call tree to the IT help desk because he wanted to confirm his Colts season tickets.

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gioraffe32@reddit

I've mentioned in other threads that the only enterprise IT helpdesk that I ever worked on also took tickets on problems with the restrooms. Across the country.

This included like lights being out, or a toilet not flushing, or even no more toilet paper or paper towels. And then we would route it to the appropriate local facilities team. Never made any sense to me. I don't understand why that made more sense than making people call their own local facilities teams. But that's what we did.

At that same place, I did have a user call in who wanted me to do their job. They were trying to make links in an Excel spreadsheet. So I showed them how to do one or two. Then had them do one or two.

Then they were like, "OK, can you do the rest?" There were like 100 items they wanted linked over a few sheets. I respectfully and politely declined and was like, "Look, nothing here is broken, but at least I've showed you how to do this. What you're asking me to do isn't a technical issue and is outside the scope of the helpdesk."

To which they responded, "Well, the last time I called, the person just did it for me." Cool, I'm not that person. Which I didn't say, but I held my ground politely -- and they were polite the whole time, too -- until they gave up. They probably called back and another agent got them, but I wasn't going to do their job for hem.

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DCourtney2@reddit

Sure, I’ll go ahead and forward all these tech calls to you so you can do my job while I do yours. How much does my new position pay? Heads up, you might be disappointed with your new help desk pay scale.

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ediciusNJ@reddit

I don't think I would trust "Steve" to handle any accounts.

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TypewriterChaos@reddit

Hey I reloaded a laminating machine the other day so this doesn't surprise me at all.

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Head_Razzmatazz7174@reddit

Are they also supposed to fix the coffee maker in the break room?

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Jazzlike-Solution816@reddit

I work Helpdesk. We do our best to fix the coffee machine when it breaks (individual serving, packet style - usually caused by a misalignment of machine operation and end user expectations), because we use that machine as well 😳

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joe_attaboy@reddit

Yeah, well, that happened at my last job and I was asked "about fixing it," which I inferred to mean "would you fix it?"

I just headed out the door and walked to the coffee bar at the convenience store/gas station on the corner.

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Dom_Shady@reddit

Like a boss.

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UNSC_John-117@reddit

I had that this week!

For background, I work in a large hospital (and have been since 2021).

I had a lady from Environmental Services (EVS, they’re the “janitors” of the hospital and clean up rooms after patients). She called and asked for a cleanup crew to a room. I was dumbfounded and told her this was the IT Helpdesk. Like you, she just assumed “helpdesk” was a general term.

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iheartnjdevils@reddit

Hell, I just got a ticket on Friday that said someone on factory floor who was mixing ingredients accidentally punched into the system they used ingredient A but actually used ingredient B and needed me to fix it. When did it become IT's jobs to fix your mistakes? I don't even work on the help desk.

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James-8675309@reddit

Well, IT Business Analysts typically help with with the process of how to correct mistakes like that in the ERP/Mfg/Inventory system

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iheartnjdevils@reddit

We don't know how to do and corrected everyone's job though. Hell, I'd make a ton more money if I knew the ins and outs of everyone's jobs.

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Blabsie@reddit

I've had people call us to request a pocket agenda. 🤷

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ducktape8856@reddit

"Sorry, we only have notebooks."

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Mdayofearth@reddit

My favorite stories are about changing lightbulbs and plumbing.

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All-The-Nope@reddit

The telecom tech can hook up my A/V equipment from home in the conference room for this very special conference, right?

The conference rooms were kitted out quite nicely with their own large displays, audio & video conferencing solution.

The user just liked their home kit better and knew how their remote worked, so thought we could just have a tech hook up their equipment into the existing setup.

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Hebrewhammer8d8@reddit

So did Steve finish the processing?

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robsterva@reddit

This could be from every helpdesk I've ever worked.

Fortunately, most of the time, it's the "I'm not sure who to call" calls, and because we interact with everyone, we can often help.

"Do my job for me" calls tend to get very well documented in the ticketing system. :)

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AskanHelstroem@reddit

Worked for a city administration, once I got a mail, that I should always ask him (the head of one of our 15 departments), before I process a helpdesk request by anyone of his department...

So I complied... it just took a week till he intervened, and said I could evaluate that by myself again.

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