"I can't respond to your email unless there is a ticket!" Tech Support |
- "I can't respond to your email unless there is a ticket!"
- "Watch we're gonna reboot the Meraki and it's gonna start working"
- "We have no dial tone! Do something!"
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| "I can't respond to your email unless there is a ticket!" Posted: 29 Jan 2020 10:55 AM PST You know how it goes. Someone wants something IT related "real fast" and you tell them "put up a ticket". They have a question about..."put up a ticket" I just need a .... "put up a ticket!" One of our snarky field techs today decided to use that line against me when I asked why he hadn't responded to an email (he had called me for something different) He said "I can't respond to your email unless you put up a ticket!" I agreed....so I put in a service call at his local office (aka shop call) to respond to email from OP. A few hours go by (he was working calls in the field) and I get a phone call saying "WTF is this s#!t?!?!" I replied "you said you needed a ticket to respond to emails...so I created one for you!" Some days it's good to have the keys to the kingdom lol [link] [comments]  |
| "Watch we're gonna reboot the Meraki and it's gonna start working" Posted: 29 Jan 2020 06:30 PM PST Just came home after a 3 hour onsite trip in a very nicely A/C'd server closet. Went to drop of some equipment to the desk I borrowed it from and decided to check in on my friend from another team while I was there. $me is me $AH is after hours friend $AH "Hey can you help me with this?" $Me "Yeah sure, watcha got?" Apparently for, for some ungodly reason, a company couldn't connect to their Terminal Server (TS from here on). The way they are setup is kind of strange in my experience but I don't think it's uncommon. The TS is run from one of our Data Centers remotely, company is setup with a site to site via Meraki firewalls. According to the ticket no one was able to connect to the TS since about 4pm, office closes at 5 I'm guessing. The icing on the cake was that they were expecting to have a nice fat software update run at 7am the next morning, and no one has been able to run a backup of their data because, well, no TS connection. $AH was working on this for a few hours before I arrived. I run him through some steps I took from the last networking issue I ran into. "Can you ping it? No. Can you ping from the other side? No. What happens when you run a tracert? Gets to the firewall then dies. Check DNS? DNS looks fine. Restart services? Yeah." I'm very tired at this point, still am as this happened today, so in my sleepy haze I jokingly say "Watch, we're going to reboot the Meraki and it's gonna start working." We don't reboot the Meraki, instead we continue to dick around and check to see if it's some kind of weird ISP issue like an outage in between the sites causing the drops. After about another 10 minutes of asking ourselves "Why does everything else work but this one stupid connection?" I finally decided to tell $AH to reboot the firewall since the office is closed and no ones there. Click reboot, wait . . . reconnect to remote PC at clients site. $me "Alright, try again..." $AH "No fucking way." $me "I'M THE IT GOD." tl;dr site to site didn't work because we didn't follow the first rule of IT support [link] [comments]  |
| "We have no dial tone! Do something!" Posted: 29 Jan 2020 02:10 PM PST Howdy y'all So here's a ticket and a tech call that landed on my desk today. Issue reported - "no dial tone" ok kinda non descript but I can work with it. Last notes by colleague - "site wants IW tech out to fix issue" Ok cool, IW is on site and they're calling. Since it's a hosted voice over ATA I ask them to check the ATA for dial tone and it does. However... The site had underwent a remodeling two weeks before, and the construction company gutted the telephone wires inside and threw them all in a box. Nobody bothered to install them back in. Now we had only sent one IW tech for the job but there's no way he can do this alone and we need more info so I tell him to go home, I'll reach out to the account manager and property manager for the site. "What do you mean that's the issue? We have no dial tone, that's the issue! Fix it" Ma'am we need to coordinate with the construction people to have wiring put in, your phones don't work because there is literally nothing plugged in Eventually they got it and now this is above me, but all I can say is... please be a little more descriptive in your trouble tickets, please! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 29 Jan 2020 07:29 PM PST Let me preference this by saying I work for a large national company in sales at a "hub" office. I also made the mistake of letting people know that I am going to college to get a degree in cybersecurity and network management. Therefore while being in sales and not in IT I have only standard rights or the rites of the user who is logged in. The worst part is everyone is old enough to be my father/grandfather with the computer ability to match. Mostly when someone has a problem they come to me to take a look. I will do some basic troubleshooting, check the version, add a printer, make sure everything is plugged in, and google error codes. Find the problem download needed programs, and either fill out a ticket or please forgive me Call IT directly to RDP and put in credentials. Now onto the story $Me = me $VP = VP $HD = Help desk slave Today we had $VP come to the office and within a half-hour come to my office. He comes into my cubicle and says something along the line "$Me you know computers fix my email." This VP is one who is stubborn, short temper and computer illiterate. I know I could spend 10 minutes saying I am not IT than have some poor Help desk worker have to talk him through fixing his computer, I decided to help him. So after googling an error code and finding out its due to not updating Office 365 (No clue how his email worked for this long). I downloaded the installer and put it on the desktop in a folder. At this point in time, I call a help desk contact personally ( I know sorry). My exchange with Help desk goes like this: $Me : Hello $HD sorry to call you but I have $VP here and he is having an issue with his outlook. I hear a groan at the mention of $VP $HD: OK did you put a ticket in, and what seems to be the issue $Me : No I have not put a ticket in but, the problem is that Office 365 is out of date. I have downloaded the installer and I just need you to remote in and use your magic credentials to install it. $HD: Thank You Thank you. OK what is the service tag ... The call goes on until he remotes in and we install the update. I am thanked for taking the bullet and not yelled at for failure to make a ticket and queue jumping. All this while $VP is being his loud impatience self in the background. I hope that by saving a poor help desk that fight I have banked some goodwill with IT. tldr: Young computer guy at office saves help desk worker VP wrath. Edit: spelling and fixed calling $HD$VP [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 29 Jan 2020 05:24 AM PST I posted this in the comments of a thread over at /r/sysadmin. Thought it might entertain you folks over here. Years ago working at my old MSP, we had a client that their entire network went down. Normally we'd drive out if we can't do anything remotely, but it wasn't an option at the time as it was too far and they would be closed by the time we arrived and of course it can't wait until the morning. So off I went on the journey of troubleshooting a down network over the phone with someone who has very, very little technical prowess. Nothing is working. No internet. No servers. No ICMP response from our monitors. Nothing. I can't tell if its a switch issue, router issue, DHCP server took a shit, or if it was something else. No one can accurately tell me if the switch and router is powered on as their closet was a hot mess. For over an hour, I've been on the phone with the same person the whole call trying to get them to reboot their machine, bring up a command prompt console, type IPCONFIG and to read me everything line by line so I can get some kind of info and direction. The reboot took 5 mins, the next 55 mins was spent explaining just how to get to command prompt. Start Menu? Can't find command prompt in it. Search for it? Can't find it. I struck gold when she was able to open a run box with Win+R. I thought "FUCKING FINALLY PROGRESS." I then told her "Oookkkaayyy. In that box that just appeared, type out for me these 3 letters. C...M...D..." Of course it doesn't work. She must have heard the letters wrong. Let me try doing the military phonetic. That should clear it up. "Ok, lets try it different. C as in charlie. M as in mike. D as in Delta." Still nothing. Holy fuck shoot me. After the unholy hour, all of a sudden, all of my alerts went away. Servers are coming back online. ISP is up. I can reach the firewall. Her PC checks in to our RMM. I asked her "uhhh, everything is online. I can connect. What happened?" Then I over heard in the background "Looks like <random person> unplugged something back here to plug in a vacuum earlier. I asked what this plug on the floor was and someone said a computer? So I plugged it back in. Ask the IT guy if anything broke." Really? Thanks I guess. I immediately log in to this users PC for two reasons. 1) To verify everything is working. 2) To find out just what the fuck exactly she was held up on that she couldn't get me a fucking command prompt window for close to an hour. I click connect. My RMM window appears. The background and icons show up. My eyes dart to the bottom left. I see a run box. Whats in it? "charlie mike delta" [link] [comments]  |
| Start with the basics people. Also: trust, but verify. Posted: 29 Jan 2020 06:23 AM PST I'm a multi-talented machine operator on a production line. I worked at station A for a few years before being moved to station B a few weeks ago. When we don't want to shut down the line for breaks, I go relieve the other operator at station A so he can get a lunch break. When I go to send him to break last night, he tells me the machine is acting funny and the only way to fix it is to hit the reset button halfway through the cycle to make everything work, and then add about 5 more steps to the process. It's doable, but it sucks to work harder needlessly. The first time I go perform the sequence, I see what the issue is immediately. I call for maintenance to come help me fix the problem. The maintenance tech starts asking me what time it is so he can track it. This is an odd question because maintenance doesn't care about when something breaks, only how long we're down for. But he tells me that the other shift had the same issue, and the engineering department wants to look at the super fancy servers that record all the processes and functions of station A. I tell him the time, but I also tell him that it's just a simple sensor that needs adjusting and we'll be ready. He doesn't believe me, so I go show him where the sensor is. Or at least, I try to. It's covered in debris (it's a bad setup), and there's even a tape measure next to the sensor that was probably messing with it. The maintenance tech is even able to adjust the sensor by hand the 1/8th inch it needed to be back in its correct position. I try running the cycle again, and it works perfectly. Needless to say, the maintenance tech is pissed. "The techs from the other shift didn't do basic troubleshooting... It's no wonder everyone thinks we're idiots!"
Start with the basics - what changed from one state to the next, and what is affected. Also, verifying the problem for yourself to get a better understanding of what's happening is not a bad thing. People just get mad because they're in a rush. [link] [comments]  |
| The Projector Won't Display Video Posted: 29 Jan 2020 07:46 AM PST Got a quick one that just happened to me a few minutes ago. This will be featuring only two people. Me=Me ITPM=IT Project Manager Little background on ITPM. ITPM constantly changes settings on her laptop and moves files and folders around to where they can't be found and blames the laptop for the issues. Clearly a PEBCAC. ITPM has gone through three laptops in the last year, which the latest laptop is one I setup. I was told that before I started with the company, ITPM fried the first laptop by using the incorrect power adapter for the laptop. ITPM wears heels and clomps around the office, and when you hear the clomps, you know ITPM is coming with another wonderful issue. Clomps start growing louder as she approaches my office. ITPM: "Hi Me, do you happen to know why the projector in the conference room isn't displaying my laptop? I have it set to HDMI on the wall panel. It keeps switching between inputs." Me: "Hmm, not really sure. Let me come take a look." Proceed to follow her to conference room. I walk up to where she has her laptop plugged in and noticed the HDMI cable is going from her laptop to the HDMI port in the computer that is in the conference room. I stood there for a few seconds looking at the HDMI cable trying to comprehend what I'm witnessing. I unplug the HDMI going from her laptop to the PC and then plug in the HDMI coming from the wall to her laptop. We now have video. Here's the best part... ITPM: "I just don't understand why all of the conference rooms can't be setup the same way." Still trying to process what I had to leave my seat for. Me: "No idea." and I shrug. They're all setup the same way, except for one room where you just plug your HDMI cable into the wall plate. For all of the other rooms, you either plug your laptop into the HDMI port on the table and press "HDMI" on the wall panel, or you use the PC in the room and press "PC" on the wall. [link] [comments]  |
| Printers are of the devil, you say? Posted: 29 Jan 2020 07:22 AM PST TLDR: Printers. They are from the Devil. A tale from my time at the printing department of a major Scottish insurance company. I was part of a small team who had a technical role in printing Stuff. There was mainframe Stuff, mainly routine statements, which took place overnight via shift workers. As it was mainly automated we didn't have much to do with it. There were plenty of jobs which were not automated, or were ridiculously time critical, or ridiculously high profile, or some combo thereof. This is a tale of a job that was ridiculously high profile AND time critical AND could have landed the company with fines totalling millions of pounds. It was the time when the Low Cost Endowment problem was full swing. Quick TLDR on the LCE problem: millions of Britons were sold low monthly cost endowment savings policies to repay their mortgages. Inflation dropped. Returns on investment dropped. Shocker, your LCE wouldn't cover the cost of the mortgage. So, Major Scottish Insurance Co had to mail tens of thousands of customers on very short timescales. The wording of the letter was legally mandated, down to the font size and type. Some of the information had to be printed on a specific colour of paper - yes, the Pantone value was specified. And it had to go out in batches that were specified. It was a horrible cluster of a job. But this isn't a tale of regulators. It's a tale of printers. We had many very nice printers in that department. The highlight colour mainframe printers, which could print black + 1 colour. The Xerox 45 page per minute duplexing colour printers. And the Xerox DocuTech 180 b&w collating printer. The DocuTech 180 was, as the name implies, a 180 page per minute collating printer. It was a beast - the controller which was interface to our network was a Sun SPARCstation. I got the DT180 set up multiple ways from Sunday to automate the fiddly monthly jobs that we handled. This printer was the one chosen to handle the regulatory letter. We got the first batch of several thousand names and addresses. The rep from the customer department comes down to printer central. We all work together to get everything set up to customer satisfaction. All of us on the team were involved because we all needed to know about it, but Muggins here was the project lead, simply because I got that printer singing. Test prints work fine. Alright, let's do the mail merge using MS Word 6, IIRC. Send over 1000 names and addresses, let's see this printer do its thing! .... no, of course it wasn't that easy. The DT180 came with a disk of Windows printer drivers. We installed the provided Postscript printer driver. We spooled over a thousand names and addresses and watched the print job abort unceremoniously after printing out a few hundred names and addresses. Wait, did I say names and addresses? Nope. About a quarter of the way through the aborted job, instead of names and addresses we had random characters and rANDom cAps thAt dissoLVED into gibberish. I will cut out a lot - literally, days - of testing, messing around, and shouting at Xerox. To print out this regulator mandated job, covering multiple batches of tens of thousands of customers, in a ridiculously tight timescale, with legally mandated freaking everything we had to:
We weren't even allowed to have a bottle of whisky or other liquor of choice in our desks because of "corporate policy". [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 29 Jan 2020 07:46 AM PST I posted this as a comment but seeing the responses I figure might as well make a post of it English is not my first language so corrections are appreciated. So back in my days as IT the company was going to change our password policy and we also had our own system for entering the local network. My boss at the time told me to create write the instructions on how to set the new password (and the new policy) as well as how to enter the system with their employee account. Simple enough right? Wrote everything down and presented it to him, he gave it a quick read and said that it was too complicated, think that you are trying to teach it to a child and do it again. So I do that write everything down, every click, every window, describe the password and policy with examples and all that, and present it again. After another read he asks if I can include pictures. By this point I am making a pamphlet on how to change a password and enter a system. (Literally it was just click on .exe and enter username and password) but it was done. Save it, send it in a companywide e-mail. On that very same day, we got people asking how to do it -_- No matter how much you describe the process either the user refuses to read the instructions or they just didn't care [link] [comments]  |
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