One time while working IT...

Homicidal_Squirrel · Nov 7, 2015

Some are really funny. Some are really creepy.

This one is one of my favorites because I've known people to do similar things.

Ryujin · Nov 8, 2015

A few of mine:

A subordinate was complaining that a computer he had on his bench for repair stank. I thought that he was talking about the usual fried chip smell of a blown power supply until he cracked the box and I saw the sandwich bag, that had been sitting inside the case since its assembly a year prior.

I got a tech support call from a user who stated that the coffee holder on her computer had stopped working. Wait for it......

I had a university professor place a high priority call, because his computer was dead. Upon attending the site I switched on his power bar.

Back in the days of DOS 4.01 I had a client call and state that while installing DOS from 1.2 Meg floppy, on her 120 Meg hard drive, she had run out of space. Upon further questioning I determined that she had run out of space in the floppy drive, after inserting the second disk, and could not insert the third. Technically she was correct in that the on-screen instructions never specified removing the first disk, prior to inserting the second.

Homicidal_Squirrel · Nov 8, 2015

That floppy story wins the lulz.

Scott DeWar · Nov 10, 2015

Ryujin said:
A few of mine:

I got a tech support cal from a user who stated that the coffee holder on her computer had stopped working. Wait for it......

funny but true:

I was removing and replacing a cd when I thought in my head in a joking fashion "Oh look, my coffee cup holder!"

delericho · Nov 10, 2015

An oldie, but still a favourite:

"On two occasions I have been asked, 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question."

There really is nothing new under the sun.

Scott DeWar · Nov 10, 2015

GIGO, learn it! That deserves a face palm.

Fasckira · Nov 13, 2015

I had one user really wind me up years back. The company used Lotus Notes for their email (a nightmare story in itself) and something had corrupted her client. When I was unable to fix it straight away she insisted that my predecessor would have had this done in seconds, why was I being so slow, that kind of gumph.

Anyway, I told her I had to double check a few things on the server and that I'd be back in 10 minutes. Got back to find the PC lying on the desk, open case, hard drive hanging out and a crowd of senior management around the desk. I immediately received a grilling - why did I leave her PC in such a state? Where have I been?

After a few moments I managed to explain that I hadn't done any of this and the lady eventually conceded that while I had started to look into the problem she had figured she could resolve this herself. Turns out my predecessor's last visit to her PC had involved him replacing a faulty hard drive. She had watched him unplug and plug the HDD back in again and hey presto - the PC worked again. Surely thats all it took for her to fix the problem, right?

When other people stopped by to see her with her PC in such a state she had opened with, "Oh its IT's fault, they're messing up my PC trying to fix it".

Ryujin · Nov 13, 2015

Fasckira said:
I had one user really wind me up years back. The company used Lotus Notes for their email (a nightmare story in itself) and something had corrupted her client. When I was unable to fix it straight away she insisted that my predecessor would have had this done in seconds, why was I being so slow, that kind of gumph.

Anyway, I told her I had to double check a few things on the server and that I'd be back in 10 minutes. Got back to find the PC lying on the desk, open case, hard drive hanging out and a crowd of senior management around the desk. I immediately received a grilling - why did I leave her PC in such a state? Where have I been?

After a few moments I managed to explain that I hadn't done any of this and the lady eventually conceded that while I had started to look into the problem she had figured she could resolve this herself. Turns out my predecessor's last visit to her PC had involved him replacing a faulty hard drive. She had watched him unplug and plug the HDD back in again and hey presto - the PC worked again. Surely thats all it took for her to fix the problem, right?

When other people stopped by to see her with her PC in such a state she had opened with, "Oh its IT's fault, they're messing up my PC trying to fix it".

I've been there. You have my sympathy. In my current position it's quite common for people to call our helpdesk and report that "a technician was on my floor, a while ago, and now I can't turn on my computer." or the like. No, we haven't been anywhere near the computer in question when that call comes in.

As Winter approaches I'll start seeing more calls like one that I dealt with on Monday. The user reported that her printer was dead. Upon attending her office I took one look at the dead printer, another at the turned on but non functioning portable heater plugged into the socket next to it, pulled the plug for the heater out, and told the user to call Facilities so that they could flip the circuit breaker back on.

was · Nov 19, 2015

...I'm not in IT, but at my last job we had a supervisor go ballistic over her PC. She kept claiming that there was a 'virus' attacking her computer. It turns out they had updated the email system which now produced a notification pop-up when the department manager, her immediate supervisor, sent her a message. She refused to click on the email notification, fearing that it would 'delete her hard drive'.

Ryujin · Nov 19, 2015

Here's a new one that started on Monday, then popped up like a bad penny again today. On Monday I got a call that stated a user's keyboard on her new desktop wasn't working. There was no further information provided. When I showed up at her office she wasn't there but her new desktop was, with both the keyboard provided with the new computer and a smaller keyboard, with no numeric pad, that incorporated a touchpad. As the provided keyboard was on a keyboard drawer that was pushed back and the smaller keyboard was front and centre on the desk, it was clear that this mysterious keyboard was what the user meant.

I corrected the issue by plugging the keyboard into one of the available USB ports.

Today my manager called me into his office to ask about the call. It seems that the user said she had told me the keyboard was an "accommodation" (HR-speak for considered necessary due to some injury or other disability on the part of the user) and that it wasn't working properly. She complained that the characters she typed weren't the ones that were appearing on-screen. Clarification: She and I never spoke. The "me" that she was referring to was the helpdesk person who received her call and then generated the work order, inconveniently leaving out about a paragraph of description in favour of the 4 word fault description, "The keyboard doesn't work."

So I returned to the office, looked down at the keyboard in question, and turned off the Num Lock.