I don't care if you are a(n):

[ebtb.livejournal.com]

• programmer
• network admin
• developer
• certified in __________
• analyst
• consultant
• engineer
• technician
• et cetera

YOU ARE STILL CALLING ME FOR TECH SUPPORT. It doesn't matter. Telling me that you a fish farmer is just as pertinent. So just STFU and let me help you. Help me help you.

Comments

[xforge.livejournal.com]

However if you're the Senior Vice President of the Entire Fricking Western Hemisphere, please let me know somehow so I don't accidentally put you on hold for 20 minutes while helping some Lowly Peon open an email attachment. Thanks.

[mouser.livejournal.com]

In fairness, if I tell you that it's so we can skip the "Press the 'Start' - that's in the lower left hand corner." part of the script and I can tell you what I've already tried.

But yes - I've had the "I'm a Systems Engineer! I'm not an ID10T!" thing too. Then I've released/renewed an the net connection, gotten the IP address and fixed the problem in 30 seconds.

[tothwolf.livejournal.com]

Having dealt with both sides of it far too many times, I still find it easier to tell folks to skip the script when I've already done basic (and advanced) trouble shooting.

There's nothing more irritating than having to deal with a 1st level rep at [insert major network company] who won't transfer me because they insist the problem just has to be on my end, when I can easily tell that some major router somewhere is misconfigured or malfunctioning ;P

[manuka.livejournal.com]

I will usually tell the remote tech support people I'm the network admin so they CAN help me. Spouting the end-user script at me isn't going to help me. Mainly because I'm probably not calling with an end-user level problem (it's my job to keep those from getting to you poor sods at vendor support)

It also gives tech support context for the problem that's being posed.

[manuka.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, those of us who really are competent geeks that ran into some oddball problem can find more clever ways of letting on to the remote support people that we're not totally clueless about operating a computer. The ones that like to think they're smarter than they are just will blatantly make the claim.

[anivair.livejournal.com]

My thought is that if you stick with a tech support company long enough they will eventually learn whether or not you know your stuff. One company that supports us kn ows me very well and we talk geek to geek. the others, I call less often, and so I go through the script. Whatever gets the job done, IMO.

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

I like the one that called in this morning:

I came into work today (duh; you're calling internal tech support) and my computer has a problem (duh part deux; you don't call when it's working correctly).

I much prefer:

Hi, this is XYZ. My computer is spitting blood from the cup holder .

Concise, informative, and straight to the point. I like it!

I really think Douglas Adams had it right when he had Ford Prefect theorize that humans had to keep talking or their heads would explode.

[brothersterno.livejournal.com]

As someone who talks on the phone with people about their internet connections, there's nothing worse than someone telling me they are smart and that they should skip the troubleshooting steps. I'm not asking you to do them because I want to punish you, I am asking you to do them because I need to see what happens when you do them. Powercycling your DSL bridge, solving the problem, and then calling an hour later and expecting me to say more than "Well, it looks like you fixed it! Way to go!" is the path to crushing disappointment.

The other thing is that I may be making you go through the troubleshooting steps to prove that it's not my problem, and that you should check your shit first.

[tnjade.livejournal.com]

Addendum: If you ARE the SVP of the EFWH, let me know, and also let me know that you're using a docking station with your laptop. That would have saved us several hours, and I wouldn't have had to have the entire engineering staff working on your issue. But what do I know? I'm just a tech.

[ghostdandp.livejournal.com]

Typically "I've run a tracert and I'm getting 3 hops up to your local NOC, DNS is not being looked up even though DHCP is getting a DNS address from you, I've released and renewed a few times, along with disabling and reenabling the NIC, I've also eliminted my router and tried a direct connectom from both the tower and notebook pcs" will generally get you past the BS.

Either that, or depending on who you've gotten, you'll get a dumb "uh.. so.. click the start button on the lower left hand side of your window"

[bassgirl.livejournal.com]

When I used to support cell phones, I'd get some really troubleshooting-resistant people. I'd ask them to hold on for a moment, I'd pound on my keyboard a bit so it sounded like I'm doing something, then say "ok, so I've tried to update something here, and I'm not sure if this will work. I know you've updated this setting/powercycled the phone/whatever simple thing I asked them to do, but after doing this change in our systems I'd like to repeat it to see if the quick fix will work today. If not, I'll get our tech support on the other line - hopefully the wait will be less than 20 min this time."

Lo and behold! Turning the phone off and then back on reset it! My magic keyboard pounding musta dun it.

[brothersterno.livejournal.com]

hahah. I do broadband DSL and t-1 support, so when I get someone who is not believing that it's their problem, I offer to check with my NOC, and put them on hold. I go make some tea, maybe take a quick break, and come back 5 inutes or so later. They, while on hold, usually follow all my sugggestions and fix it themselves, since they have nothing else to do, being on hold for tech support. :)

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

Powercycling your DSL bridge, solving the problem, and then calling an hour later and expecting me to say more than "Well, it looks like you fixed it! Way to go!" is the path to crushing disappointment.

Agh! Don't talk to me about people who call me up when there is ABSOLUTELY. NOTHING. WRONG. At ALL. And they'll wait twenty minutes in my phone queue to tell me so. Especially when I was in a job where every call, no matter how trivial or short, had to have a ticket logged for it. Even calls where people hung up before talking, or wrong numbers. Twenty minutes in the queue, plus three minutes calling up a new ticket and punching user information into it, only for the log to read "Caller phoned to advise there was nothing wrong at all."

WHY DO THEY WASTE MY TIME?

And these aren't the people who just think something's wrong, or have a "feeling" that the PC is 0.0001% slower than last month. They will freely and happily admit that there was absolutely no reason for them to be calling at all, except possibly so that if their boss asks why they're not working, they can say "I'm on the phone to tech support."

Worse still, they were public servants - my taxes were paying for these wastes of skin to literally do nothing except annoy me!

[brothersterno.livejournal.com]

So, we had a discussion about this at work. If someone calls and insists they don't have to do troubleshooting because they are a consultant, unless there is something obviously broken, they are too stupid to fix it themselves, and are trying to get you to help them for free. Smart network consultants do two things: Anticipate questions (so they have a computer directly connected, have access hours, DMARC info, etc etc.) and they don't tell us they are network consultants, so they don't get the "You are an idiot" troubleshooting treatment.

[tothwolf.livejournal.com]

Exactly :)