Since I work with the same group of people all the time, I have gotten to know most of them pretty well. There are some I'm happy to work with and enjoy the banter over the phone. Some...as soon as I see their name in my queue I just hang my head and sigh. One user in particular almost makes me want to slit my wrists.
Last week I got a ticket for him stating his system had a virus. I called him and he had a really nasty one that I wasn't able to clean. I had him ship his system in to be wiped and re-imaged. Once I received it, I wiped the drive, re-installed Windows, set everything backup, and shipped it back to him. I asked him to call me when he received it so we could go over the system to make sure no applications were missing or settings were missed. When it arrived, he called in a complete "the sky is falling" panic, and according to him the system didn't work at all. I was like "WTH?" After listening to him rant and rave for a few minutes I realized his computer was working, he just couldn't get connect to VPN. I checked his account and realized he had let his network password expire. After some "creative engineering" I was able to get into his system and help him get connected to VPN and back on the network.
He mentioned a couple of other things that needed my attention, one of which required him going to a specific website. I asked him to type the URL in the address bar. The following conversation occurred:
Me: Open Internet Explorer and type the address is the address bar
User: I can't.
Me: What do you mean you can't? Did you mouse click on the address bar in the browser?
User: Yes. Nothing happened.
Me: Did the address turn blue when you clicked it?
User: Yes, but now it's not.
Me: Is there a flashing cursor at the end of the address?
User: Yes.
Me: Ok. Use the backspace key and clear the address out.
User: But won't that take me away from the homepage
Me: No, it just clears the address so you can type a new one there and go to the website I asked you to go to.
User: Ok...but I don't think that's going to work.
...dude...really??
Me: It will work. Just clear that address out like I told you and type in the new one.
User: Ok...
I hear typing and clicking in the background.
User: Ok I did what you said but it's still on the same webpage. I told you it wouldn't work.
At this point I'm really gritting my teeth and trying to stay nice.
Me: After you typed the address in, did you hit enter?
User: No.
Me: Is the cursor still flashing at the end of the address you just typed.
User: Yes
Me: Ok, just hit enter.
User: I don't know what good that's going to do.
Me: Just hit enter and it will work.
User: Ok, it looks like it's going to the website.
The call just got progressively worse from that point, but after 5 hours on the phone taking care of little adjustments and settings (that should have taken less than an hour), he was back up and running. After incidents like that, I see why people drink on the job! I told a co-worker we needed to take that guys computer away and give him a Big Chief pad and a Crayon.
