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The Gripe Line: Top 10 Annoying Help Desk Calls

COLUMN: The Gripe Line: Top 10 Annoying Help Desk Calls
By Ed Foster
InfoWorld (US)	Category: User News & IT Management

     SAN MATEO (04/06/96) - I think we need to talk about our relationship. No, 
I don't mean the relationship between you the reader and me the columnist. I'm 
thinking more of the relationship between you, the person responsible for 
supporting the users in your organization, and me, the user who needs support. 
     I hope you're not so repressed as to refuse to admit that there is a 
problem with that relationship. You know there is. We've actually talked about 
it before, but we're way overdue to discuss it again. Something has to be done. 
     It's not an easy problem to describe, but a message I received recently 
from Rich Ellis, who is the LAN administrator for the Raleigh, North Carolina, 
branch office of Aon Consulting, may help us get some perspective on it. Ellis 
sent me what he called The Top 10 Annoying Things Users Say When Calling the 
Help Desk. It was, he said, a list he had been compiling from personal 
experience, and not just a little frustration, for some time. 
     This is Ellis' list as he sent it to me: 
     (10) "Can you get me a faster computer?"
     (9) "It wasn't doing this yesterday. What did you do to me?"
     (8) "I need you to fix this right now, it's been busted for three weeks. 
No, this is the first time I've called..."
     (7) "This computer is jinxed. I want another one."
     (6) "I hate dealing with computer geeks -- oops, um, of course I don't 
mean you."
     (5) "You're saying it's user error? Well let's just see what your manager 
thinks about this."
     (4) "What took you so long? This is the 15th time I've called you. No, I 
didn't leave any messages."
     (3) "I want a new hard drive. This one's out of focus."
     (2) "Oh, by the way, yesterday I swapped out the motherboard and the hard 
disk, installed Windows 95, and dropped the computer down the stairs. Do you 
think that has anything to do with my problem?"
     (1) "I didn't change anything -- I swear!"
     Ellis also included two runner-ups that didn't quite make his Top 10: 
     "Well, the last guy told me to do it this way, and I'd rather believe him 
than you." 
     "My computer is broken, and if you don't replace it right away, I'm 
calling your boss and his boss and his boss." 
     Ellis confessed he had only been compiling his list on an intermittent 
basis, and he thought it would be a good idea if I could solicit ones from 
others. 
     Now that InfoWorld Electric exists, doing that sort of thing is a lot 
easier than it used to be, so I posted Ellis' message in our Reader Forum to 
see what other user questions could be found. Here's just a few of the better 
ones, or the better ones that were short: 
     "My blinky is stuck."
     "Don't talk to me -- just fix it! Just fix it!!"
     "It was working fine yesterday, and I didn't drop it!"
     "I'm getting an error message that says `Network error, unable to connect 
to socket.' Does that mean my computer is unplugged?"
     "Should I hit enter or return?"
     "I need to know what bulb my monitor uses. It has burned out and my 
monitor no longer works."
     "I've learned this command that keeps me from running out of disk space. 
When the disk is full, I just delete some files. If I ever need them again, I 
can always undelete them."
     "It says to hit any key. My keyboard doesn't have an `any' key."
     Several readers submitted versions of the last one, so I guess a lot of 
users don't have an any key on their keyboard. 
     Now, you may be wondering why I'm giving you the opportunity to laugh at 
us poor dumb users. Well, it's partly because laughter is good therapy. And the 
other reason is because your turn is coming. Next week it's The Top 10 Dumb 
Answers From the Help Desk. 
     (Ed Foster's Gripe Line examines product quality, customer service, and 
sales practices. Send gripes to gripe@infoworld.com or call (800) 227- 8365, 
Ext. 710. Participate in Ed's New Gripes forum on InfoWorld Electric at 
http://www.infoworld.com.)