• GrandmasterB (unregistered)

    "I'm sorry, but the system administrators [insert names] have created a policy that requires their authorization to unlock accounts. If you'd like to discuss this policy, their phone numbers are ..."

  • Bare (unregistered) in reply to GrandmasterB
    GrandmasterB:
    "I'm sorry, but the system administrators [insert names] have created a policy that requires their authorization to unlock accounts. If you'd like to discuss this policy, their phone numbers are ..."

    Instant sack in a lot of place's I've worked.... People seemed more worried about personnel information being released to the public than anything else

    I once worked on a project in the middle of contract negotiations. Real sticking point on the contract was that the People we were contracted to wanted uncapped liability on any losses should their internal telephone directory be leaked out. The mission critical software (planes kinda relied on it to stay in the sky) we were working on had liability capped at $5 million, and this mob were worried about a phone book??

    Naturally, this was all despite the fact that everyone who worked there had been security vetted and approved by the client.

    Giving out phone numbers (while nice, especially here to keep people awake) is something companies frown upon, because they have an eternal fear of lawsuits from breaching privacy laws.

  • semipseudointellectualitis (unregistered) in reply to Mogri
    Mogri:
    pink_fairy:
    Interoperability between Broca's area on the part of a meme's proponent, on the one hand, and Wernicke's area on the part of the recipient, on the other, using the metalinguistic short-cut of an acronym is a perfectly cromulent methodology.

    There are, however, two problems in this instance:

    (1) It's not an acronym. How the hell would you pronounce it? (2) It's incorrect. It should be "BTDTGT(IG)T." FTFY. (3) Did it really take you ten-plus seconds to figure it out? How tragic...

    Oops.

    Ignoring your rampant pseudointellectualism for a moment, I believe the acronym (and it is an acronym -- a word (as NATO, radar, or laser) formed from the initial letter or letters of each of the successive parts or major parts of a compound term ; also : an abbreviation (as FBI)) is "Been there, done that, got the t-shirt." I'm not sure where your (IG) comes in. How tragic...

    Oops.

    wow pseudointellectualizing the pseudointellectualism. that's metapseudointellectualization. good job

  • asdf (unregistered) in reply to semipseudointellectualitis
    semipseudointellectualitis:
    wow pseudointellectualizing the pseudointellectualism. that's metapseudointellectualization. good job
    Clearly an antimetapseudointellectialist.
  • (cs) in reply to Bare
    Bare:
    Giving out phone numbers (while nice, especially here to keep people awake) is something companies frown upon, because they have an eternal fear of lawsuits from breaching privacy laws.
    I thought it was more for the purpose of preventing unwanted phone calls. Occasionally I get a call from a vendor who somehow got my work phone number--most likely from someone associated with some seminar I attended where the online registration required a phone number for confirmation.

    This guy wants a foot in the door and thinks I'm it. I'm quick to point out that I am not a decision-maker regarding whatever product he's pushing. Then of course he wants the name and phone number of the person who is that decision-maker. My response is always, "You give me your name and contact information. I'll pass it on to him, and if he's interested he'll be able to contact you."

  • Franz Kafka (unregistered) in reply to Bare
    Bare:
    GrandmasterB:
    "I'm sorry, but the system administrators [insert names] have created a policy that requires their authorization to unlock accounts. If you'd like to discuss this policy, their phone numbers are ..."

    Instant sack in a lot of place's I've worked.... People seemed more worried about personnel information being released to the public than anything else

    I once worked on a project in the middle of contract negotiations. Real sticking point on the contract was that the People we were contracted to wanted uncapped liability on any losses should their internal telephone directory be leaked out. The mission critical software (planes kinda relied on it to stay in the sky) we were working on had liability capped at $5 million, and this mob were worried about a phone book??

    Naturally, this was all despite the fact that everyone who worked there had been security vetted and approved by the client.

    Giving out phone numbers (while nice, especially here to keep people awake) is something companies frown upon, because they have an eternal fear of lawsuits from breaching privacy laws.

    really? How do you get anything done? Besides, how the hell is your extension a private datum?

  • blunder (unregistered) in reply to Mogri
    Mogri:
    pink_fairy:
    Interoperability between Broca's area on the part of a meme's proponent, on the one hand, and Wernicke's area on the part of the recipient, on the other, using the metalinguistic short-cut of an acronym is a perfectly cromulent methodology.

    There are, however, two problems in this instance:

    (1) It's not an acronym. How the hell would you pronounce it? (2) It's incorrect. It should be "BTDTGT(IG)T." FTFY. (3) Did it really take you ten-plus seconds to figure it out? How tragic...

    Oops.

    Ignoring your rampant pseudointellectualism for a moment, I believe the acronym (and it is an acronym -- a word (as NATO, radar, or laser) formed from the initial letter or letters of each of the successive parts or major parts of a compound term ; also : an abbreviation (as FBI)) is "Been there, done that, got the t-shirt." I'm not sure where your (IG) comes in. How tragic...

    Oops.

    I believe he was trying to contrast an initialism with an acronym. But I'll be damned if I know what that extra IG is for. A type of cotton weave?

  • (cs) in reply to semipseudointellectualitis
    semipseudointellectualitis:
    Mogri:
    pink_fairy:
    Interoperability between Broca's area on the part of a meme's proponent, on the one hand, and Wernicke's area on the part of the recipient, on the other, using the metalinguistic short-cut of an acronym is a perfectly cromulent methodology.

    There are, however, two problems in this instance:

    (1) It's not an acronym. How the hell would you pronounce it? (2) It's incorrect. It should be "BTDTGT(IG)T." FTFY. (3) Did it really take you ten-plus seconds to figure it out? How tragic...

    Oops.

    Ignoring your rampant pseudointellectualism for a moment, I believe the acronym (and it is an acronym -- a word (as NATO, radar, or laser) formed from the initial letter or letters of each of the successive parts or major parts of a compound term ; also : an abbreviation (as FBI)) is "Been there, done that, got the t-shirt." I'm not sure where your (IG) comes in. How tragic...

    Oops.

    wow pseudointellectualizing the pseudointellectualism. that's metapseudointellectualization. good job

    I'll see your semipseudointellectualitis and raise you a Semiramis... And to Mogri: Pretentious, moi? I'll have to step outside and look up the French translation for "whoosh!" I may be some time.

    Feel free to look back at previous IG references on Worse Than Failure ("Look, Mommy, I can spell it out now!"). Yes, you missed something epochal. Yes, you are indeed tragic ... but so many of the best clowns are, really.

    Way to go on attribution, BTW. I doubt all your beliefs derive from Merriam-Webster; certainly, very few of mine do.

    Let me spell this out for the chronically hard-of-thinking. Point (1) -- the acronym point -- was a JdE; that's a J.E.U. D.'E.S.P.R.I.T. It would be an acronym, but unfortunately it's just three words in a foreign language.

    Here's a totally unrepresentative, but quite cute, reference: "Let’s start with the official meaning. In the Oxford English Dictionary "acronym" is defined as "a word formed out of the initial letters of other words". Its derivation is from the Greek words acro (= "topmost") + onoma (= "name"), by analogy with "homonym", "synonym", etc."

    I stand by this. BTDTGTT is not a word.

    Although, if it was, it would come in jolly useful at Scrabble.

  • Ru (unregistered) in reply to pink_fairy

    (1) 'Butdutguttea' (2) ITYF it works just fine without the extra IG. YMMV. In fact, I can't even work out what the IG might mean. I even had to look up FTFY :-(

    It was funnier in my head as 'Fk That, Fk You'

    Ambiguous abbreviations are always entertaining, and make a splendid substitute for making a real, helpful, useful or humourous contribution to the subject, IYKWIM.

    ISYD.

  • GrandmasterB (unregistered) in reply to Bare
    Bare:
    GrandmasterB:
    "I'm sorry, but the system administrators [insert names] have created a policy that requires their authorization to unlock accounts. If you'd like to discuss this policy, their phone numbers are ..."

    Instant sack in a lot of place's I've worked.... People seemed more worried about personnel information being released to the public than anything else

    Werent these 'internal' customers? Giving the (work) phone number of a sysadmin to another employee at the company isnt exactly a violation of privacy.

  • Frenchier than thou (unregistered)

    Amybody clicked on the trackback link? I did not think trackbacks were used for spam....

  • Anonymous (unregistered)

    Sixty-fourth!

  • (cs) in reply to Frenchier than thou
    Frenchier than thou:
    Amybody clicked on the trackback link? I did not think trackbacks were used for spam....
    I'll assume you're NOT being sarcastic. (protip: Sarcasm usually uses tone-of-voice, so it doesn't work in textual comments.) Trackback spam is essentially an SEO technique. It's common enough that some *back systems are designed to combat it.
  • Frenchier than thou (unregistered) in reply to pink_fairy
    pink_fairy:
    I'll see your semipseudointellectualitis and raise you a Semiramis... And to Mogri: Pretentious, moi? I'll have to step outside and look up the French translation for "whoosh!" I may be some time.
    Hey, I could probably help: the translation you are looking for is "wouche!"
    pink_fairy:
    Point (1) -- the acronym point -- was a JdE; that's a J.E.U. D.'E.S.P.R.I.T. It would be an acronym, but unfortunately it's just three words in a foreign language.
    If there was an acronym for "jeu d'esprit" in french, it would be JE; french acronym composition does not take into account connectors like "de" of which " d' " is a contraction.
  • (cs) in reply to PyroTyger
    PyroTyger:
    It took them two days to fix this process screw-up? Wow... try working in the public sector. Six months, minimum.

    Six months is the if you're lucky figure. 2 years is more realistic... And if it's a policy based around a new system they paid millions for, at least 4 years.

  • Henning Makholm (unregistered) in reply to Todd
    Todd:
    I'm continuously befuddled at this. Its not rocket science...its basic common sense that improving the way call centers work would have a huge impact across the board on your organization. But yet no company does it. I just can't figure it out.
    Companies know this. So they bring in consultants to figure out how to make customers better satisfied with the phone support. The consultant will have a degree in PR or Communications (the humanities kind), but probably won't know a bit from a byte. The consultant will then recommend a program to make sure that supporters use the customer's first name in conversation.
  • Gusgus (unregistered)

    sigh A whiney story by someone who hates his job. Help desk is full of idiots and the admin was right to assume that he was one. This is no fault of the system administrators (although half of the system admins i know are stupid too..) it's the fault of stupid management changes instead.

    Our help desk is so stupid that one of our help desk called our lead software engineer to ask him how to change a desktop resolution. I've got no sympathy.

  • Isaac Eiland-Hall (unregistered) in reply to system admin
    system admin:
    One minor mistake of the system admins. One major whine of the helpdesk agent Stephen. And guess what? We got that palankin thing just a few weeks later!

    Three Mistakes for the Board of Directors under the sky, Seven for the Accountants in their halls of stone, Nine for Helpdesk Techs doomed to die, One for the SysAdmin in his dark bed In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie. One Mistake to rule them all, One Mistake to find them, One Mistake to bring them all and in legalese bind them In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie.

  • compro01 (unregistered) in reply to Todd
    Todd:
    shepd:
    Yes, totally serious. I was being paid $10.41/hr (Temp agencies absolute minimum pay is $10/hr, if you had even half a brain and would come to work on time you'd get $12/hr).

    ...snip...

    Man, sorry for the spiel. It felt so good to vent, though!

    Actually, interesting story. My wife has worked in a few call centers (airlines, banking, etc) and has many similar stories.

    I'm continuously befuddled at this. Its not rocket science...its basic common sense that improving the way call centers work would have a huge impact across the board on your organization. But yet no company does it. I just can't figure it out.

    The problem is that they seem to think they are improving how they work by setting stuff up like this.

  • Not as DULL as you (unregistered)

    The only WTF here is that the sysadmin didn't follow through with being placed on call. Had he done what he was presumably employed to do and unlocked the accounts everything would have been fine.

    This was not a problem with process.

  • nobody (unregistered) in reply to Matt A
    Matt A:
    shepd:
    BTDTGTT.

    Although, in this case, it was the next level up rejected perfectly valid tickets because of the slightest bit of troubleshooting being missing, even things that make no sense. Example:

    I know that you typed that acronym to save yourself 10 seconds of typing time. But as a result, you cost all the rest of us who don't know what it means, more than 10 seconds of time looking it up. Just so we could know what you were talking about.

    In short, acronyms are over used.

    No, he's just a cunt and likes to feel special because he knows something you don't.

  • HB (unregistered)

    Whoa... who posted my company on here?

  • Major Malfunction (unregistered) in reply to GrandmasterB
    GrandmasterB:
    Werent these 'internal' customers? Giving the (work) phone number of a sysadmin to another employee at the company isnt exactly a violation of privacy.
    Once the clients have the number of a decent sysadmin, they try to (understandably) bypass the helpdesk by calling him direct. This is bad for statistics, and often a PITA for the sysadmin, especially in a centralised global helpdesk.
  • Jonathan Wilson (unregistered) in reply to webhamster

    These days, even if someone who worked in a help desk DID know how to solve the customers problem (rather than just following some stupid script that wont help), they aren't allowed to do it.

    So when someone rings up because they are having trouble and its obvious from the symptoms that they have a virus, the help desk people have to run the ridiculous script (which almost certainly will NOT include "have you run a virus scan", for some reason ISP/computer OEM/etc help desk managers seem to mot want to have their staff ask the customers to run such scans even when its clear that there is a virus involved)

  • Sane Person (unregistered) in reply to snoofle
    snoofle:
    And this clearly illustrates why, when saddled with strangling procedures, you should use them to cause as much damage as possible, thus forcing the upper up's to notice and change the stupid rules.

    An associate of mine used to work for a certain railroad operation in the United Kingdom. He once told me that when the union there had a dispute with management, one of the job actions that they would take as a measure tougher than just complaining or threatening but when they weren't prepared to go as far as a strike, was something they called "To Rule". This meant that they followed all company policies ... to the letter. Until management gave in to their demands.

  • (cs) in reply to Isaac Eiland-Hall
    Isaac Eiland-Hall:
    system admin:
    One minor mistake of the system admins. One major whine of the helpdesk agent Stephen. And guess what? We got that palankin thing just a few weeks later!

    Three Mistakes for the Board of Directors under the sky, Seven for the Accountants in their halls of stone, Nine for Helpdesk Techs doomed to die, One for the SysAdmin in his dark bed In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie. One Mistake to rule them all, One Mistake to find them, One Mistake to bring them all and in legalese bind them In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie.

    Troll^H^H^H^H^HOrc!
  • (cs) in reply to Sane Person
    Sane Person:
    An associate of mine used to work for a certain railroad operation in the United Kingdom. He once told me that when the union there had a dispute with management, one of the job actions that they would take as a measure tougher than just complaining or threatening but when they weren't prepared to go as far as a strike, was something they called "To Rule". This meant that they followed all company policies ... to the letter. Until management gave in to their demands.
    It's called "Work To Rule", and what it *particularly* means that scares management is "No more feckin' unpaid overtime, you cheapskate skanks!" :)

    We should try it in our line of work more often...

  • db (unregistered) in reply to DaveK

    Nice story here about violating a rule that seperates successful operations from pointless beauracracies.

    Thou shalt not let pointless personal empire building hold up production.

  • Michael (unregistered) in reply to Todd
    Todd:
    I'm continuously befuddled at (how call centres are run). Its not rocket science...its basic common sense that improving the way call centers work would have a huge impact across the board on your organization. But yet no company does it. I just can't figure it out.

    No, it isn't rocket surgery. You, however, operate on the clearly-deluded notion that businesses are run by rational, self-interested people who seek to maximize profit.

    They aren't.

    Businesses are run by egomaniacs and by people who seek power, where "power" is defined as "being able to make someone else miserable and get away with it".

    That is all.

  • 50% Opacity (unregistered)

    I used to work in end-user support for a major multi-national computer manufacturer, and a lot of the support center stories here sound very familiar. Fortunately, that was in the Netherlands, were they have decent unions (i.e. no random graveyard shifts) and non of the superiors really gave a crap about sticking to the rule.

    Calls were monitored randomly, and there was a lot of emphasis on the opening and closing script ("Welcome to ..., my name is ..., can I have your support ID, how can I help you, please look at our website ...") and stuff like that. Everybody hated saying it, everybody hated hearing it, nobody wanted it. I rarely gave the whole speech, I rather focused on helping the customer. And I was good at it, so even though they always complained about my lack of script, they knew I was (one of) the best in the whole team and didn't do much about it.

    Eventually they folded the small call center into HQ, then outsourced everything again to Ireland, then to the lowest bidder someplace else. Their support sucks now I hear.

  • Noddy (unregistered)

    Does this remind me of one of my previous positions or what! funny how the people making the decisions usually have no idea of what they decide on....

  • TWC is da BEST!!! (unregistered)

    I worked in a call center for about...two weeks, not including training.

    It was my first job out of college, when I was sick of school and wanted to do something unchallenging and make some money while I figured out what to do with my life. A women referred me to a cable company (funny story actually--she was an executive at Goodwill, thought I was homeless because of my dirty denim jacket, bad shoes and long hair, and gave me her card syaing she could help). I interviewed and got the job.

    I was top of my class in training. I learned all bout channels slection and router troubleshooting and packaging and bundling and everything. It was pretty fun and I was genuinely excited about helping people and being a positive experience for people in an inconvenient and frustrating situation.

    Like I said, I was there a week. The customers were horrible, but everyone knows that--my two most memorable experiences were a man who, after I asked if a particular time was good for him, berated me for such a long time that by the time we got back on topic about getting a tech out to him, that slot had been taken by someone else, leading to more abuse; the other was an old lady telling me to go to hell for [boring reasons].

    And there was all the policy crap. Can't go to the bathroom whenever you want, always have to make the upsell (which seemed crazy to me--"Oh yes sir, I know the stuff you're paying for isn't working, but would you like some MORE stuff?"). They recorded EVERY call, and had an army of QA people to listen in. It was nerve wracking and terrible.

    After two weeks I couldn't sleep. I couldn't taste food. I was miserable, but I was ready to stick it out for the life experience, the possibility of a better position down the line, and yeah, because I did want to help people. The tipping point for me was when I told my supervisor person that I was stressed out and if she had any advice. She did: "Start drinking".

    I was still in my six week probation period, which they claimed was "so we can make sure you're comfortable with the position" (i.e., so we can fire your butt for any damn reason). I decided I wasn't comfortable, called and said I wasn't coming in, and simply decided never to put that job on any resume ever. I anulled my marriage to that company.

    The next day, I went to the mall, and got a job in an Optometrist office as a tech. Not a great job--all the bad stuff about retail plus cranky doctors--but looking back I thoroughly enjoyed that job, because when people were mad at me, they at least had to look in my face before calling me a name. And I really felt like I was helping people.

  • Nepto (unregistered) in reply to Xanthus179
    Xanthus179:
    Was going to be first, but got locked out of my account. Check my comment in about nine hours.

    Hahaha, really funny :-)

  • Not the Real WTF (unregistered)

    Is this Active Directory? I thought certain account properties propogate immediately to other domain controllers...otherwise you could end up with say, a disabled account in one site but the account is enabled in another for some time? That'd be a breach.

    Anyway, the policy seems idiotic, but the sysadmin, in the time he spent berating the help desk guy, could've logged in, unlocked the account, and been asleep. Asshole.

    And account lockout should have a limited duration. Someone more ambitious than me could write a formula that includes the login failure threshold, the lockout duration, and the time until password expiration to calculate the number of login attempts possible in that time period, and adjust all the settings so you can only go through x number of passwords. Of course meanwhile, the attacker has effectively DOS your account.

    Considering that, its certainly arguable that lockout decreases risk at all.

  • (cs) in reply to Not the Real WTF
    Not the Real WTF:
    Anyway, the policy seems idiotic, but the sysadmin, in the time he spent berating the help desk guy, could've logged in, unlocked the account, and been asleep. Asshole.

    I get the impression that he knew a storm was coming - he does that, then he has to do it all night for every one of the calls, then it's become his responsibility so the policy won't change back, then a week later the next guy to rotate into being on-call kicks his ass.

  • Not the Real WTF (unregistered) in reply to Random832
    Random832:
    I get the impression that he knew a storm was coming - he does that, then he has to do it all night for every one of the calls, then it's become his responsibility so the policy won't change back, then a week later the next guy to rotate into being on-call kicks his ass.

    Yeah. So what kind of socially maladjusted crap eater abuses a colleague in that manner? (well, besides a DWTF commenter?). Yeah, I know. In a better world there wouldn't be a need for this website...

    If he wanted the policy changed, simply tell that to the help desk guy, so that they he understands what's about to happen. Stress goes down, morale goes up, win-win-win.

    A coworker that treats me like that is going to have something very bad happen to him.

  • John (unregistered)

    "Stephen" is in no way biased, though.... nope, completely unbiased, reasonable and hard-working.

    well, I'm off to go make the helpdesk's lives miserable again... we've got a strict schedule around here and if I don't get around to removing more random permissions before 5, I'll have to do it tomorrow and then I wouldn't meet my evil quota.

  • cb (unregistered) in reply to blunder
    blunder:
    I'll be damned if I know what that extra IG is for. A type of cotton weave?
    In-Game perhaps?
  • dailyWTH (unregistered)

    why should the admin deal with minor tickets in the middle of the night? sounds perfectly fine to me...

  • Old Fart (unregistered) in reply to Isaac Eiland-Hall
    Isaac Eiland-Hall:
    system admin:
    One minor mistake of the system admins. One major whine of the helpdesk agent Stephen. And guess what? We got that palankin thing just a few weeks later!

    Three Mistakes for the Board of Directors under the sky, Seven for the Accountants in their halls of stone, Nine for Helpdesk Techs doomed to die, One for the SysAdmin in his dark bed In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie. One Mistake to rule them all, One Mistake to find them, One Mistake to bring them all and in legalese bind them In the Land of Corpor where the Shadows lie.

    'Twas brillig! and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble full of win!!1!over9000!!1!one!!

  • Old Fart (unregistered) in reply to asdf
    asdf:
    semipseudointellectualitis:
    wow pseudointellectualizing the pseudointellectualism. that's metapseudointellectualization. good job
    Clearly an antimetapseudointellectialist.
    wtf, is this forum overrun with germans? i'll play: Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz

    (also, throw the brick right, it's a -u-, and he/she/it's only semi: antisemimetapseudointellectualist.)

  • Matt A (unregistered) in reply to Old Fart
    Old Fart:
    asdf:
    semipseudointellectualitis:
    wow pseudointellectualizing the pseudointellectualism. that's metapseudointellectualization. good job
    Clearly an antimetapseudointellectialist.
    wtf, is this forum overrun with germans? i'll play: Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz
    Beef Labeling Law surveillance task transfer?
  • (cs) in reply to cb
    cb:
    blunder:
    I'll be damned if I know what that extra IG is for. A type of cotton weave?
    In-Game perhaps?

    IG = Irish Girl

    As in "Been There, Done That, Got the (Irish Girl) T-shirt"

  • tamosius (unregistered) in reply to akatherder
    akatherder:
    I like the way you think. I wouldn't necessarily use the word "damage", but you can't get in trouble for following a process to the letter. If you can, you shouldn't be working there. So do whatever dumbass retarded things the process tells you to do and fall back on the process as your excuse.

    ..but isn't that what procedures are being created for? you print it, and then cover your ass...

  • ex-ISP (unregistered) in reply to shepd
    shepd:
    bigtuna:
    shepd:
    BTDTGTT.

    Although, in this case, it was the next level up rejected perfectly valid tickets because of the slightest bit of troubleshooting being missing, even things that make no sense. Example: ---eek-----

    Sure, they might lay you off. But the pay was so low, temp agencies were hiring at exactly the same pay rate. So who cares? Besides, if you're laid off, you get pogey, which is nice.

    seriously? I'll never be surprised by bad tech support at my ISP again... bet they do the same thing

    Yes, totally serious. I was being paid $10.41/hr (Temp agencies absolute minimum pay is $10/hr, if you had even half a brain and would come to work on time you'd get $12/hr).

    I was expected to work shifts that would change every two weeks. You could be on a 5 pm - 1:30 am shift (the 30 minutes were lunch) working SuMThFSa, and then be put on an 7 am - 3:30 pm shift working MTuWThF, meaning on Friday you leave work at 1:30 am, go to sleep at 2 am at home, wake up at ~6 am (with ~4 hours sleep) and work 8 am - 4:30 pm.

    And this sort of BS would happen to anyone who didn't fight to keep their AHT (average handle time) under ~8 minutes (below 8 minutes and you were in the top 25% and had a pretty good pick of shifts). If your AHT was above about ~14 minutes you be getting the worst of the worst, since that would place you in the bottom 50%. Oh, if you were on a call that lasted longer than your shift (and this would regularly happen) you would get to stay overtime until it was done. Not that the last bit is a surprise, but imagine being on a horrid 30 minute long call at the end of the shift change... God help you. [...snip...]

    Man, sorry for the spiel. It felt so good to vent, though!

    I know how it is. I worked for the helpdesk of a multinational Telecomm/ISP in Europe called Tele2. I was in the DSL department.

    I am a computer engineer, so I was overqualified, but it was close to home, and other engineers I know worked there too, I like to help people with problems.

    I should have known that would be a problem when i heard about AHT (average handling time), the time spent on the phone and after the call per customer, before you're ready for next call. The requirement was a little under six minutes. If the call was about VOIP, we had like 30 seconds more. Remember, this is the sum used for all the welcome bullshit, troubleshooting, and submitting a ticket.

    At first, i was very sad about the support workers who were clearly not interrested in solving problems, just to get rid of the customer in time. ("Have you tried turning off and on again? Well you did? Try turning it off for two hole minutes, and then turning it on again." If the customer calls back, it's somebody elses poblem.) After some time, and several reviews with my boss, I understood. i never met their measurement of "effectiveness", even though they told me i was one of the best problem solvers, and took responsibility for my work. I used too long on the phone, troubleshooting too much, seldom made upsales etc.

    A friend at work got complaints on his AHT. He then started to release the conversation a little over four minutes, in the middle of a sentence. If anybody asked, he said the connection was broken. He got a bonus.

    I died a little inside every day at work.

    The biggest problem was that Tele2 does not run the customer care themselves. We worked for a call center company called Transcom. Transcom was paid per call, so if the customer had to call multiple times for the smallest issues, Transcom profited greatly, as long as every call was under six minutes. The shorter the better.

    After 15 months, they would not renew my contract, and they let me know that two days before the old one was finished. Had I been a regular emplyee, that would have been illegal, but since they hired over 50% of their staff from various agencies, they could do what they want.

    PS. I got a new job and I am hapy today. PSS. The company is still like that today.

  • (not) Jay (unregistered) in reply to lolwtf
    lolwtf:
    Ninth!
    No. Tenth.

    Saluto!

  • Karmakaze (unregistered) in reply to Matt A
    Matt A:
    I know that you typed that acronym to save yourself 10 seconds of typing time. But as a result, you cost all the rest of us who don't know what it means, more than 10 seconds of time looking it up. Just so we could know what you were talking about.

    In short, acronyms are over used.

    You bothered to look it up? I just assumed the author could not speak English and didn't bother reading the rest... Did I miss anything?

  • timmy (unregistered)

    Sadly, their replication setup doesn't work like that. Logging on with a bad password causes a connection to the PDCe checking for an updated password. Or, you have urgent notification repl due to the password change.

    Not one of the best, and not just cos the 9 hour no-workee is wrong.

  • (cs) in reply to AquaDuck
    AquaDuck:
    cb:
    blunder:
    I'll be damned if I know what that extra IG is for. A type of cotton weave?
    In-Game perhaps?

    IG = Irish Girl

    As in "Been There, Done That, Got the (Irish Girl) T-shirt"

    Well, it's nice to know that someone on this site has been paying attention for the last eighteen months or so ...

  • (cs) in reply to Not the Real WTF
    Not the Real WTF:
    Random832:
    I get the impression that he knew a storm was coming - he does that, then he has to do it all night for every one of the calls, then it's become his responsibility so the policy won't change back, then a week later the next guy to rotate into being on-call kicks his ass.

    Yeah. So what kind of socially maladjusted crap eater abuses a colleague in that manner? (well, besides a DWTF commenter?). Yeah, I know. In a better world there wouldn't be a need for this website...

    If he wanted the policy changed, simply tell that to the help desk guy, so that they he understands what's about to happen. Stress goes down, morale goes up, win-win-win.

    A coworker that treats me like that is going to have something very bad happen to him.

    I'd have said the same thing, but I would have probably put a very different intonation on the whole thing.

    If you change how the sysadmin says it (keep the words the same, but emphasize different phrasing) you get this idea that perhaps the sysadmin knew the policy was flawed and needed a shitstorm to change it.

    I'd also add in a little note for those like Stephen who didn't understand what I was talking about: "All you have to do is log a ticket. It's not your issue if the ticket isn't addressed in 4 hours, now is it? It's our departments, and you need to unleash your unholy scorn on the policy that ties your hands. Not me."

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