And you call yourselves a help desk!

Working individuals of the world unite! It's the evil help desk that is the topic of today's discussion.

Last week, I came into work on Monday to find that I could not access anything that required an ethernet connection. I couldn't get on the intranet, access servers, etc. Begrundingly, I called the help desk. My case was turned in to desktop support with a high priority. I sat around and twiddled my thumbs all day and then called the help desk again just as I was leaving and told them I absolutely had to be up and running by Wednesday.

Tuesday morning, I come in and I can't even boot up. There was a corrupted file. I called the help desk again. About 2 hours later, IT guy comes up and works on my computer. It appears that part of the problem was a token ring (aren't these things extinct) that was stuck in a loop that was causing part of the problem. We did a cleanup on the computer, eliminated some spyware, and did a backup just in case they had redo my hard drive. The computer is working for what I need it for that day.

Then, I have to go out and approve a wire. There are these blasted smartcard readers here whre you have to insert your card, select your certificate authority, and input your pin to approve wire transfers. Well the blasted card reader doesn't work. I call the guy back again and he gets it working. It works for a few days.

Well, the darn thing is down again! You would think that since I work for a computer company (not mentioned...we'll just call it Big Blue for now), that I could get hardware that would work CONSISTENTLY. So today, I called the guy back again, and yet again, I'm sitting here twiddling my thumbs waiting on IT guy to come get it working again (and to show me how to fix it myself next time so I'm not waiting for an elusive IT guy). I have a wire to approve that has to go out today.

I want to be elusive. How come the accountants can't be elusive? Blasted!

UPDATE:

Well, I got out of my process automation meeting this afternoon, and low and behold, IT guy #2 is here to fix a printer for a co-worker. This is the guy that got the darn card reader up and running in the first place. A fiddle here and there and it is working. IT guy #1 has yet to call. Figures, huh?