[windows2000] Re: OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
- From: "Greg Reese" <GReese@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 9 Sep 2003 11:21:46 -0400
I have to do this too but on most occasions, it involves me actually traveling
to their house too.
I had the same thing happen here. His daughter had managed to install a bunch
of trojans etc. I explained to him the dangers of a Trojan logging his
keystrokes because he does a lot of online banking. He was pretty pissed at
here. I now have to go back out there and install a Watchguard SOHO for him.
But before I can do that I have to go to our President's house and install a
new video card for him so he can play Flight Simulator. It's all part of the
job even if its not in the description.
I just do it. They are the ones signing my paychecks. If they feel my time is
better spent doing crap for them rather than everyone else then that is their
problem. I get paid whether I am doing that or building a server. Either way,
it's their money.
I look at it as all part of the job. One thing I did for the rest of the
employees here is enroll us in the CDW Employee Purchase Program. It lets all
our employees buy computers with the same discount level we get. Which really
isn't very much. But, support becomes CDW's problem and not mine. I have
found that even if I recommend a computer for someone, it suddenly becomes my
support headache forever. Family and friends do this to me as well as our
users. I point all my users to CDW, and I tell all my family and friends to
get an iMac.
Who knows, that guy may get promoted or something and then remembers you as the
IT guy with the bad attitude who didn't want to help him. I would just do it
with a smile and be as helpful as possible so that he thinks you are a genius
in the end. Then he tells everyone how great you are and they should double
your pay. You never know when you may cross this guy's path again.
Greg
-----Original Message-----
From: Farrugia, Paul [mailto:pfarrugia@xxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2003 10:56 AM
To: windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [windows2000] OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
Hello, sorry this is way off topic but I need to vent before I get myself fired
by beating someone with a keyboard,
I was wondering what others are doing or would do with situations similar to
this:
I work for a credit union. We have Board members who are given "perks" each
year (laptops, desktops, cell phones, etc.). When something goes wrong with one
of these devices (usually do to user's negligence) they expect our IT
department to fix them. Our upper management is too busy brown nosing the board
so they expect us to fix these problems as well.
Last Friday I was told by the VP of my department that on Monday (yesterday) I
would have to go to one of our branch locations to meet with one of the board
members because he cannot dial up to AOL on a desktop PC that we gave him a
year and a half ago and he was also having other problems. I had to bite my
tongue while my VP told me this. As soon as he left I went to my manager told
him that this was a load of horse crap and he agreed with me. (By the way I am
the only network admin here and I have 12 laptops, 4 desktops and a new server
to set up). I made the suggestion of having the board member overnight the PC
to us or having someone in our branch send it for him so he doesn't have to get
his hands dirty. This would have been more cost efficient as well. Well, my VP
who I guess knows more then me said no. Go figure. Anyway I go and get the PC
and bring it back to my office.
Today I am told that the PC needs to be returned by Thursday the latest. (Oh by
the way I cannot fed ex it back to him as per my VP). My manager tells me to
work on that PC only, forget everything else and just do that. He doesn't agree
with what is going on as well. So I boot the PC up and of course every program
you can think of is installed on it, except for the anti- virus program which I
know at one point was on the machine because I installed it myself. I can also
tell that his teenage daughter uses the pc for things that teens do these days.
I run a virus scan and guess what the PC is infected with 4 Trojan horses. Also
windows update hasn't been done in the longest of time.
Basically I am trying to find out if this is something that I should have to do
for the fear of losing my job or do I have any recourse in situations like
these. I think this is totally ridiculous that we can give someone a "perk" and
he can abuse it and expect us to fix it.
Thanks for listening,
Paul.
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