IT vs. Tonerheads

[mrwho]

I think I know that guy....

Hey, what? You know that guy too?

Heck, he's everywhere!

[copytechman]

Boy, that person sure gets around!! Jeez!!

A.

[Jimbo1]

Infallible

I think the situation I wind up with the most that has caused me the most grief is the complete and utter infallibility of the computers and network at whichever client the IT person in question is servicing.

It is


N E V E R the network.

It is

A L W A Y S the MFP. ALways.

I have had no less than four cases where I have been in major hot water for not resolving a situation until the IT opens up and says...

"Oh yeah we found that, it was on our end."


Much, much, much grief preceeded this confession.

It's bad when you can't copy when connected to the network..so you get the laptop...build a port...set the IP and print a small book no proble.
Hook it back into the network and it tanks but it's still YOUR equipment causing the problem. This was the guy who admitted his network was at fault.

And it stormed right after that.

[schooltech]

I get a call from an account about 1 & 1/2 hours away on a Monday morning a few years ago, with a guy saying that our Kyocera would no longer scan or lan fax, as the fax routing would no longer route their faxes.

I did not set up this Kyocera so I said something like, "Ok, when did you notice all of this stop? Has anything recently changed on the network?" The guy first said, "no," then after a few brief seconds of silence he chimed back in, "Actually, I just changed out all of their computers over the weekend with brand new desktops."

Dammit---------DID I NOT JUST ASK YOU IF SOMETHING CHANGED AND YOU SAID NO!!! I GUESS YOUR HOTSHOT ATTITUDE CANNOT SEEM TO ANSWER SIMPLE QUESTIONS? Yeah, you go you bad-ass.

Of course, this WAS their contracted "IT" person that called me. Needless to say, I had to go up there and get everything working again. It was, as most small networks are, somewhat hokey and I needed to do the regular work-arounds to make everything go smoothly.

[mrwho]

It was, as most small networks are, somewhat hokey and I needed to do the regular work-arounds to make everything go smoothly.

Yeah, I sometimes feel like a plumber, fixing leaks here and there...

[Jimbo1]

Uh-huh

Had one where I went in and networked our install. Couple days later the owner of the business says come fix it or pick it up.


The IT had come in right after me and installed a firewall that kicked out all the inbound fax rounting and all and of course it was OUR MACHINE that was at fault.

Spent two hours on the phone with a guy who sounded like his voice was still changing to get it straight.

[jneezy2008]

I completely agree with what everyone has said.
A personal horror story of my own, if you don't mind.

I had to install a Muratec MFP in a dental office, no big deal. The customer's IT person was nice enough to setup a wireless adapter for the MFP so it could connect to their wireless network. Along with that he left me all the information I would need(IP, Subnet Mask, Gateway, path for scan to SMB, etc.).

So, I get everything installed, leave, and go on my way. A couple days later the customer calls saying they can't print. I then connect to their network remotely and find the print driver is crashing the print spooler on their server. I then ask the sales person "Did you put a PCL board in the Muratec". His reply is "No". I have told ALL the sales people countless times to put a PCL board in these Muratecs if the customer is printing from specialized software(Muratec uses a proprietary OfficeBridge port for printing, not a standard TCP/IP port. The PCL board allows the use of a standard TCP/IP port). Needless to say, I had to miss our company Christmas party(my first one with this company) to go back to the customers and reinstall everything after a PCL board was put in.

A little time spent doing a site survey can save everyone a massive headache.

Sales people piss me off! After the sale, they could care less.

[mrwho]

Sales people piss me off! After the sale, they could care less.

Is there a "dumb-things-that-sales-people-said-or-done" thread?

If any of you recognize the following examples, raise your hands:

Sales- Hey, can you make machine x on customer y do that thing?
Tech- No, the machine isn't conceived to do that.
Sales- Oh, come on, don't be like that!

---

Sales- If you buy this machine, you can sell all your offset equipment!

(Come on, the machine was good, but not THAT good!)

[pacman]

I think the situation I wind up with the most that has caused me the most grief is the complete and utter infallibility of the computers and network at whichever client the IT person in question is servicing.

It is


N E V E R the network.

It is

A L W A Y S the MFP. ALways.

I have had no less than four cases where I have been in major hot water for not resolving a situation until the IT opens up and says...

"Oh yeah we found that, it was on our end."


Much, much, much grief preceeded this confession.

It's bad when you can't copy when connected to the network..so you get the laptop...build a port...set the IP and print a small book no proble.
Hook it back into the network and it tanks but it's still YOUR equipment causing the problem. This was the guy who admitted his network was at fault.

And it stormed right after that.

LOL! Oh. My. Goodness. This sounds like 90% of the issues I encouter. Sporadic print failure? I plug in my laptop w/ a crossover cable and print just fine. Then again, it does help when you don't have to run 50 feet of ethernet cable from the jack to the machine and have A DESK LEG SITTING ON YOUR CABLE THAT PERMANENTLY CRIMPS IT. But no, it's the machines fault.

Same client......same machine......different location.

"This machine has never printed or scanned since you moved it to our new location."
"It's because you're IT guy never gave you a jack or a line for it."
She calls back....
"Never mind. I plugged it in."
Ultimate facepalm.

Or one I've run into quite recently, 3 times in fact. Customer can't figure out why they can no longer print to the machine after they change ISP's or buy a new router that's a different brand from before. DOH. "a default gateWHAT?"

Show a PC person how to install the driver and then they expect that to be done for 50+ PC's.

That, my friend, is the absolute truth.

[mrwho]

We got a simple solution for the 50+ PCs install problem: started charging per computer for anything over 5 PCs.

Misteriously, we started to finish the installations and get out of the instalation sites much sooner than before!

[pacman]

We got a simple solution for the 50+ PCs install problem: started charging per computer for anything over 5 PCs.

Misteriously, we started to finish the installations and get out of the instalation sites much sooner than before!

We KIND of did that. We do the initial install no matter how many machines. After that, they are chargeable at our regular rates.

[Dark Helmet]

We got a simple solution for the 50+ PCs install problem: started charging per computer for anything over 5 PCs.

Misteriously, we started to finish the installations and get out of the instalation sites much sooner than before!

We do a max of 10 pc's. After that it's $110 per hour for any extra's. Fortunatly though most customers who are running 10+ computers have some sort of file server set up or maybe even a domain and in that case the print drivers are shared from the server and that only takes a few minutes per computer then

[KenB]

I have a feeling that this will wind up being a looooooooooong thread.

[fixthecopier]

One of the things that makes working on a military base difficult is that for security reasons the users of any computer have no acess to anything in it. When they have issues, the IT people come from a different building and work by scheduled appointment. This means if it comes down to trying to prove it is not the print equipment that has issues, you do not have someone right there to check drivers or ping it. They come after I have left and say it is a printer problem. This is an example:

I have a work order for an HP 4600 in the commanders office on an air base.
Machine needs a fuser, I return next day and install fuser and clean machine.
I run test pages from within the machine.
I leave and leave the bill.
Next day I get a call. Can't print to printer. I explain that nothing I did had anything to do with the network connection. I go by in person to check machine, make sure it is hooked up and there is not something stupid. Everything OK. I do test print and the sergeant shows how he clicks print and nothing happens. I look at what I can see and make sure it is still the default printer and other simple stuff. I tell him to call his IT people. Next day he calls and says the IT people say they have checked thier stuff and have no problem, I must have done something to the printer. I go back next day with my laptop and hook up and print to it and show em it prints. Call your IT people and tell them. Next day they call and once again say the problem is mine, They have nothing wrong on their end. I go back, make them load the printer in my truck and I take it to the shop and put it on our network. I find that it for some reason it does not like PS drivers anymore. Works fine with the universal driver. I burn a copy, tape it to the front of the printer take it back and inform them if they call again, I will back charge them for every visit I made. It is ashame that a well paid government IT pro couldn't think to try new drivers.

[KenB]

Just had one today - one of my techs calls and tells me that the customer made some "minor" network changes, now they can't TWAIN scan from their Ricoh MFP; they're getting a "Can't connect to scanner" message on the workstation.

He asked me to call the customer, and I did.

I explained to Captain Genius that the error is almost always a port issue, where a firewall of some sort is blocking port 1022. I then emailed him a PDF of how to verify that the port is open.

He will check and call me back on Monday.

Should be interesting...