Stop Asking for Turnaround Estimates!

[Jay 2K Winger]

At the IT Service Desk, I frequently end up creating trouble tickets that get sent to other support teams for service. It's not uncommon for users to ask how long until the issue gets resolved.

This is not a question I can answer. First of all, because I don't always know what the issue is, so I can't begin to guess how long it will take to fix it. Second, even if I do know what the issue is, the fix may not be that simple. Third, I don't know what the work queue for <support team X> looks like, how many other tickets are ahead of the user's ticket in the queue, etc. And even if I did know all of that, I'm not going to put another team on the spot by saying something like "Oh, they'll have that done for you in five minutes!" ...because five minutes later, when it hasn't been done, they'll call back asking what's taking so long.

Twice so far today, I've been asked for estimates on how quickly a ticket will be turned around.

One of them was for a user whose admin account had gotten locked. Now, the ITSD can't unlock admin accounts-- we don't have the access for that-- so we'd have to send that up to the Account Problems teams. However, all account locks time out after a certain interval, an interval which, honestly, would have probably passed by the time the Account Problems folks got to her ticket. I advised the user about this, but she wanted a ticket submitted anyway, since the account had locked after one failed attempt at logging in, instead of after the usual <X> tries. So I submitted the ticket, but made sure to note on the ticket that she insisted on it, instead of waiting for the lock to time out.

The other turnaround estimate was for a "critical" ticket. Now, I put "critical" in quotes because however desperate someone might be to have their ticket addressed immediately, the highest priority a ticket can get without senior manager authorization is "medium." This user was having a problem on the "Envy" work environment with several applications, and the issue had been ongoing for several days. The ticket had gotten submitted earlier in the day, and been kicked up to Tier 2 and sent to the engineers so they could figure out what the issue was.

Mr. Impatient had called an hour before for an update on his ticket, and was calling back again because this was a "critical" issue. I placated him as best I could, which admittedly wasn't much, because there was nothing documented on the ticket about what, if anything was being done. Do note, however, that this does not mean that nothing is being done, it's just not been documented if so. The user wanted to know how he could be sure anything was being done, and asked me to put on the ticket that he wanted someone to call him immediately, so he could be sure someone was actually looking at the ticket.

Then Mr. Impatient asked me what the usual turnaround time is on critical tickets. Now, I did not give him an actual figure for that question. I told him that every ticket is different, and as his ticket was in the queue of a completely different support team, in a completely different office, I had no way of knowing what the turnaround could be. Still, with my noting his call on the ticket with his request of "OMG CALL ME NAO NUTHINS BEIN DONNNNE" logged in as well, this seemed to satisfy him enough.

Sigh.

[Raveni]

Yeah, the people who call to complain that nothing's being done usually only convince me to log that I had a teleconference with them and put it at the bottom of my pile.

[raudf]

Thank you for bringing back the ol' memories of turnaround estimates for the repair center.. You'll find me in the rage room (room full of nicely breakable things that I don't have to clean up!) after this.

People bring in a product and usually ask when it would be done. Note, I'm not saying a ballpark estimate, they want to know when it'd be done. *grrr* Well, let's see, it's summer and you brought in a lawn tractor with "engine problems."

Okay.. Summer means our busiest time for repairs in lawn and garden, so we have two techs running house calls and one tech and one trainee (handles the yearly maintenance) in shop. You're looking at a minimum of two weeks bringing it into the shop. If it needs an engine, you're looking at an additional one week for parts and having the parts installed. That's three weeks right there. Oh, wait, you hit a stump and tore the rear axle out too? Ohh, umm.. it's on backorder right now. In other words, I haven't the foggiest clue how long it will be, because our warehouse doesn't have any. None of our warehouses have any. The manufacturer hasn't sent them any.

Basically, what I'm telling you is that it will be more than a month before your lawn tractor becomes something other than a high tech lawn ornament. And if you call more than once a week, the tech will get irritated and put your tractor at the back of the line. Like all the way back.. like every mower in the shop is completed before yours is. So... see you sometime in September.

[EricKei]

And even if I did know all of that, I'm not going to put another team on the spot by saying something like "Oh, they'll have that done for you in five minutes!" ...because three minutes later, when it hasn't been done, they'll call back asking what's taking so long, after all, they've been waiting for TEN minutes after you promised them that it would be done in TWO!.

Fixed that for ya

[Moirae]

Yeah, being tech support sucks. I did it myself for six months and finally started having nightmares that I was being physically tortured every day I was going in to work. I had to quit. Alot of people are so rude when talking to a tech person.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Yeah, being tech support sucks. I did it myself for six months and finally started having nightmares that I was being physically tortured every day I was going in to work. I had to quit. Alot of people are so rude when talking to a tech person.

I'm fairly fortunate not to have to deal with abuse at The Client. Because rather than getting tech support calls from the random unwashed masses, we're getting calls from more intelligent people, and they're just as interested in getting their issues dealt with quickly so they can get back to their job.

Of course, we get our own special breeds to deal with...

[Hyndis]

I think I might have a mild case of PTSD from my time as tech support.

Its like a perverse Skinner box, wherein one has no control over when the buzzer sounds, and at random pain will be inflicted. After a while you begin to fear the buzzer. It might be an easy case, or it might be another horrendously painful case.

It really is hard to do. Its an extremely stressful job. And I honestly have no idea why people are so incredibly rude to those giving them FREE SUPPORT. Yes, the help we give is free, as its part of the warranty.

Maybe people just don't appreciate free. Maybe if they pay some guy who isn't familiar with the gizmo $150 to poke and prod at it like a barely trained chimp they'll actually listen to what that person to say, even if that person isn't even close to being an authority on said gizmo.

[emax4]

If they're wasting time, adding calls to the queue, and haven't learned to be patient; simply inform them that their calls are being tallied, and if they call in again, their ticket will be moved to the very last in the queue.

[sirwired]

My favorite calls are ones where I get asked how long it's going to be until X is fixed, and I don't even know what is broken yet, and I'm still missing the most basic documentation needed to work the problem.

It's like having your car towed to your mechanic because "it runs funny", and then calling him the next morning asking for an estimate, and he hasn't even walked out to the parking lot yet...

[EricKei]

Hyndis -- This, in my experience, is the dark side of the "You get what you pay for" notion...They're not (directly) paying for the support, so they erroneously think of it as the same as asking the teenage computer dude down the block...BUT, if they're forking over $150 for the exact same support, you can be damn sure they will listen!

[Jay 2K Winger]

Folks, when you go fishing for a turnaround estimate, just accept it when I tell you I can't give you one.

I really don't need you to then give me a life-story summation of why you think your job is super duper importantses. Telling me all this will not change the fact that I can't give you a turnaround estimate.

I mention this because I just dealt with one of these cases. Luser calls in for an email password reset. Alas, this is not something ITSD can do. Having worked on the account problems team briefly, I learned that said email password resets take upwards of fifteen minutes to complete. Hence, ITSD is not permitted to do them, as it would cause our response time to all the calls coming in to drop. (I'm sure there are probably other explanations for it as well, but that's the basic gist.)

Even though I work on Sundays, where I can count the number of calls I get in the day on one hand, and thus have time to spare, I still don't have that access.

So, Luser needs her email password reset. Not only that, she's in a different department, over which I have no access period. So even if I did have email password reset capabilities, being that she's in [Other Department], I wouldn't be able to assist her.

Thus, I create a ticket and send it to [Other Department]'s account problems team. Alas, being that it's Sunday, there isn't anyone on staff there, although I'm not going to tell her that. What I tell her is that I'm sending it over to them and that someone should get back to her soon with the temporary password.

She then asks how long that will be. I tell her that I can't give an estimate on another team's queue, as I don't know how many tickets are in the queue. She then proceeds to give me the rundown on why she needs this done-- short version is she'll be out of her regular office this week in training and needs to get into the email so she can file some paperwork-- while I'm busy thinking "please stop talking, this changes nothing." When she finishes, I tell her I can't give her an ETA, just that hopefully someone will be in touch with her soon.



FAKE EDIT: While I was typing this up, she called back. She apparently didn't realize it was the same person, and explained "I just need a temporary password for my email." I told her I remembered her, got the ticket number from her, and pulled it up to put a status request update on the ticket, and did the 'bump in priority, but not really' thing we can do. (The ticket's actual priority doesn't change, but the reported priority (i.e., what the user would be able to see in the system) does.)

She then proceeds to tell me the rundown on why she needs this done all over again, but I interrupted her, "Yes, ma'am, you explained all this to me on the last call," and again re-iterated that I can't give an estimate on how quickly it will get taken care of. She added, "I drove an hour and a half to come in today to do this" and asked if I have a phone number for the person who will take care of her ticket.

Ugggh. Again, not something I can do. We don't have phone numbers for the account problems folks, because there's no group phone-queue for them. The closest thing I could give her was the number for her close support team, which I gave her. She accept that and hung up.



FAKE EDIT #2: And she called back again. Unsurprisingly, there was no one at her close support team to answer the call. She wasn't too happy to hear I'm the only one on shift for ITSD, and again wanted a phone number for the account problems folks. I again told her I don't have a number like that I can give her. She gives me the rundown again, including the "drove an hour and a half" thing, and I interrupted her again with "Yes, I know, you explained this to me on both your previous calls." Again, I told her I can't give her an ETA on when it'll be done.

She then says, "Then what's the point of ITSD?" Trying not to start swearing, I replied, "We can take care of a lot of issues, ma'am, but email password resets are not among them. I understand your frustration, I really wish I could help you, but I can't. I really wish I had a phone number to give you, but I don't." She bitched a bit more, and finally hung up.

I don't think I'll be getting another call from her tonight, thank god.