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Ask Slashdot: Dealing With Service Providers When You're an IT Pro?
New submitter username440 writes: So, a lot of us will have been here: You have a problem with your ISP, cable TV, cellphone whatever technology and you need to call the provider. Ugh. Foreign call centers, inane fault-finding flowcharts (yes, I have turned it off and on again) and all the other cruft that you have to wade through to get to someone with the knowledge to determine that YOU in fact also have a degree of knowledge and have a real problem.
Recently I had a problem with my ISP, where the ISP-provided "modem" — it's a router — would lock up at least 3 times per day. I had router logs, many hundreds of Google results for that model and release of hardware showing this as a common problem, and simply wanted the ISP to provide a new router (it's a managed device). I replaced the router with a spare Airport Extreme and the problems disappeared, to be replaced with a warning from the ISP that they could't access my managed device" and the connection is provided contingent to using THIER router. However my point was to prove that their router is at fault.
How do you fare when trying to get through to a service provider that they actually DO know something in the field? How do you cut through the frontline support bull*hit and talk to someone who knows what they are doing? Should there be a codeword for this scenario?
Recently I had a problem with my ISP, where the ISP-provided "modem" — it's a router — would lock up at least 3 times per day. I had router logs, many hundreds of Google results for that model and release of hardware showing this as a common problem, and simply wanted the ISP to provide a new router (it's a managed device). I replaced the router with a spare Airport Extreme and the problems disappeared, to be replaced with a warning from the ISP that they could't access my managed device" and the connection is provided contingent to using THIER router. However my point was to prove that their router is at fault.
How do you fare when trying to get through to a service provider that they actually DO know something in the field? How do you cut through the frontline support bull*hit and talk to someone who knows what they are doing? Should there be a codeword for this scenario?
Shibboleet
https://xkcd.com/806/
Of course in the REAL WORLD you have to put up with the crap along with all the others :(
Honestly, as a last resort, it's not a bad idea. I have a fair amount of ESD test gear at work, including a bunch of static discharge guns and the like that can be dialed up to some crazy levels. I was once stuck in a situation much as you - they controlled the modem/router and it was crapping out every few hours, and they were the only game in town for non-dialup access (this was 15ish years ago). I'd already replaced it with a spare that did not have the issue, but since it wasn't provisioned, the only place I could go was their internal pages.
I spent probably two hours going through L1 support, L2 support, and then had them tell me that "oh, sometimes the boxes just do that". So I took the box to work, fried the shit out of it, plugged it back in to let it power up and do real damage to itself now that half the fet gates were probably cooked, and then called them back to tell them that the box had finally crapped out and started smoking. They promptly sent me a new one, and told me "must have been lightning or some sort of power surge."
Yup, a power surge indeed.
Ask for a new one. Say you're not suing them for the soot in the apartment. Problem solved.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
There are many code words... "please", "thank you", "yessir" and the name of the guy on the other end of the phone (take a moment to write it down).
We had some guy who set up cacti to monitor his connection and he claimed he went down every evening around 6:00pm. We looked at our monitoring and sure enough every day his modem went off line around 6:00pm. The cable modem right next door to it never went offline. Sure enough on the day we showed up around 6 to look at what the possible problem could be we noticed the cleaning lady had unplugged the whole rack and had plugged in her vacuum cleaner. Then suddenly the 'pro' noticed that his router had a up time of less than twenty four hours. He didn't have any monitoring on that, just traffic. So I would say around 80% of the time when a 'pro' calls us with a problem, its not our problem.
Granted. But if your internet connection ain't working, it's kinda hard to chat/email...the ole "keyboard error, press F1 to continue" problem...
"Your call is very important to us. We have been experiencing unusually high call volumes lately. Your estimated wait time is 2 years, 37 minutes. Please stay on the line." music
You are right, codewords wouldn't work, but how about a skill testing multiple-choice question(s). If you get enough right, you can get escalated
So, some questions like...
"Is it plugged in?"
"Did you try rebooting your computer?"
"Have you tried unplugging the route, waiting 5 seconds and then plugging it back in?"
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.