Dumb, Dumber, Dumbest, The IT Edition

(I’m a work-study student in IT at my college. At the beginning of the school year, there are always tons of dumb parents and students that call or come to my desk for help, as well as dumb students and employees all year long. Story #1. The phone rings:)

Me: “[School] help desk; how may I help you?”

Caller: “Hi. I’m trying to use an email link that your website has provided, but it’s broken.”

Me: “Oh, it’s not actually broken; it just means that your computer does not have a default email client set up. Just copy and paste the link into your recipient’s bar when you go to compose a new email.”

Caller: “Do what?”

Me: “Copy and paste?”

Caller: “I don’t… I don’t know… I don’t do that.”

(Story #2. An obvious freshman and his friend come in.)

Freshie: “Hi. I want to sign into [Related School Website], but I don’t know my username and password.”

Me: “Your username is ‘firstname.lastname,’ and your password is the one you set up when you were first accepted.”

Freshie: “Oh, I forgot it. Can you give it to me?”

Me: “I’m sorry, but we don’t give out any passwords. But I can direct you to the place where you can reset it.”

Freshie: “Let me try one of my usuals real quick.”

(He types it in on his phone.)

Freshie: “I got it! It was my Facebook password.”

Me: “Glad you remembered.”

Freshie: “It’s the high school I went to, the year I graduated, and my football number.”

Me: “Please don’t tell me that.”

Freshie: “So what? You don’t know any of those things.”

Friend: “Yeah, but I do.”

(Story #3: The phone rings.)

Me: “[School] help desk; how may I help you?”

Father: “Hi. I was wondering if you could tell me the laptop requirements for students. My son will be arriving soon and we need to get him a new laptop.”

Me: “Our IT page has an entire section on the requirements, as well as several options for discounted laptops through a company that we have a contract with.”

Father: “Oh! Okay, what is the website?”

(I tell him the address to type directly into the URL bar to get there immediately.)

Father: “And where do I type that in?”

Me: “The URL bar.”

Father: “The what? Is that my MSN search bar?”

Me: “Um, no. It’s the bar on the top of your browser that displays your web address. If you clear it, and type in [address], then it will bring you right to our IT page.”

Father: “I’m searching it on MSN; it’s not showing up.”

(This goes on for a while before I give up and tell him the ten steps to get to the IT page through the school’s website.)