IT Horror Story
Instant messages from a friend who I’m sure would blog this but can’t for obvious reasons:
Steve: I’m making an emergency run to best buy for someone because they need 6 UPSs and they won’t make it in time
Steve: and I’m going to spend $1200 of my own money and someone will meet me with cash in a town 40 miles west of me (the best buy is 40 miles east of me and closes in an hour)
Steve: he works for a bank and it is apparently for them
Steve: the cash exchange will happen in a gas station parking lot
And that my friends is how IT in the banking industry works: money exchanged in the parking lot of gas stations for consumer grade equipment thats bound to be put in a mission critical position.
Steve, you know who you are, and you know what site to submit your story to. 
January 18th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
lol…
Yeah, definately sounds like a wtf to me.
January 18th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
You left a few details out (not your fault, I didn’t receive them until I was on the road). I also also instructed to withdraw a bit of cash (which would be repaid) on the drive to be provided to the best buy employee as a token of our appreciation. In the end, the employee declined citing company rules, which meant that instead of $250 for 3 hours & 160 miles, I get $300. And to make a very quick visit to the bank in the morning, not because I’m going to go bust in a day but because while $1600 in cash looks cool, I’d rather not carry it around.
There actually is a quite reasonable explanation for the immediate demand, but instead of providing it, for now let me just make a correction. It ended up being the poorly lit parking lot of a poorly lit walmart.