Under-trained Techie Didn't Claim Overtime for Mistakenly Failing to Phone It In
The Register, Monday, May 25th, 2026
An entry-level IT technician accidentally disrupted a clinic's network by misconfiguring VoIP phone ports but refused to claim overtime for the extra work required to fix it.
In this week's 'Who, Me?' column from The Register, a reader named April recalls an early career mistake at a medical clinic company where, despite having only basic CompTIA A+ certification, she was tasked with deploying PCs and VoIP phones to a new office space.
After completing the deployment, she accidentally plugged both Ethernet ports of a single VoIP phone into the network, which knocked out internet access for the entire clinic.
Though her supervisors responded graciously and helped her quickly resolve the issue, April was so embarrassed by her error that she amended her timesheet to not claim the overtime she had worked, and subsequently invested in further networking education on her own dime.