Reply to: Asked to take work laptop home but cannot work from home

[vetran]

If the client is concerned about laptop theft, they can supply their own Kensington locks in the office (many do), look after their own stuff, and check their own insurance. I am not carting their nasty laptop around the country, unless it is to WFH. Clients! Know your place!

I have a couple of locks on me I take the first day clearly marked as mine.

When they say take it home I can reply "I will lock it up"
then when they say "we don't have a lock"
I can reply "I have one you can borrow for a week while you order one".
Lock it up with your lock then put an IT request in for a lock and a week or two later you have your lock back. They want a key so they don't damage the laptop if you get marched off site so they want to buy the lock.

Works like a charm.

[Mordac]

A security guy at current client was doing something similar at car boot sales. He didn't remove the service desk phone number sticker and got caught when one of his buyers phoned for support.

I had a client about 10 years ago where a soon-to-be-ex-IT-bod had done the same with some old servers. Several hundred thousand bank customers details ended up on e-bay. He got caught when the bloke who bought the offending server went straight to the press.

[unixman]

Indeed supply a Kensington lock & leave in the office. That stays on their insurance. If they want you to take responsibility you might as well supply your PC and have something that actually runs properly.

Unless you have an autosafe in the car and a safe at home its not like you can keep it safe. I hate having to walk around with a laptop while checking into a hotel, especially a classy joint like the Thistle!

If the client is concerned about laptop theft, they can supply their own Kensington locks in the office (many do), look after their own stuff, and check their own insurance. I am not carting their nasty laptop around the country, unless it is to WFH. Clients! Know your place!

[WTFH]

The converse side of the argument from all the disguised permies on here is that if you have a desk in the office with a set of drawers with your stuff in them, etc, how much of a contractor are you?

[SueEllen]

What kind of tulip places do you lot live in where you put laptops where children can trip over them and dogs pee on them? Or you leave them unattended at coffee shops?

[vetran]

Indeed supply a Kensington lock & leave in the office. That stays on their insurance. If they want you to take responsibility you might as well supply your PC and have something that actually runs properly.

Unless you have an autosafe in the car and a safe at home its not like you can keep it safe. I hate having to walk around with a laptop while checking into a hotel, especially a classy joint like the Thistle!

[Old Greg]

On a retail bank tech upgrade project I was on many years ago, there was a member of the deployment team going out collecting up the old kit and putting it on eBay. I *think* they may have wiped the hard drive but can't be 100% sure...

A security guy at current client was doing something similar at car boot sales. He didn't remove the service desk phone number sticker and got caught when one of his buyers phoned for support.

[ladymuck]

They didn't want you selling them all off for crack like last time.

On a retail bank tech upgrade project I was on many years ago, there was a member of the deployment team going out collecting up the old kit and putting it on eBay. I *think* they may have wiped the hard drive but can't be 100% sure...

[northernladyuk]

I had a client that issued a Kensington lock with the laptop. Thought it was a great idea until I was told its to be used in the office without exception. They have regular checks where someone takes any laptop not locked down during the working day and you've got to go get it back cap in hand. Bloody ridiculous.

They didn't want you selling them all off for crack like last time.

[jds 1981]

I was at *a large American bank* for a while and they wanted us to take laptops home, but also claimed we were responsible for them while out of the office..

[tomtomagain]

I had a client that issued a Kensington lock with the laptop. Thought it was a great idea until I was told its to be used in the office without exception. They have regular checks where someone takes any laptop not locked down during the working day and you've got to go get it back cap in hand. Bloody ridiculous.

pb? ( It's an anagram of a well known UK company ). Used to work their, go to lunch, come back to find a notice on your desk from security where the laptop used to be and then spent 90 minutes wandering over to the security office to get it back.

[Old Greg]

I had a client that issued a Kensington lock with the laptop. Thought it was a great idea until I was told its to be used in the office without exception. They have regular checks where someone takes any laptop not locked down during the working day and you've got to go get it back cap in hand. Bloody ridiculous.

The infamous Richard Granger* of the NHS NPfIT used to do this personally at lunchtime. It was fun the time he did this to a very very grand Professor who was in the office for the day.


*The one whose mother briefed against him.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/...lic.technology

Richard Granger, the tough 42-year-old management consultant who runs the government's Connecting for Health project, initially failed his computer studies course at Bristol University - and took a year off as a result. He was only allowed to resit the exam after she appealed on his behalf, and he went on to gain a 2:2 in geology.

His mother, Mary Granger, spoke to The Observer about her surprise at her son's role in the ambitious initiative that was supposed to transform the NHS's computers and allow patient records to be kept electronically. She hasn't spoken to her son for 10 years after a family row, but she is now campaigning to save the local hospital in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, which is losing some services to another local trust, and believes the computer modernisation plans are a gross waste of money.

'I can't believe that my son is running the IT modernisation programme for the whole of the NHS,' she said.

Mrs Granger, a former teacher and local councillor said: 'He was disappointed when he failed his computer studies course at Bristol. It was pretty serious, so I had to write to Princess Anne, who at that time was "university visitor" there to appeal for him to be allowed to resit the exam, as initially he was refused permission. He did resit it and he passed it.'

Mrs Granger said she and her son had had no contact after rows 10 years ago, with her husband Les - Richard Granger's stepfather - and their other two children. 'After university he became a management consultant with Arthur Andersen [now Andersen Consulting].'

[northernladuk]

Dear client: Kingston lock

I had a client that issued a Kensington lock with the laptop. Thought it was a great idea until I was told its to be used in the office without exception. They have regular checks where someone takes any laptop not locked down during the working day and you've got to go get it back cap in hand. Bloody ridiculous.

[Old Greg]

Dear client: Kingston lock

Is that a downmarket Kensington lock?

Real contractors have a snow leopard to guard equipment.

[unixman]

Dear client: Kingston lock