remote access (2)

Well, her I am sitting at home again, with the same company laptop computer. Only this time I have been told to run a specific remote access program. Right, I do that and it asks me which machine I want to connect to. "Progress" I thought to myself. But alas no, as it just reported that there was no computer of that name on my network. No, it is on the network back at the office. So how to get a connection to the office LAN? I was told that it would "just work" and ask me for my identity number.
I'll have to phone them whilst I am at home and go through the steps. The laptop is clearly not configured for remote working, or else there is some other instruction that the support staff have forgotten to tell me. What we need is some clear documentation.

Why do I end up being the one experiencing problems and ending up writing the documentation myself? I wonder ....