If the pay was better i would go back to the desk.

Same, what really pisses me off was our help desk had a "lead" position that was on the same pay scale as the app support role I moved into and was basically my dream job of handling escalations and more difficult issues and developing process (which I was pretty much already doing) but without the inbound calls, unfortunately the last time that position was open I was still in the "cooldown period" after getting promoted to a senior role so I wasn't eligible. Then the next time one opened they just got rid of it. The only guy that was left was a massive POS too that never got anything done and the managers all acknowledged that I was working circles around him even with my normal responsibilities on top of it.