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Tech Support Getting Even Worse
ehiris writes: "Came across an article on CNN about tech support falling out of the useful category. The interesting quote: 'In part, the problem can be blamed on tech companies' attempts to cope with shrinking profit margins and a bad business environment.' Bad tech support makes life hard and new technology becomes undesirable to the general public. Which company has the best support? What are they doing well? What would you like to see improve about tech support?"
I hate all manners of tech support. They don't usually know what they are talking about and then theres crap involving restrictions and frankly, the best tech support are your geek buddies and the guy at the local computer place. They know there shit. I don't like calling my tech support company because they are in Quebec and are such assholes that they insist on french. Lousy frogs... :P
(Pirst Fost?)
Yet another thing Microsoft has forced the world to get used to...
Those who almost can, support
Those who can't, teach
Those who really can't, manage.
I spent hours on the phone with ATI trying to get it to work with my computer, and ended up sending back the equipment. The vendor (AccessMicro) was nice enough not to charge me a re-stocking fee, but I've decided to invoice ATI for the shipping costs. I haven't gotten anything back yet from them, but I'm guessing they'll just pay the chump change rather than continue to process the bill.
Last year I had a data T1 fail, so I called the Business Support Group. Got a tech on the line and explained the trouble. He asked if he could put me on hold and look into it; I agreed and he put me on hold.
After 5 minutes or so, my phone rings, so I park the line on hold and pick up the second call.
It's the same tech from Verizon calling to let us know that our circuit was down! I explained that *I* was the one who just called him and he became extremely confused (as if he wasn't before).
That was something else, lemme tell ya!
---
Information wants...you to shut your pie hole.
They make a good point in that article. If you know your stuff, you ain't gonna be working on phone tech support. Quite often, the guy on the other end of the phone knows no more (usually less) than you do about the product. They have a wide selection of resources on the product that might help though.
Putting those resources online to let you solve your own problems really is the better solution.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Everyone who has touched a computer has a problem with Windows.
what I do whenever I have a problem that I can't fix in less thgan twenty minutes is re-install. That usually clears it right up, nut you still have that nasty Windows problem. But now it IS Microsofts fault.
Quite simply many people won't pay for a quality, well supported product. If they can save $5 they will buy from an irreputable company with lousy support. Maybe you are one of these people. Do you have an Intel or 3Com NIC in your computer or a Realtek? You get what you pay for.
I mean, all more complicated systems, like PC+OS can go wrong in a million different way depending on hardware, third-part software etc etc.
:).
Most tech support only manages to answer easy things, like how do I open a file in Word.
Most doesn't have a clue what to do when someone put in that new joystick-port-card and the menu-shadow (XP shadows) flickers on the screen from time to time all of a sudden (for example, it happened to me
All of these companies have lots of money to trumpet their products. They roll out new ones every few months, and spend a lot of money to keep them rolling.
I remember when I used to buy computers from DEC in the mid-80s. You would get a genuinely impressive series of well-indexed and comprehensive manuals. When you couldn't find the answer there, you could call technical support and talk to a technically capable person. If that person could not help you, they would put you through to an engineer.
I also remember the first day that I got put through to a clueless, script reading, customer support representative at some anonymous call center when I called DEC. After that, I bought PC clones from Gateway or PCs Unlimited (eventually Dell). The only point of ponying up the big bucks was for the extensive documentation and support.
DEC tried to become a different company via changed marketing and survive. It died. You cannot abandon your customers and survive.
A great piece of satire/research dealing with the "usefulness" of Tech Support can be found HERE
Don't read this!
Check out the good old Rinkworks at
:)
http://rinkworks.com/stupid/cs_stuptech.shtml
Of course, most of the Computer stupidities deal with stupid users (and they have some really funny stories), but the above page is about "role reversal" and stupid tech support being a pain for a computer-literate user seeking help.
There is a section about stupid salespeople as well
This is a rant.
The problem with most our tech support people is that they cannot possibly familiarize themselves with all of our environments my company has. On top of that we release new systems and come out with so many different projects that frankly the systems they use to track environments are never up-to-date. It's quite ironic that a story such as this be posted now. I'm here on a Sunday on hold with the Tech Support people while they're trying to track down who my "trouble-ticket" is supposed to be assigned to. That's right, I work on a new system that's not in their trouble-ticket tracking system so they have no idea who's supposed to work on my problem.
I suggest the following when you start working in an environment:
1. Get to know your DBA's and their telephone numbers (pagers, cellphones, etc).
2. Get to know your DBA's bosses names and phone numbers. You never know when one of your DBAs' bosses may have gone to the same college as you and you can sit around discussing all the 'needs' your system may have.
3. Learn the political nuances of your company and more specifically the groups that support your systems.
Additionaly, use these tech-support poeple as sparingly as possible. They don't know what your Oracle Error messages mean anyway. It's also likely they'll put fautly information in the trouble ticket. If you have to use them, make sure you tell them to write YOUR telephone number and name in the ticket as a contact person.
This way, maybe the DBA, or unix guru you need will call you first before taking action.
Always review with the tech-support person on the phone (or in person) and make sure they understand the importance of your problem.
It's only karma..
What would you like to see improve about tech support?
How about some training and a fair wage for the poor bastards that work in the call centers?
I used to work as a support whore for Verizon DSL -- that is, until my entire call center was laid off. The jobs were moved to another center in Canada, where Customer Service employees were handed a database full of canned answers and told that they had to start handling tech support calls.
In the meantime, the actual trained techs like myself were all out of a job. And the other center that was on the same level as us - same training, same subcontractor, same call queues - took a savage pay cut.
The technology economy of today is based on some seriously thin margins - and frankly, once a company has your money, they are happy to screw you out of decent support to save a few bucks.
--saint
Google Answers has reasonably good tech support for popular programs. It's even possible to get an answer without losing $4, since other users who are unsure that their solution will work may add a comment rather than claiming to have the answer. In that case, you're only out the 50-cent listing fee.
Another advantage of Google Answers is that you get to vent your frustration publicly instead of to a poor tech support worker.
The shareholder is always right.
I've found HP support to helpful (for printers anyways) they say they offer phone support for warranty customers only but I've regularly called in on products 2-3 yrs out of warranty. Even though it's not an 1-800 number, their agents are usually very knowledgable and have helped me get my products back up and running (or replaced if in warranty) in a reasonable amount of time. I've also had good experiences with Microsoft support even though it was via e-mail, they replaced my Intellimouse Explorer when it stopped working, within a week, with very little hassle. A lot of other companies out there, however, do give you the run-around and make you wait on hold forever (I waited 4 hours once for @home) But the first two examples are the exception in the industry and I think a lot more can be done to make most support experiences a lot better.
I bought a Inspiron 8000 preloaded with linx, and tech support couldn't help my any. In short, they sold something that they couldn't support.
Oh, but it gets better!
I called up once because the laptop would randomly turn itself on, make a bunch of noises, then turn off. What did I get from the tech support guy? "Wow, never heard of that one before."
My friend has another Inspiron. His problem occours when you start up the computer, the computer screetches until an OS is loaded. Dell doesn't believe him.
The only good thing I've heard from any tech support was from IBM. Another pal has a Thinkpad, and when he had a problem, IBM just sent him an empty padded box with shipping paid for, he sent off his Thinkpad, and within 4 days he was working on his repaired laptop.
There used to be a time when you could call up the phone company and get a person on the other end. No so anymore. Software companies are falling into line with other industries who have realized that fixed-costs are the easiest to trim. As profits gets slim, customer service gets slashed. Charming to the least.
When I was a kid, we only had one Darth.
Damn I hate calling tech support and giving the people on the other end a lesson on whatever it is they are supposed to help me out with. Whose providing the tech support? They caller or the call center!!!!
- Make sure your cables are all solidly connected (this includes the power cable) before you call.
- Know what kind of computer you're using, and the version of your software.
- Describe your problem clearly and succinctly. We can ask for more detail if needed.
- Don't get upset if I can't answer your problem, or if we can't send you new equipment without being thorough. We have strict policies that are in place to protect against people who are trying to cheat us.
Of course, most of these shouldn't ever be necessary. But with support centers being as understaffed as they are now, and pay being so low, these are the tips that will help make your support experience more enjoyable.Ceci n'est pas un post
Im surprised many places function as well as they do, to answer the question "What would you like to see improve about tech support?" I would like to see less dependence on Contracting agencies, more direct hire and less middle-men between the person inside the company or department who needs a tech and the person getting in contact with the potential. Anymore if you dont already know someone on the inside of a company your chances of getting hired are slim-to-none. This is especially true when it comes to tech support, anywhere from call center work to desktop support guys. This is not good for the company's or the techs cause it can create such a lack of compatibility between skill-sets and needs. If more company's were willing to go out of thier way and direct hire instead of relying on a contracting agency, whos primary concern is usually the margin they will earn from getting thier tech hired and is going to feed said company anything they want to hear to make that happen. Misrepresentation is the bane of contracting agencies, and the standard practice in most cases.
I think the only times I called for tech support is to attempt to get RMAs. Except for one time when I called IBM because my old Valuepoint DX-2/66 was being upgraded to an overdrive 83 and that their mother board needed an 'interposer' chip that went between the motherboard and the actual board itself. The technician knew exactly right away when I mentioned my Valuepoint 66 and an overdrive chip and told me that he would ship the interposer chip out right away. I spent more time waiting in the queue than talking with him. The interposer chip came within 3 days. Talk about fast! :-) But this was like in 1997, aka the glory days of tech support.
i work for the help desk of a major canadian ISP and i can tell you for certain, tech support is getting a back seat to upselling and cross selling. 2 years ago when i started there, it was actually about fixing problems. they had staffed at least somewhat knowledgeable people and gave a decent training. since then, things have changed drastically, it's all about customer service and trying to make users upgrade to the next level or service. i mean, when calls are listened to by quality control, they don't even check for technical acuracy any more, they just make sure you branded the company about 7 billion times, tried to sell them some crap and made sure they knew about the company's website. and it's probably about 85% scripted! oh well. i guess things will change once everyone has the highest level of service and things STILL don't work :)
... is that the hiring process, in most cases, doesn't include determining if the candidate can actually DO THE JOB. (That is, do they have enough experience?)
Case in point: Here in Winnipeg is a company called "Convergys" -- they do tech support for several ISPs throughout North America. One of my friends recently got a job there doing phone-based technical support for Shaw. Now, this individual knows computer basics, but has NO clue what a router is, what IP tables are, DNS servers...
Most places hire people based on "can you read from this script?", which simply isn't adequate.
This problem is all over the service industry and can probably be linked to both Americans' expectations of standard of living (I want TIVO too, some day), and corporate greed.
I personally blame this on the "me" mentality of most corporations and the bad decisions made in the early to mid 90s. (Yes, this problem started long before the Dot Com boom/bust.) In order to bring more money to me, I must throw my weight around, which costs a lot of money, but according to the current business model, I will be making all this money back in spades within ten years.
(Five years of speculation spending later:) Oh no! I am not making the money I thought I would! Something has to go. I can't sell off property without seriously alarming stockholders and other investors, and technology spending can only increase throughput and therefore profits. What's left? The people.
I've watched this happen first-hand. Service-oriented industries' upper management talking themselves into a position where the most reducable liability is the service!
In a way this makes sense, but in a kind of "fake an injury to get out of trouble" way. It's not a way that will help for long. And, imagine that, it doesn't.
This now concludes our broadcast day.
I had a horrid issue with a motherboard, lets just say I am now short one RAM chip and am in the possession of 80GB of data with a corrupt parition table in the front.
Couldn't get ahold of anybody who spoke sufficent english who was able to understand that I wanted anything outside of the regular RMA. . . .
d*mn fucking offshore tech banks. . . . >: |
Need help treating your acne? Come here!
Being a transitioning tech from Windows to Linux, I do rely on Microsoft's tech support from time to time. I have noticed a steady decline in quality of service over the last couple of years.
For example, I have an ongoing issue with a client that is bordering on insane. They're running Windows 2000 Small Business Server, and twice they've had a blue screen of death while rebooting the server.
Having talked over the issue with 7 different technicians, not only do we not have a solution, but there's conflicting advice. Also there are patches that are not available to the public because they're still not "prime time" (took 7 months for a hot fix to be made available for another problem with licensing. Seems that if Windows 2000 Pro workstations connect to SBS 2000 server, the licenses get gobbled up until no one else can connect, even though there's only 7 computers connecting to a 10-licensed server. The patch still doesn't work properly).
It's a scary thing when a client is afraid to reboot the server in fear that they will be down an entire day. Thankfully in North America Microsoft will fix business servers that are down for free (MS Business Critical Support 10888-455-7422), so at least their weakening support is on their dime.
Maybe we'll solve the problem next time the server BSOD's (8th tech's a charm!?!?) Or maybe the customer will let me move them to Linux.
Ruby on Rails Screencast
At least, George thinks so!
I work for a small computer firm that (among other duties) repairs name brand computers. In my experience, Gateway has always gone the extra mile to ensure that the problem has either been identified and an work around found, or fixed entirely. Now also, in my opinion, their home machine are some of the biggest pieces of junk on the market, but at least they support them. Compaq, on the other hand, has never even been polite when I've contacted them for tech support (driver issues) and as fas as I know, are the only firm out there who charge for drivers (this is a sore point with me when I attempted to obtain drivers for a notebook modem, only to find they weren't listed on their website, and I would have to pay for a 'system restore' disk to get the needed driver) which in my eyes is patently absurd.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
This is an actual quote from my phone call to NextGenTel (Norwegian DSL providers) hotline:
Me: "Hi, I'm having problems getting online here. The router WAN lamp flashes, it can't connect"
Her: "Do you have the correct settings?"
Me: "What kind of settings, it comes with a Cisco router, shouldn't it be preconfigured?"
Her: "Yes, but you have to do some adjustments on you computer as well."
Me: "Yeah, the TCP settings, I know".
Her: "Amongst others, yes. Now click on the start button, and go to Settings.."
Me: (interrupting) "Uh, wait, I don't use Windows."
Her: "What.. Do you have a Macintosh?!"
Me: "No, I use another operating system.. OpenBSD."
Her: "Huh!" (silence)
Me: "UNIX."
Her: "Well, then I can't help. You must send our support group an email describing your problems in detail."
Me: "I would if I could, but I can't get online!"
Her: "Oh, yeah.. that's right.."
Later on I discovered that the problem was their fault: The didn't have enough capacity for all the new users, so I had to wait 14 days (felt like ten thousand years) before my ping requests finally received some echoes.
Maybe a bit OT, but I had to get it out.
-skurk
www.6502asm.com - Code 6502 assembly or.. DIE!!
Many companies have outsourced tech support and thereby cut costs and improved quality. But, apparently, that's still not enough: tech support still sucks because companies simply can't afford to pump more money or resources into it.
So what companies are looking to do *now* is outsource their tech support to companies who, in turn, export the entire operation abroad. Middle-men companies (like spherenomics - no affiliation) are building call centers in countries where labor and construction costs are low (like India). Lower base costs lead to better tech support. This really simple idea has birthed a burgeoning industry - lots of big-name companies are catching on.
By this model, the consumer benefits. There's absolutely no degradation in tech support quality, and, in most cases, it gets better. These call center outfits are really top notch - you definitely won't be stuck speaking to some foreigner with broken English. In fact, next time you call a big company for tech support, ask the attendant where he or she is speaking from - chances are you'll be surprised by the answer.
I asked this question many years ago when I was tearing out my hair at support desks trying to support crazy problems, and bullshitting to disguise the fact that the company I worked for decided that it's product sucked - so they put a bunch of support people on the front line to take the beating and free up their programmers to do more profitable things?
The answer I came up with was - that with closed software the customer does not have the option of going to someone else without changing their entire system, so basically companies are free to screw them over after they get them hooked. Ever since then I've started using more UNIX and Linux and tryied very hard to aviod dealing with closed source software in my career. It's been hard, but I'm glad I did because at least I won't get stuck like those people in dead-end careers, who after awhile simply have too much troubble relearning everything from scratch every few years, they inevitabley get stuck in some dead end field with some dead end technology.
Seeing as how I'm a tech support rep, I'm the line of fire of this one... and I actually think that the overriding problem with providing truly effective tech support is manpower (or womanpower, of course).
Quite simply, many ISPs and other tech companies have a hard time recruiting enough people to keep in line with increasing volumes of customers. That prevents them from choosing people simply based on technical prowess and forces them to treat it more like a regular job. That in turn means that support resources are based more on what the support rep has been taught in training, and any resources they have handy, than a deep-down understanding of how the technology works.
When the demand for Internet access (particularly broadband) finally tapers off, we'll be in the mostlikely position for when tech support will truly leap up in quality. Up until then, what another poster said was right: the best tech support is your own knowledge and that of your tech-savvy friends. If they can't help you, they're either not used to that particular tech or it's something on the company's end.
My major isp dsl service (I am product manager) provides sub-1 minute average speed of answer. So there.
I work for a company which provides streaming media for its clients. One of our biggest headaches has been providing support for to windows media technologies up and running for many of our customers. Netscape users, AOL, users, even many IE users cant get it to work a large percent of the time. Have you ever tried to support a non-power user over the phone? Its a daunting task. It makes us look bad when we cant fix Microsoft's problems 100% of the time.
Microsoft's website has a horrible design, try to look up a kb article and you get junk you cant comprehend half the time, how is a non-power user going to find out how to fix common Windows problems for themselves? many times we end up searching for the problem/error using google and send along the results to the customer. This costs our company allot of money in unneeded support costs.
We are currently looking towards other solutions that don't involve supporting Microsoft.
... is that the people hiring, in most cases, don't want to pay tech support people an engineer's salary. If the person can do much more than read from a script, they're overqualified, and won't be happy with the job or the salary.
I'm a knowledgeable guy in his early 20's who needed a foot in the door, so I took a job with Cow Computer tech support. I had no certifications and only 1 year of professional experience, therefore I was nieve and surprised that I was even hired.
Well the surprise soon wore off. During the first weeks of orientation and training, it struck me as quite odd that the majority of other new-hires had minimal computer knowledge, it just absolutely floored me.
Eventually they closed us up and shifted the majority of tech support to outsource companies, which are an absolute joke (I do know some of the outsource techs are bright people that "get it," but the vast majority are near-min-wage college students, housewives and retirees). Voila, there go your hold times out the roof and the quality of support (although it's not like our call center was full of bright folks).
I guess my point is that these companies are looking more for damage control than support, therefore they just want customer service people. I recently had to call in to request a replacement vid card in my desktop machine, did everything to ensure that it was the card and the tech, who took 7 mins to come back on after I explained the issue, walked me through a couple lame steps and finally I think he just got frustrated and said he would replace it.
Cheaper prices on machines = less money for support = fear = anger = hate = suffering hehe
It costs anywhere from $12 to $48 each time a technician picks up a phone, McEvoy said.
At a major ISP I once worked for, the cost per support call was approximately $2.70. I remember because they had a promotional "How can we lower this" competition where you got a prize if they used your suggestion. My suggestion was to give customers access to current outage information on the net and over the phone. This was turned down for potential legal concerns over regional variations in quality of service. At any rate, $12-$48 seems like a deliberately inflated number (unless you are someone like Cisco).
I have found that online forums like MaximumPC's forum are very helpful. There are many users on there who answer questions just for the fun of it. Any person that posts a question on there usually gets 5-10 responses within half an hour.
I think that it's better than waiting on hold on the phone!
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
I've called IBM tech support several times with questions about my ThinkPad, and they've always been helpful and curteous on the phone. It's also nice when they know the difference between a hardware problem and a software problem...
One time I called Dell about my sister's new laptop and they refused to help me because I had installed Windows 2000 (I removed the existing WinME), but I didn't buy the copy of 2000 from Dell. Thanks Dell, and I thought you won awards for support. (BTW, it was a problem with the CD writer).
When I've spoken with IBM they've never asked me what OS I was running unless that info was actually relevant to the troubleshooting.
In addition, IBM support (for me) has had very fast response times...
Now, I'm sure some of you will have complaints about the infamous Deskstar family, but my comments only apply to the ThinkPad support group.
I worked for Dell, and we had a 17 minute Average Handle Time (AHT) goal. If we spent more than 15 minutes with a customer, a flag would go off up at the Supervisor on Duty's desk, and someone would come by and have us put the customer on hold. Several techs were not knowledgable at all, but were so frustrating for the customer to deal with that they would give up. Thus, the worst techs had the best call times. Other techs would focus on getting the cust off the phone by dispatching parts.
One man, about 70 years old, would call in about once or twice a week (looking back through the call logs), and he was simply inept at using the computer. This man had been sent a video card, sound card and motherboard. This was a simple case of techs not wanting to deal with this guy and his lack of aptitude.
ClientLogic is just one outsourcer, there are others. Some companies, like Dell outsource to multiple companies, while maintaining their own base of techs, usually for their more valuable customers. We were given home and small business. Laptops, Servers and larger companies were handled by Dell directly.
Often in Error, Never in Doubt.
Is like having a long nail pppounded into the head, flat side first.
I have some questions for them pending but I am very reluctant to experience that sort of pain, so my questions remain unanswered.
I strongly agree with the above comment. Unfortunately I don't have moderation points.
Companies are following Microsoft's lead in being abusive.
One company I work with has an intra-company tech support for all the agents. The problem is the tech support sucks POO POO. The hold times are insane. Once you actually get a person, it is just a level one tech who can just look at the 10 page trouble shooting manual. If its not there, you get a problem number and a level two tech will call you back. Sometimes, that can takes DAYS. One time I was told a level 2 tech would call back by 5 our time, we waited till 7, called back and found out everyone had gone home. Teh support also will lie to you as well, which is always fun.
Being tech oriented, I try to avoid calling tech support like the PLAUGE. However, some times I have to and it drives me bonkos. There needs to be a code word that lets the person know, "Okay, he doesnt need to hear: Click Start, Settings, Control Panel."
The ultimate network admin tool needs HELP!
I work in tech support, and I end up wasting my time NOT solving the immediate problem, but rather teaching Windows 101 to many of the callers. I think it should be a pre-req to have at least completed some kind of basic computer knowledge course, or at least have some experience with computers. It is a waste of my time to get a call, "I bought your new video card and I don't know how to change my wallpaper.." Well BOOHOO read your help file.
"The 27,000 respondents to the unscientific poll reported longer waits on hold and less knowledgeable technicians. It is also taking longer to find fixes. An increasing number said problems were never solved. "
I wonder why..
On the company side:
Chopping Block Gods are hired to find where the fat in the company lies. Mr/Mrs. Chopping Block plugs a couple of numbers into his/her overpriced calculator and finds that the tech support people are working only 80% of the time and therefore 20% can be cut.
Mr/Mrs. Chopping Block tells management this and says they can probably save the biggest money by getting rid of the more experienced (read: overpaid) techs since everyone is reading from a script anyway.
3 months later you have an overworked call centre with clueless staff. The place is no longer fun to work at and the turnover rate goes up. Big surprise. As morale goes down you find staff taking longer breaks, more sick days, etc. The cycle continues.
On the consumer side:
Mr/Mrs "Informed" Consumer scans all ads in the newspaper looking for the absolute cheapest price for their pocket computer. He/she first finds the cheapest company that offers a pocket computer since they're all the same, then finds the cheapest model made by that company, then the cheapest store to buy it from.
Mr/Mrs "Informed" Consumer does not consider how the prices got so low and may not ever have to as long as a) they don't need tech support, b) their product doesn't break. If either of these happens, they are in for a nightmare experience.
I'm not necessarily saying that the cheapest products have the worst tech support/warranty scams running (some save money on big ad campaigns), but the cuts DO have to come from somewhere. Unfortunately, some of the cuts come from the quality of life for people who have the misfortune of working at one of these companies.
Dell: good
At&t: poor
Qwest: criminal
My personal opinion, Dell... That is once you get through to them. The display in my last laptop went bad a few monthes into getting it. I called up, and once I managed to talk to a real person, they scheduled Airborne Express to come to my dorm and pick it up from me the next day. The guy arrived on time, and put the laptop back in my hands in just under 48 hrs. When they made that repair they ended up frying my modem (how i really dont know), which i didnt realize for a few monthes later, I called again, and they sent someone to meet me at work. Again, I had the laptop returned in 48 hours. My experience with their support was very friendly and helpful. The only problem I had was that it would generally take at least a half hour to get off of hold... thank god for speaker phone...
I'm only paranoid because everyone is against me...
i loved their tech support, we had hardware warranties on all of our equipment for three years, and i'd call in around twice a week for anything from a new mobo to a new slim line cd drive.....next day air.....how will the merger affect the support, i hope to god they don't take on HP's level of support.....
--fetch daddy's blue fright wig, i must be handsome when i release my rage
The decline in tech support is nothing new. For quite some time, I've argued to management and coworkers that the only kind of technical support worth having is per-incident support, where the company providing support gets paid only if the issue is resolved successfully. "Gold" and "Platinum" support contracts (where you can get help as much as you want) still send you through the same tedious process of explaining your problem, receiving instructions whereby you, the customer, spend even more time diagnosing the problem, following up to the company, receiving still more diagnosis instructions, ad nauseam. Personally, I'm sick of bothering to isolate a test case, telling the company the version of their software I'm using, only to be told to mindlessly upgrade to a newer version that allegedly fixes the problem. The last time I was told this, I asked the company in question if they could try my problem scenario in their environment with the proposed new version. They said "no". Their expectation is that I will take half a day setting up an environment, installing a new version of their software, setting up my test case, and making a determination. Paugh!
I'm willing to bet that if the support vendor got paid when and only when my problem was resolved that I'd have received very different answers and a willingness to actually solve my problem.
The idea that only big companies with high-priced products can offer good support is stupid. The company I've spoken of sells a very expensive database product with even more expensive support. If the support isn't per-incident, there's simply no incentive to do better.
The best tech I know of anywhere-- online or elsewhere-- comes from the makers of the (now EOL'ed, but availible through other cahnnels) Linux-based Rio Car (formerly Empeg). All questions are personally answered by the people who designed the hardware and software within a few hours. Seriously. They are also very open to third party development and will help anyone with any issues they are having. There is also an incredebly extensive FAQ maintained by a member of the community. The user forums are also frequented by the hardware and software designers as well as massive number of Linux gurus who jump at the opportunity to answer your questions. Its a tech support dream. John
Black holes are where god divided by zero
A big selling point for closed software is that it comes with "superior" tech support. (A debated point, but anyway...)
Is it the case that open source software support is immune to economic changes? Is one of the dangers with closed source support the notion that economic changes will affect the quality of support?
A responsible person, driven by an interest in science, would see these as open questions, and not rush to state "Of course open source is better; it does not get affected by the economy.".
Which camp are you, the reader in? Are you driven by science or propaganda?
A few examples of GOOD customer support experiences, to let people know some companies still care:
I had purchased a copy of OS/2 3.0 from a friend. It was a boxed copy, still had all of the registration cards, manuals, etc. OS/2 did not like my sound card, which was a cheap SB16 clone. I called IBM tech support, and was rather horrified to know that I was a known OS/2 custoemr in their records (despite never using it before, not telling them about it, and my friend never tellng them about me. Odd) Anyway, the support person that I spoke with actually had a clue, and ironically shared a story about how he promised himself he'd never buy IBM again because of bad tech support in the past. Anyway, it two phone calls over two days, but IBM eventually had me download an experiemntal driver from their website and said that if that did not work, they would conference to determine whether they had to fly a tech to my home to solve it, or if there were a way to solve the problem more quickly. All this over a $50 copy of OS/2!
My new HP USB scanner (4100C, I think it was) didn't work in my computer because there were two basic types of USB controller: The Intel one and everyone else. I had everyone else. I called HP tech support who, after about an hour, could not solve it. The tech eventually spoke with someone else and found that it was a known problem with my USB controller. Now, the company that I purchased the scanner from, Future Shop in Boise, ID. (USA), had gone out of business so I was pretty convinced I was SOL and out of $200.
The HP tech then asked me if I had a working parallel port or SCSI controller. I did, so he offered to send next HIGHER scanner to me provided I sent the old one back, and that it would take 6-8 weeks to deliver.
Well, 5 weeks later I called (6-8 weeks is usually a BS figure they give for safety so you don't bug them) and asked where the scanner was. Apparently the last guy had forgotten to ask for my credit card for collateral in case I did not send back the old scanner... So he sent the next higher up scanner after the one they already offered to send. A 6100Cse. So, I was getting a $400 scanner as a replacement for a $200 scanner. Not bad.
The next day the scanner arrived, sent priority overnight and with documents explaining who to call to have my scanner picked up on HP's bill.
That pretty much won me over to HP, other than their crappy PCs. I was very impressed at how far they went to solve the problem.
Cisco:
I have a friend that works for a telco in Pocatello, ID, USA. To make my point clear, let me give you some quick background: Pocatello has a population of about 45,000 people. It is in Idaho, one of the physically largest states in the USA with one of the smallest populations. The total population of the whole state barely exceeds 1 million and there are zero major cities within several hours.
There was a problem with a Cisco router and my friend's work. Bad power supply, IIRC. He called Cisco about it and they had a replacement part to him TWO HOURS LATER! They had actually hired a taxi cab to deliver it that much faster. How they got a part to such a podunk little backwater town in two hours amazes me to this day. The have no offices anywhere near.
DirecTV also has great support (the support guys get in trouble if they don't solve your problem--if they don't, ask to speak to a supervisor).
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. --E. W. Dijkstra
Crap product (IMHO). Great technical support. Its web based and you can even raise faults on the tech support system itself.
I do helpdesk/network support for a small workgroup, and have been exposed to many supplier's idea of "support", mostly regarding hardware failure within warranty period. Apple, IBM and HP have been absolutely great so far.
I recently bought a Canon scanner, which didn't work out of the box (scanhead's jammed). E-mail support acknowledged straight away that I had done all that's humanly possible to get it to work software-wise, and referred me to phone support line to get an exchange. We're now more than three (3) weeks further down the road, and I still haven't been able to get anyone on the line: perpetual busy signal. I did manage to get through in the weekend once, calling from home, but the support person insisted the e-mail support isn't authorised to make exchanges, and wanted to talk me through troubleshooting the scanner - which I didn't have at home of course, knowing there's no point in re-installing the drivers/what have you not they make newbies go through before admitting it's really their hardware that's the problem.
My conclusion: there's still some companies providing decent support. But buying Canon? Never again.
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sigs are a total waste of bandwith, especially when the signal-to-noise ratio is lower than 1:10.
We have several older Compaq servers (1600s), and every time we have called for tech support, we got a tech within a minute or two. Each time the first line tech was first rate, and knew how to fix the problem with patience.
One tech knew Linux well enough to guide us through adding additional parameters to LILO boot to fix the problem, without having to consult a knowledge base (he had installed and played with linux on a 1600 in his office previously!).
If you want great tech support, buy a used (or new) compaq server!
Say what you will, but I've got nothing but good to say about Sun's support. If I needed a engineer, I got an engineer to talk to. If I needed a kernel team person, I got transferred to one. Parts were always delivered on time-- if not before the response window expired, they would call me to followup on issues, ect. All in all, I've had good experiences with 'em.
Later when I became a MS Exchange consultant (1996) I was calling about a corrupt message store. The guy on the phone didn't know anything. That was the last time I called.
Please Hold, Your call is important to us. (But not your time!!) After dealing with Gateway, Sprint, Mindspring, I don't use customer service unless I have no other choice.
CS at sprint (bless their heart!) did not have computers to view your problem! They could not solve the problem, but they sympathized!
Purchasing? -- If the price is extremely low, I might buy from a company a second time.
Scenario:
The modem was not shipped with my order.
1. Called (waited 30) and was told it would be taken care of.
2. Next week, called again, (waited 45), was told it would be taken care of.
3. Next week, call again, (waited 30)asked for a manager, she corrected and said she was re-starting the order and that I would not be charged shipping (got her direct ph. no!)
4. Four days later I received a memory stick and was charged shipping. (memory was same price as modem.)
5. Called back, told her, If you remove the shipping charge from Master Card, I will keep the memory, and forget the modem.
6. Total time, 3.5 weeks. Over hours on phone -- and still no modem.
I ordered a modem later. ($20.00)
Service like this stinks, but is was the first time in 5 years. They got a second chance due to price only.
I'm fairly senior tech guy. I can sys admin and I can code. (I'm a better coder but that's besides the point).
I would take a guy in a call center. That job stinks. It's an entry level job that tries to serve senior level people. It's not a surprise that it doesn't work out well. The only way to fix it is to pay very well.
That model works in consulting. You give some comforts when you travel (the job is worse) but you get paid better. In support, you have to deal with more crap but if you get paid better you'll take the job.
That which does not kill me only makes me whinier
Having worked at various ISPs doing tech support over the last few years, I've got a few interesting insights.
1) Too many companies emphasize quantity over quality. By quantity, I mean the number of calls you take in a day, or average call times. At some places, if you can't resolve an issue within 15 minutes, you're required to end the call, even if you could fix it with a little more time. This is stupid, because customers will call back, get someone else, and have to explain their problem again, which wastes time and costs the company money. Companies need to be less afraid to let go of techs who can answer a lot of calls in a day, but rarely actually solve anything, and more afraid to lose good techs who know what they're doing.
2) Interdepartment communication in most large companies is terrible. Very often, the only way to get something done is to make friends with people in other departments, and ask them personal favors, because following procedure might get the issue brought up at the next manager meeting, but it won't go anywhere from there, because it's not important enough to make a big deal over.
3) Immediate supervisors of tech support agents usually know how to encourage and motivate their teams, because those people were probably promoted from tech support themselves. The manager one level above them may have a general idea what's going on. Anyone above that is absolutely clueless, and has no concept of what's happening on the floor. Immediate supervisors are powerless, and their managers have little actual power. This means the people in power don't know anything about tech support, and people who know about tech support have no power. It's a direct inverse proportion.
4) Management assumes that tech support should be in an isolated box; they don't need to know about what's going on in the rest of the company. Thus, marketing comes up with a new advertising strategy, and tech support doesn't know about it. Engineering releases a new software version that works differently, and tech support doesn't find out until customers tell them. This goes back to the communication issue above, but it's more than just different departments not talking to each other - it never occurs to anybody that tech support needs to know about anything happening outside of tech support. Tech support needs to be given a little more respect - if you respect them, they'll respond to that.
5) What's up with long hold times? If a hold time of over five minutes for any department is not an unusual thing, you need to hire more people! The company is losing customers (or just losing money, as customer service gives away free service to bribe customers so they won't leave) just because the hold times are so long. Sure, you need to take steps to ensure that techs aren't needlessly wasting time, but once those steps have been taken, it's time to increase headcount. Sure, it costs money, but how many customers can you afford to lose? You don't want techs sitting around waiting for a call, but usually there's something productive they could be doing. How about cross-training people so they can be moved between a couple departments as needed, as call volume demands? That way you don't have to keep hiring and firing.
6) Many companies throw techs out on the floor with inadequate training. Usually they'll get a training class, but it's not enough to absorb everything they'll need. As long as it's clear who they can go to for help, this may be OK - it only takes about a month on the floor to figure out what's going on, and as long as the tech isn't spreading misinformation or causing problems, that's fine. New techs should not be held to the same expectations as seasoned techs, though - they should be held to the same standards of quality, but if it takes them longer to get an issue resolved because they have to ask three people for help along the way, there's nothing wrong with that.
7) Monopolies don't have to care about any of this.
.. and CNN sucks too, btw...
... ridiculous" I believe and hope that this sort of crap will eventually go away. We need remove desktp access as in XP. That, or just bring your goddam peecee to local specialist. I mean I don't see Honda or Ford fixing cars over the phone ("ok, ms. jones, now remove transmission..."), so why is it considered that much more complex computers can be fixed while talking to retatded users over the phone?
There are several major problems in tech support:
1. It is experiencing essentially the same problems as popular web sites: many non-paying users, high costs of doing business. And before anyone mentions that users did pay for the product, yes, they in most cases did (some can pirate the program and then contact support with angry rants as of why it doesn't work for them), but that often doesn't cover tech support costs. If tech support costs to be covered, product prices would have to be increased, often dramatically. As it curently is, support lives on what remains from other departments, so the service is corresponding.
2. Often unreasonable expectations from users, which is the most common cause of disappointment. ("what you mean you can't tell me exactly and right now why my computer crashes (which was the first computer he built himself, from cheap crappy parts, and is running 40 various utilities on the background). Fixing such issues would require many housr, but lusers only have attention span of 30 seconds. Besides, they didn't pay for 10 hours for the technician, so why should he go out of his way to fix luser's faults?
3. Insufficient capabilities. I still consider phone and email support(most commonly used) to be ridiculous means of resolving technical issues. Anyone who ever tried doing that knows what I mean. ("so now you click Ok""there is no Ok""sir, Ok button is in the lower right corentr of the dialog box""which box??"
I believe that to improve things in support:
1. It will have to be paid for by users. As I said, currently retail prices don't cover support. Funny, I recently explored support options at richest of the rich Microsoft, and guess waht, you get 3(three) installation-only questions within 90 days of purchase. THat's all folks. Everything else has to be paid for. Other companies should do the same. Costs should be covered, and a small profit would be nice, too. This is not charity, after all.
2. Myth that you can fix computers over the phone while trying to get a retard to click on the right thing has to go. Lusers should be told that computers are very complex things that they shouldn't be poking around. If it doesn't work, bring it to a specialist so he can see in what way you screwed your computer. He will contact vendor's professional support if really necessary.
Oh, and the last thing, idiots should be fined and banned from wasting support's time again, ever.
As a rule, they offer no telephone support. All of their support is via email, or a web form in case your email is down. They usually respond within an hour, and always within 24 hours. The people who respond are actual techs, and they actually have the power to fix things if they're broken.
One of the nicest features about their support web form, though is that after you ask your question, there's a little choice control, with the question: "Please select your general expertise in the area of this request:", with options ranging from "Please explain everything to me carefully" to "I have a good understanding of this stuff" and even "Not to be rude, but I probably know more about this than you!".
What a difference it makes! They don't waste their time reminding me to check my caps lock key when typing in my password, and similarly they don't confuse a newbie by talking about IMAP vs. POP3 (they support both, BTW, which rocks!).
I really like this model - I would be willing to give up phone support from any company if their email support worked this well.
And I highly recommend DreamHost for all of your web-hosting needs. And that's not just because if you say that "dmazzoni" referred you, I'll get a discount!
From my experience, short hold times, techs that know their product (shocking!), free overnight crosshipping on busted parts and best of all it's free to their customers. When I call, I don't get the "your an idiot" treatment that Dogbert is famous for. My biggest worry is that this HP deal is going to screw this all up.
---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano
Computers get more popular -> more of the general population uses them -> more calls to tech support from people who are total morons -> tech support gets sick of dealing with these people all the time, quits -> only person willing to take tech support job and deal with morons is also a moron. This is the story of many of my friends who have been tech support people, the good ones can always get a better job somewhere else and not have to deal with it.
This has worked well for me and while it increases your hold time initially it works in the long run. When you get through to a human during the initial chat determine if you have a good one or a bad one. If you have a bad one hang up and call again. If you have a good one do your best to get their name, extension and/or email and use that for future contacts with that vendors tech support. In my experience the quality of support depends largely on the individual tech
Whether you were kidding or not. While I've heard of this kind of thing before, phrases like "theres absolutely no degredation in tech support quality" feel more like a potshot at the current state of affairs within the US.
But I can see the reasoning if you truely agree with it. The only downside is the increased lag time between parties. Its bad enough when dealing with telemarketers that wait five seconds before saying hello.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
IMHO, I have found no better tech support than the fine people at Lotus (and this was before IBM pulled them back in). Everyone I have dealt with knew their stuff or knew how to get ahold of someone that knew the answers. Since their convergence with IBM, the support has gotten even better (hard as that is to believe). It's a damn shame that my employer is going to switch us off of Notes/Domino and onto Outbreak/Exchange. I can't wait to have to call M$ $upport.
"Klaatu, verada, necktie!" -Ash
We have a large number of different systems (Suse SLES, HP-UX, Solaris 7, AIX, and SGI IRIX). The best support comes from SGI. I have the cell phone number of a very senior support engineer who is willing to help us with any problem we might have. He has been working for SGI for over a decade and so far I have never been able to stump him. He even answers his cell phone on the first ring.
And, SGI servers are the most scalable (up to 1024 CPUs in a CCNUMA SMP configuration) of any system we have found. They even cost less than Sun!
Why we keep buying SGI systems year in and year out:
(1) Amazing hardware, long uptimes, very scalable, huge internal bangwidth, well priced.
(2) Great OS: scales well, lots of features, XFS file system, handles real time scheduling and real time IO.
(3) Great support. See above. Better than any othre company I've ever worked with, bar none.
If they paid decent, and let people DO more than just 'read from the script', end users would get better support and people may find the position a bit more fulfilling. Maybe not MUCH more fulfilling, but we won't know as long as people are only allowed to read from scripts, will we?
creation science book
... is because no one wants to pay for it.
Think about it - everyone thinks short-term, and buys on price. Does ANYONE buy a PC because of the excellent support anymore?
Look at the cheapest Dell desktop you can buy. What was cut out? The support. They only offer 90 days. How many people buy no-name crap at computer fairs and the like, or questionable goods from Ebay, since it has the cheapest price, and then attempt to get Microsoft to answer the phone when it doesn't work?
Why are companies outsourcing to crap outfits? Product support has become something that is a checklist item that never turns up in reviews, for the most part... which is not surprising, since companies like Dell and Gateway pay the bills at the reviewer's magazines. Ever wonder why the biggest advertisers always get the best reviews? Has PC Mag ever said a negative thing about Dell or Microsoft?
So companies find the cheapest way to pay tech-support "lip service" to their customers. This means that some half-asleep foreigner with a good American accent is going to answer the phone call... after a half hour on hold.
Fact is that if you want good support, you pay for it - either in the product's price, or afterwards. Well, no one wants to pay for it the product price anymore.
Tech support should be an option that people have to pay for - either the screwdriver guy in the neighborhood, a local third-party, or as an add-on from the company that sold you the gear in the first place.
One thing that pisses me off is that people always assume that the phone support people have heard it all and know the answer to everything. People can call and if I do say "Wow never heard of that one before" and they get pissed. Now we all work in a enviroment with multiple operating systems, multiple operating system configurations, multiple hardware setups, multiple software packages with multiple dependancies. Now we know that is a enviroment that can create millions of issues. Now what needs to be addressed I think is not so much thinking that phone support knows it all but has a firm grasp of how to narrow down the option of what a problem could be. I may have not heard of that problem before but with what I know I am pretty sure it could be narrowed down to these certian options. Phone support gets harder everyday and maybe that is a contributing force that is not addressed very well in the CNN article. I salute all of of us phone jockeys that sit at a phone 8 hours a day berated with 6 hours of idiotic questions about missing shortcuts and 2 hours of true problem solving. As for the folks that read scripts....i would say something to them but you know they dont read Slashdot!
1. Overall product quality: down
2. Tech support: largely useless
3. Marketing: too expensive
4. Clue factor at 90% of tech companies: 0
5. Experienced IT staff: laid off
6. Salaries: down
7. Benefits: gone
8. Investment: way down
9. New ideas: not approved, obstructed, suppressed
10. Average workday: 80% meetings, 20% e-mail
11. Profit margins: thinning
12. Search for new qualified staff: failed
13. Money spent: incalculable
14. Projections: bleak
15. Likelihood of reaching anyone except a receptionist at any company: 0
Now, how do we know this is directly and completely the fault of management? They are the only people STILL EMPLOYED.
When was the last announcement of several thousand managers being laid off? BZZZT Time's up!
Each of these things is NOT happening in a vaccuum. At some point, these problems have to be fixed or all businesses are going to have problems.
(and here come the apologists... sigh...)
my mom has a dell computer and we tried to install a new cd burner. so we installed it and everything and when reconnected the power and turned it on it didnt work. considering that this was before i became a geek, we called dell tech support. they told us that our hard drive was corrupt and we had to reformat the hard drive. so we did and the computer still didnt work, so we called a friend who knows about computers and he comes to fix our computer. right away he spots the problem, we had the cd drive set to master instead of slave!
IBM -- I will never forget the first and only IBM PC I ever bought. Constantly crashing and about every month or so, crashed beyond repair and a rebuild was necessary. After about 5 months of this (5 rebuilds) I knew something was wrong. After performing every kind of test imaginable I narrowed it down to a probable BIOS problem. Called IBM and asked what the latest BIOS was. Turns out I had the latest. I tell tech support the BIOS is faulty. They disagree. I tell them to e-mail me when a new one comes out. They add me to some mailing list. Two weeks later I get a notice about an updated BIOS. Crash problem fixed. Miraculous.
Although I can't say IBM is all bad. They never argued when I said a part failed. Next business day the part was there. Nice.
Compaq -- Never had a problem here. With our Proliant servers, Compaq has been amazing with support. Very few problems to begin with but wow are they top notch to get us parts and such.
Dell -- I can't say enough bad things about Dell's tech support as of late. We use a RIS server to deploy Windows 2000 installations. When we discovered about 20 of our Dell computers wouldn't work with RIS because of faulty BIOS Dell's response was "We don't support network installations on these machines so if it doesn't work there is nothing we can or will do." Wrong answer.
Not only that, but you get a tech that knows next to nothing that makes you jump through 10 hoops before they will send you the part you KNOW is faulty.
We are in a world filled with technology, trying to learn how to use it all, while the guy on the other end of the line is doing the exact same thing. I don't know how to solve the tech support problem. I'm one of the pretentious people that never calls it because I think I know more than they do, how the hell are they going to help me? The only time I'll phone it is if the light is red. Hi, my name is ___, my username is ___, I've reset, yes, yes, done,.. skip to page 5 please. If I have a problem and it's on my end, I can fix it, and if I can't fix it, then it's not on my end. I don't need support.. it's probably them that needs support.
of course, there's this whole group of the population that can't fix problems on their end. So tech support has become this "learn how to use a computer" hotline.
what would I like to see about tech support?
If nothing else can be reliable, make the webserver reliable. And overload that "about" section with as much possible documentation as you possible can.
People with an actual education that know how to solve problems. There's too many people that talk on the phone for 8 hours a day that aren't good problem solvers. Common sense.
I'm reading this CNN article because I'm waiting for my mail server to come back online. Is it gone forever? Probably not. It's just taking a long time. Longer than I'm happy with because I pay money for it. I keep drifting over to their system status page on the web to see if there's any news.
If it's a gadget that you buy and you can't get it to work (as the guy was described at the beginning of the article), it's not good tech support that the guy needs. It's a good return policy. RTFM, and if that doesn't work, take it back. There are billions of products being sold with chips in them in this world, probably daily. There are bound to be defects.
Warranties are stupid. The only reason warranties are used is because the cost of them to the firms is still lower than the cost of making sure every product that's released to the market works perfectly. Make it a simple, returnable product for x years. (providing it didn't quit working because the user ran over it with his car)
But as for services, this is where the problems are. What this world needs is some good consumer reports. The track records of companies need to be easily available information for every single consumer, only then will service problems be solved. Technology still has a lot of kinks in it, so I guess a little patience also never hurts.
You have paid for a total of 0 pages and so far 0 have been used up (0 today).
From the article "We're still looking for the cheapest way to answer the stupidest questions," he said. "If you go out of the script, they have no idea how to react."
This quote exemplifies the real problem that tech support faces. People computting beyond their means. I used to work tech support for an ISP. Our install software was good, Our POPs were fairly stable. Yet we still had a large call volume. The problem was the LUSERs that kept calling, and calling, and calling. Some of these people had call history logs that contained thirty to forty entrys, none of them due to anything we had done. I literally spent 15 minutes one night trying to get a woman to type her password in the same way twice.
Why this is important, These people cost money. Every minute they are on the phone money leaving the company. We had a 800 number and of course I was getting payed. We figured it out one night that if a customer was on the phone with use for 10 minutes that wiped out our profit on them for the month. With aditional months getting wiped out ever 11 minutes. Some of these customers had call logs that indicated 15 to 20 HOURS of time on the phones with us. They had wiped out their profits for the next ten years and the profits of thrity of forty other poeple also.
What tech companies have woken up to is the fact that these people make up, at worst 10% of your customer base, yet they burn up 50 to 60% of the profits a company makes.
In a defensive measure companies are trying to ditch them. Unfotunatly people with a real issue of need are ditched with them also. This is a sad state of affairs, yes, but then the level of support required to maintain this level of helpfullness is destructive to the company.
No other industry in america is expected to provide this level of support. Not car manufactures, VCR manfacturers, nobody. They are expected to replace defective product, which everyone should do, but GM does not have to have a help line to explain to idiot customers that the reason their car stopped after 300 miles is that they did not put any more gas in it.
The level of support we see now is due to the tech companies brutally shedding this dead weight. It's harsh, and unforgiving, but it needs to be done. The tech recovery cannot begin while we struggle with all the dead weight we must carry
As a further note, if you think these comments harsh go work a hell desk position. You will develope an abiding hate for human kind quickly. I am still puzzled myself on how most people managed to have ancestors smart enough to evolve to come down from the trees, let alone learn to walk upright.
Papa Legba come and open the gate
Just after we got the box, the PS died. It took longer than the promised 2 days to get a new one. It was christmas, newyears and their inventory was going on at the same time.
A few weeks later, we get a letter from them saying that an internal audit noticed the times on our service call. They sent their apologies, and told us to keep the letter, it was good for 6 months more on-site warranty. Turns out we did use it, the on-board cmos battery died 3 years later. We faxed them the letter, they sent the battery. (we told them not to bother sending a tech, we could do it).
Once we had a problem that we could not solve. Thought it was the CD. Might not be though
Too bad they aren't much into making boxes any more. They were fantastic.
It has been rumoured that there the call centre is often populated with the most knowledgable technical people who are paid appropriately for their knowledge. It is considered a high-prestige job. NOT the call center slave that we experience in NA.
Anyone out there got any direct experience or is this just so much "grass is greener over there" party chatter?
(Europe is where ITIL (now mutating/innovating into MOF in Redmond) came from after all...)
Last week, I had to use Microsoft's free "low-priority" tech support to replace my broken IntelliMouse Explorer, and I was pretty impressed with their promptness in handling the issue. 3 e-mail exchanges and 2 days after I initiated my support request, they're sending me a new mouse, which should be here within a week.
We are currently having problems with Matrox video adapters and LogiTech mice on new computers that we build. They don't work under Windows XP, and there is apparently no fix.
Matrox drivers are causing blue screen crashes in Windows XP. The blue screen blames a matrox DLL.
The Matrox technical representative told me to try a video card from another manufacturer. I told him that, if the Matrox card didn't work, and nVidia did, we would just begin selling nVidia cards. This did not bother him.
It is so difficult to deal with Matrox that it makes me wonder if they are going out of business.
LogiTech is similar. There are problems with mouse wheel scrolling. LogiTech has a variety of "try this, try that" solutions. None of them work for us. Obviously, no one has bothered to actually troubleshoot the problems.
Doesn't matter how easy to use or intuitive you make programs, idiots will still have questions about how to use them. That's just life, and it's also why you don't see many qualified people on the tech lines, no company wants to pay a qualified tech when the majority of questions are probably the exact same ones you always get. Not to mention the fact that the moment you change anything, even to make it easier, half the users go into a panic and can't even manage what they used to be able to do. In addition to that, unless we let one company produce every single product on someone's computer(and even that doesn't necessarily guarantee good intearction ex: visual studio), it's very difficult to track down the exact cause of a problem with all the different software which could be having problems. Phone tech support is a horrible, low paying, unrewarding job, and it probably always will be.
I seriously can't remember having a good tech support experience. A tree fell on my phone line once, and they said (Ameritech) they couldn't come out to fix it for a week (this is after I was on hold for almost an hour). Ouch. Being Pissed of I did what any nerd would do, I claimed up the poll, got out some duct tape, taped the wire to the poll again (lots of tape) and spliced the wires back together. This little home remedy caused me nothing but trouble in the end though.
:)
The tech guy came out in a week, tested the line, saw that it was ok, and left. I never saw him. Too bad he didn't see the tree that was still on the ground, or the fact that the pole (wooden) had a large amount of duct tape on it. Maybe thats how they fix things sometimes, *shrug*. So anyway long story short, I had to call them a multitude of times more, in the end 4 different guys came out all doin the same thing execpt the last because I camped out waiting for him. I gave him the story, he laughed, I sighed, and he fixed the line the right way.
Oh and I told the person on the other side how I fixed it every time, to let them know why I was complaining about a line that was down that was somehow calling them. One of them actually told me that I should rip down my home-fix and wait a week for them to come out and fix it. Sigh.
In the end it took about a month for Ameritech to fix my line. If you thought waits like that only happen in third world countries, think again.
P.S. The duct tape fix lasted all month! It even rained 2 or 3 times in there! Surprised the heck out of me, I have now a larger respect for the Gray Roll of Tape God
but you don't have to be a genius if you have good reference librarian skills.
A good tech support person ought to be able to fix common problems by ad libbing. If they don't know the answer, then they shouldn't give up, but rather should begin researching what they need to know in order to solve the problem (or determine what the problem is for that matter).
A good call center would collect and organize this research and put it in a format that is easy for everyone working there to search.
The only other thing they'd need to do is pay the tech support personnel well and not overwork them. Then people will actually want the jobs and you'll have no shortage of quality employees.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Having worked in the OEM reselling business, I can tell you that 'front line' tech support people vary greatly depending on who will be calling the line.
If the tech support line is set up so end users can call in when they have trouble, the people on the other end of the line will be the clueless idiots we all know and love. This is because the average customer calling in will have their problem solved by one of the following manners:
- reboot the machine and/or redial
- reinstall the software or drivers
- fix the configuration (i.e. RTFM)
These are certainly the vast majority of the issues and so when non-clueless people phone with a real issue, the chance of getting it solved by people who only know how to fix the above three is very low.
On the other hand, for support that is designed for vendors, it is a different world. When a vendor phones a supplier for support, you can be fairly certain that a tech from the vendor will be phoning and that this tech has eliminated the obvious problems already. Because of this, support for vendors tends to be very good. Having dealt with supplier tech support myself, I can say that wait times are low (usually less than 2 minutes) and the competency of the person you talk to is high.
The bottom line is that unless the end user gets smarter (highly unlikely) we cannot expect much help from the front line mainstream tech support personnel.
Anymore, TS is too much of a crap shoot (quality depending entirely on who happens to answer the phone) to be a useful way to solve problems.
I remember the early 90's when you would call TS and an actual *engineer* (as in product designer) would answer the phone. They were cool, they knew the answers, they got my jokes. I want an ID card I can swipe on my telephone that forwards my call straight through those people again because if I'm desperate enough to call someone else for help it's a pretty frickin' real problem.
That said, I really can't blame the industry for the way things are. Enough people are now using computers that have no real troubleshooting skill I think it has to be this way. I imagine support techs drink a LOT of tear-addled beer after work.
Thank God for the www. It's really the only tech support that consistently works anymore.
"Lawyers are for sucks."
- Doug McKenzie
See Microsoft Technical Support vs. The Psychic Friends Network
The conclusion: The Psychic Friends Network is better at answering technical support questions for Microsoft products. Neither organization has useful answers, but The Psychic Friends Network is more friendly and less expensive.
Penguin Computing would have me believe their tech support is great.
Speaking as a tech, the best tech support I've reached is from Cyrusoft, the makers of the lovely Mulberry email client. Every inquiry I have ever made (well, all two) has been answered by Cyrus Daboo personally. Even my "thanks for your help, love the client" gushes that follow have been answered by well-written personal responses.
Game... blouses.
They left out one important choice
"I don't even bother with tech support"
I can't help but think this would receive a
majority of votes.
mike
I dont' even bother trying to contact tech support anymore. I've found that user forums get answers a lot faster and usually more accurately. I discovered this when I had a problem with my old system (a Dell). After sitting on hold a few times I ran across the Dell | Talk site and found the answer in about half the time I had already spent on hold.
When I built my new system earlier this year that was one of the things I looked for when selecting parts. I also checked the user forums before hand to see what kinds of problems other people were having. As a result of doing my homework I haven't had a single problem with the new box, but it's still reasurring to know that real help is there if I need it.
I work for for one of the big computer manufacturers -- Phone Tech Support. Business and Consumer. Desktop and Portable. All Versions of Windows - 95 - a b and c, 98, 98se, NT, ME, 2000, XP - Pro and Home(not windows 97 dammit). Third party equipment -- at very least prove that our hardware is working.... Printers are fun... The Tech Support from the printer manufacturers are great -- "your USB port is too fast for the printer..." Everyone from the BOFH down to the person that doesnt know how to turn it on. Oh yea, remember sell warranties and promote the website. And if that call is longer than 15 minutes we need to have discussion..... And all of this glory for $9.30 an Hour. The only thing that keeps me from snapping and walking out, is the times that I remember that I like my work. Its the way I know how to help people. Listening to people scream at their kids, ask for help because they cant get onto Playboy.com without error messages, and the guy who is running his quarter-of-a-million-dollar-a-year business out of a p5-133 get upset because he has to service the thing out of warranty and be away from it for a week. Its not my fault people dont know anything about backing up important documents, antivirus updates, or having a backup system in case the sole system you have (being used for payrole) suddenly stops booting. I do the best job I can do. There is a lot of things that go on behind the scenes. There is a mountain of information to know. This is one of the most stressful jobs you could wish for. Until the industry finds the people that want to do the job, good tech support will be few and far between. Instead of paying outsourcers to eventually transfer the call to me because they dont want to replace a part or because they "dont know windows 2000" for a system that isnt even booting. The other piece of the puzzle is that the people calling in have to work with us too: I cant clap my hands and wall around in a circle 3 times to fix your computer. It doesnt work that way. And when I ask for the serial number, and I say its all digits no letters, and you give me a rs506ghh... number and then argue with me about it for 5 minutes untill you see the correct number, things are not going to be pleaseant. Also, IF YOU THINK YOU KNOW MORE THAN ME AND ALLREADY HAVE THE ANSWER --===-- FIX IT YOURSELF AND STOP CALLING ME! Remember -- your calling me about something you own, If you break it its not our problem. The car dealership isnt going to give you a new car because you accedentally ran into a power pole, or you decided to take appart the engine. One last thing -- we will make you troubleshoot your hardware, we dont jus send parts out to send parts out. You WILL work for it, because its YOUR COMPUTER. I feel so much better now --
Since when has anyone viewed tech-support as anything but nerve-wracking and half-assed with decent support as the exception rather than the rule?
But, in fairness... it *IS* Sunday and I guess they needed to put something up on \. for the hour.
I don't know about Intel, but I don't plan on buying any more hardware from 3Com anytime soon. I have two 3C905B eth cards in my gateway, and they get serveral dropped frames and transceiver ressets per hour. On my client PCs I have LinkSys, D-Link, and Realtek cards. Never had any problems with them.
I do phone tech support for a certain PCS carrier. The company who hired us to do it pinkslipped all of their tech support for this area and sent them to another city to train their outsourced replacements. Imagine how motivated they felt? You should pink slip after they train their replacements not before! They'll know they are being replaced, but they aren't sure. It sucks either way, but at least their replacements will be slightly better trained. None of my coworkers or management seem to be that knowledgeable or that well organized.
I think the only reason they are still in business is because I know that at least one of their competitors has even worse tech support. They don't have tech support on weekends.
Customers get very frustrated when the services they ordered don't work, and when we tell them it could be several days before we restore it, you can imagine how annoyed they are.
I do the best I can with the limited tools I have at my disposal for those who do get me. Other departments misdirect calls to our dept all the time then we have to transfer them back to the main customer line and tell them to ask for the right dept.
And yes I am a bitter underemployed IT worker who was used to having a real job.
Maybe, in part, the shrinking profits are because of bad tech support. Nothing makes me want to drop a product faster than bad tech support. On several occaisions I've called Oracle GOLD Support with a problem and the gotten the response: "Oh, that would be a known OS problem. You'll have to take this up with the OS vendor." Who, of course, blames it on the RDBMS software.
Another problem might be the propensity for PHBs to demand that you call for Tech Support on problems you could solve for yourself with a bit of time. This would tend to flood Tech Support with fairly trivial questions and tempt those who manage Tech Support to man the front line support with less skilled techs.
Companies that have virtual monopolies in their fields are deliberately allowing their products to be shoddy, so that they can get people to "upgrade".
If the products worked, you wouldn't need tech support.
Hmm, there's probably some money to be made in a service that would match new-users-with-a-problem up with knowledgable-users-who-know-how-to-solve-that-pro
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
"The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity, will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water." Dr. John W. Gardner, former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare.
This surely applies to several layers in a dis-organization. Things like, "What? You are doing the front-end work? Should suck!", or "What? You are programming in that language?", or "I don't code. I design!", and so on... On that note, I have seen directors of QA treated poorly compared to junior "core engineers".
S
The school provides tech support in the form of "Residential Computer Consultants". These are students, one per dorm, that other students can call if they have problems. Sounds great, right? It would be, except that they're a bunch of clueless dolts. Case in point: last month, a friend of mine's girlfriend was having troubles with her HP box. Seems there was a hell of a lot of noise coming from the back of the machine. The RCC had been and gone, reluctant to open the case and having no theories as to the problem. Upon arriving, things became apparent:
The noise started when the machine booted.
If one actually listened close, the sound seemed to come from the graphics card.
She doesn't have an onboard graphics card. Ergo, her card probably has a fan. Hmm, that noise reminds me of when the fan died on my old 133.
Taking things to their logical conclusion, I opened the case and observed that the fan was vibrating (removing the card killed the noise, hmmm).
Some tightening of the screws later, things were fine. It took me maybe 10 minutes at most.
Moral of the story? Don't call tech support. Call some geek buddy. Chances are, they're had your problem before or worked with someone who has. They'll probably fix it for free out of pity, hell, they might even donate excess parts they might have lying around. I have before. Even better, for the geeks, it's a great way to pick up girls...
~Chazzf
No statement is true, not even this one.
I've worked in various support organizations, and feel compelled to share my recipe for a good support team, and some of the factors that I know first hand can contribute to a bad one.
1. Managers must EITHER know the product being supported, OR at least have the mental capacity to understand what the product is used for and slowly learn the product itself. (The best tech manager I ever had started off as an analyst, and knew the software inside and out. She knew what could and couldn't be done, and kept up as new modules were written. It was a dream to work for her.) If you're hiring a manager of techies and they can't do the job of the people they're managing, they aren't qualified.
2. Hire intelligence not flash. If a guy is a moron but speaks well on the phone, there's no way he's going to be a good analyst. There are classes at community college to teach public speaking and diction to your "nerdy quiet types" (not to mention clubs like Toastmasters), but nobody can make you smarter than you really are. In these situations, I would refer the flashy not-smart guy's resume to the SALES department.
3. Pay a good salary. Not a "competitive" salary, a good salary. Just because Joe Blow is paying $27k in a slow economy doesn't make people happy to be offered $27,500. In six months when the economy is all the way back, the $27k (and $27.5k) people will simply quit for more money elsewhere.
4. Train your people. Yes, you should be hiring people with experience and brains, but that doesn't neccessarily tranlsate to instant productivity on what your company is selling and supporting. (ESPECIALLY if you're talking about specialized proprietary software.) Effective training is the difference between success and failure for software support folks.
5. Tell the truth. Don't layoff 30% of the staff due to "economic hardships", then anounce record-breaking profits the next week. Besides being ethically questionable, it's in poor taste, and kills your team's morale faster than a 44 magnum.
6. Recognize achievements. This seems trivial, but I worked for a guy for about 7 months who didn't say ANYTHING positive to me, ever. Not once. People are VANE. When they feel like they've done something special, they need recognition for it. It's a simple fact of human existence.
Oh, and last but not least:
7. MORALE, your greatest friend or worst enemy. If your team is feeling low, they're going to do shitty work. (Or, rather, perform at just high enough level not to get fired.) Don't let them get low! If you live by rules 1-6, you'll always be maintaining high morale, not "turning around" low morale. (Three guesses which is easier, the first two don't count.)
Who did what now?
My experience with Microsoft technical support has been that, in 19 years of dealing with them, they have only answered one technical support question correctly.
I know someone who headed the system administration at the headquarters of a $300,000,000 a year company, and he also found MS technical support useless. Microsoft's technical support representatives didn't know why SQL Server was failing, and they could not discover the reason.
In my extensive experience with Microsoft technical support, since the days before PCs existed and we had the CP/M OS, Microsoft has only answered one question correctly. That was a question about a C compiler problem.
Obviously, part of the reason I don't get help from Microsoft is that I don't call to ask easy questions. I'm sure that Microsoft provides help to many of its customers who are novices.
I have called Microsoft technical support about operating system problems many times, and they have NEVER been able to solve the problems, although once a technical support representative and I worked out a solution together, after 4 difficult hours.
Once several years ago I talked to a friendly Microsoft technical support representative. He was very knowledgeable. I had a written list of questions about Windows. He was able to give me no answers. He just laughed at some of them and said he wouldn't know how to begin finding the solution. He did, however, provide me with some very useful information concerning problems I wasn't currently having. I remember this representative so clearly because I called expecting the usual Microsoft roughness, and he was friendly.
Lots of people don't seem to understand this. And this is how it is all through the industry. People call in and expect to speak to someone who knows every detail of their system and network inside and out, from 3rd party hardware to BIOS switches to operating system specifics to IP addressing to client/server configuration, etc. I don't know everything about Windows because I don't support it, I support the specific piece of hardware with our name on it. Ditto your router, switch, service provider, etc. You want somebody who knows everything there is to know about your network and systems and will configure anything and everything for you, fine, go hire one. Their hourly rates are 5-10 times what mine is.
And if you have a question on some obscure technical detail of the product, it may not get answered right away, because I'm not an engineer. If you're trying to do something unsupported and are nice about it, I'll try to help you, but if you call up and act like a dickhead from the get-go, you aren't gonna get crap, as I'm under no obligation to help you. Being a condescending jackass isn't going to get you anywhere.
And of course, there's the customer that's angry because no XP drivers are going to be developed for a product that was discontinued 3 years and he picked up on eBay for $10. And the customer who is upset because when he talked to his service provider or OEM, they told him everything was fine, or that the problem is with our product, and won't listen to any instructions as a result.
Yeah, there're customers who are unhappy with the support they receive. But this isn't because I'm incompetent or we're trying to screw them. We support what we support, and we do it well. 95% of the people I deal with on a day-to-day basis understand where our boundaries lie and are quite happy with the support provided. Yeah, it's not like that with a lot of other companies, but the fact is, a lot of the people bitching about bad support wouldn't know good support if it bit them in the ass.
(Of course, I make an exception for cable companies, as they generally have horrible technical support, but I wouldn't really expect the billing guy to know how to push a firmware update anyway.)
I once called their developer support hotline for assistance:
MS: What options did you choose in the AppWizard?
Myself: I don't use the AppWizard. I code everything by hand.
MS: (long pause) You can do that?!!
OMG!! That is the funniest stuff I think I have ever read. My eyes and throat hurt from havening to laugh so much.
I do not feel that tech support has gotten worse. I actually feel that in the last 5-10 years it has improved. The percieved drop in tech support quality I believe is twofold.
1 - Many places, to keep up with tech support demand, have published some kind of self help tech support (which may be as simple as a faq). However, rather than using this, end users will still call before looking at the web page. A simple remedy that I find does work is to notify all callers of the on-line tech support options.
2 - As businesses grow (and conversly trimmed down). There seems to be a movement to place people without even minimal technical training in jobs that do require some technical knowledge. Thus when the "customer" calls for support, they are not able to have pre-diagnosed their inquiry (ie "my thingy doesn't work"). Most techies will then have to coax them through the task of finding out exactly what it is doesn't work. Again a remedy might be for the techies to point out some simple things that they can try to look for when a problem arises (ie "is a key not mapped correctly in your AS/400 emulator, here's how to check it.")
What is causing this is that now most companies outsource their tech support to other companies, and typically it's the company who has the lowest bid that gets the contract. The result is that wages suffer, equipment suffers, and training suffers.
In the two call centers where I worked the annual turnover rate was 60%. From the minute you sign in to the minute you leave every second is monitored. If you are allotted 30 minutes for lunch every day but your average last month was 31 minutes, your manager will tell you that you are taking too long for lunch. If you are expected to have an average talk time of 8 minutes per call but you average 8 minutes and 30 seconds, your manager will talk to you as well. You have 30 seconds betwen calls to wrap up your call. You are scheduled to take a break at 10am and 2PM for exactly 15 minutes. Every instance of your workday is monitered down to the second. You feel like a robot. Who would stick around there for more than a few months?
Call centers did not used to be that-my fist job was enjoyable for the first 6 months-but they have turned into call processing centers and the tech is just the answering machine robot. Nobody wants to work under those conditions so call centers now have turned into stepping stones to bigger and better jobs. The person you are talking to likely hasn't used the product you are phoning about until he started working, and that may just be a couple months ago. Any wonder why tech support is so crappy?
My friend Joe wrote about an experience he'd had doing tech support:
"Ya know, in the tech support business, he who answers the phone has the power. We wield the secrets of the servers and computers and you are at our whim. We are the Dark Overlords of the Network, you must pay homage and appease our sick desires or you will be left in the cold, cold space of non-connectivity..... or so I thought.
Joe: User Support Center, this is Joe, may I have your employee number please.
Customer: Yeah Joe, it's XXXX.
J: Charles XXXXXXXX?
C: That's me
J: Cool, what seems to be your problem, Charlie?
C: It's Charles, and the problem is I have no connectivity what so ever.
J: Ok, Charles, you're in charge, let's get you fixed.
C: What was that supposed to mean?
J: Huh? Oh never mind, what exactly is going on when you try to connect?
C: Absolutely nothing, it brings up the account window, but refuses to connect.
J: Yeah, ok, been surfing porn lately? Maybe changed some settings to get some Real Video downloads?
C: Excuse me?
J: Why? Did you fart? Ah, forget it. When was the last time you had connectivity?
C: Are you trying to be smart with me, son?
J: Um, no, dad, just trying to cut through some ice, and give the call a little 'loose feeling' so it's not so professional is all. I find I can work better with people that don't have a stick up their bum.
C: Commendable choice, but I want to keep this rather professional, I'm more accustomed to it if you don't mind. (his voice becomes a little tight) J: Sure, whatever floats your boat. Now when was the last time you were connected?
C: Last night at the hotel, I had my secretary send out a batch of reports.
J: She was getting a little overtime at the No-Tell Motel, eh, Chuck?
C: That's it, what is your name?
J: Uh, I already told you, durr! It's Joe.
C: Ok Joe, do you have the Company's Network Hierarchy Status page?
J: Sure do, why do ya ask?
C: I want you to look up my name now!
J: Okies, I'm all over it like glaze on a donut...
(I open the ole webpage, type in the magic passwords, insert Chucks name... Searching, please wait....)
Results:
Name: Charles XXXXXXXX
Title: Executive Vice President XXXXXXX Technologies, Network Resources
Location: XXXXXXX Technologies Head Quarters, Santa Clara, CA
Status: You done Fucked up, Joe!
J: Well, Mr. XXXXXXX, I have the results back from the search sir, what exactly may I do for you?
C: You can start by packing up your desk, son, I don't think you'll be needing any personal items at the workplace for a while.
J: (GULP!)
C: Do we have a little more understanding as to the situation, Joe?
J: I believe I am in full understanding as to the situation at hand, sir, and may I compliment you on what a wonderful work environment you have created for all of us employees here at XXXXXXX Technologies?
C: That's not necessary.
J: Oh, but sir, it is. Why, just earlier this evening, me and my fellow employees, each of whom are very happy to be employees of this fine company, were commenting on how great this company has handled the recent bottom out of the technological market. Why, it would take a veritable genius, nay, economic god, to have protected the interest of not only his company, but of it's employees as well. We are all in your debt, kind and benevolent ruler of our lives.
C: Hehe, really, let's get back to the subject at hand.
J: I worship you sir.
C: Excuse me?
J: I keep a picture of you on my desk, you are an inspiration to all of us here in the User Support Center.
C: Fine, I'm not sure to believe you or not, but I'd like to get back to my problem.
J: Your problem is my problem sir. Let's fix this.
End Result? I was pwned!"
No comment.
Probably 10-20% of the population claims to be IT savvy. In reality 1% at best actually is. Having a tech degree or certification doesn't guaranty you know squat. Too many people get them only because they think they can make a lot of money not because they live and breathe the stuff. The people that hire for tech jobs a lot of the time are HR or management and can't tell the difference. Tech support is just worse then other IT jobs because it's one of the lowest paying, but the problem exists to some extent in all IT jobs.
"In fact, of the thousands of readers who said that they had e-mailed questions to manufacturers about their malfunctioning computers, only 25 percent reported that the answer they got back actually solved their problem."
Competence costs money. It's easier to be incompetent but able to show the management where you've saved XXX million dollars in support costs.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Here's the transcript of a conversation I had with Gateway a year or so ago. The chats at the beginning were conducted with a piece of software called "e-Gain" that's designed to help techs be more professional in online chat and allow them to type less. The net effect is that the customer feel patronized and like they're talking to a bot.
y ea r=2001&month=03&day=19
http://www.fahrvergnugen.net/journal/index.php?
(be gentle, it's only a K6-3)
Even Jesus hates listening to Creed.
I used to do tech support for Erols Internet.. shortly before RCN bought em. This was a while ago, and yes pay sucked, but it was a start. Doing Tech support is a good inroad into the industry, atleast it used to be. It taught new IT people patience, and how to find a solution to a problem if there was no canned response available to resolve the problem. But like I said, this was a long time ago, when most companies actually had their own tech support call centers.
I find these days, companies are either outsourcing, or completely dropping the tech support call centers, or merging tech support with customer service (which in the past really only handled billing and non technical related problems) Todays support/customer service groups are almost completely useless, their call volume gets higher, while companies are either cutting back on staff, or no longer hiring as their customer base increases.
What this does, is put increased pressure on support staff to resolve a problem, or dump it off on someone else as fast as possible. When I say dump it off on someone else.. I mean blame say MS (if your an ISP), or anyone other then youself to get them off the call.
Hell, even back in the day, as a senior support person who dealt with escalated issues, I was repeatably bitched at for taking too long to resolve an issue since I tend to go that extra mile to make sure a problem was resolved before finishing the call. But the company would rather I give a customer a solution, and tell them to try it and end the call, if that did not work the customer had to call back, and sometimes wait for hours on hold in the queue.
Alot of bad tech support is from clueless people having the job dumped on them, but I suspect most of the problems come from teh fact, that the company VP's see tech support as something that they can live without, and would rather pump cash into sales and marketting, and deal with problems later. Which results in low support salleries, which in turn results in very high employee turnover, as no one wants to sit in a very high stress job and get paid peanuts. This in turn results in a knowledge base drain, where the people who actually did know something leave for greener pastures, and the only people left are those who are not as knowledgable but can read from scripted solutions, which rarely work.
Anyways, enough of my ranting, I'm no longer in tech support due to the crappy pay, companies not willing to train their support people so they could possibly further their career within that company. I personally think that if companies invested in their employees (specifically support), those people would stay within that company in most cases, and that would result in better service.
But VP's only see the bottom line, and to them tech support is a drain on their funds, so they will always try to cut corners there, which is why support will always suck
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
I know this subject is going to get filled with mostly people griping about their bad tech support experiences. I know I've had several myself (Gateway, HP, GE Zurich Warranty support, etc).
But I think a major part of the decline is due to financial constraints. It's cheaper to hire some guy off the street and hand them a checklist and a database of problems and solutions than it is to hire a person with IT experience. A friend passed along an interesting story from their new hire orientation class which illustrates this. A person in that class was hired just out of college to do internal UNIX support for $50K a year at their company. In the middle of a new hire orientation class, that person then asked the other people what UNIX was. They had been hired based purely on a college degree and the fact that they had a slightly relevant degree(MIS). The company figured that actually knowing UNIX wasn't required to do UNIX support.
This would also explain the internal IT support people I've often had to deal with at my company. It's not a pleasant experience when you call up about a network file system problem, and you have to TEACH the tech support person how to debug the problem. And when you tell them they can look up this stuff in the man pages, they respond with "what's a man page?". Ugh...
There's a simple reason for the lack of good support for companies out there: companies are unwilling to spend the money and give benefits to retain good tech support employees.
:D
Raise your hand anyone out there who's worked some form of tech support/help desk in the past. I have. And just about anyone who has will tell you that 1) It's HARD WORK. even for those who know what they're doing. 2) it's DRAINING work, especially emotionally. Hours upon hours of abuse from some moron who put in his own phone number instead of the phone number he's supposed to dial, and being told you HAVE to fix problem X with program Y because its YOUR FAULT that it broke wears on a person.
The stress leads to burnout. the burnout leads to quitting. The quitting leads to massive overturn, which leads to a scramble for new employees, who are rushed out with improper training, etc etc. It's a vicious cycle.
Here's another reason:
Any call centre type environment works on a lowest common denominator level. The tech support workers who DO know what they're doing are lumped in with joe blow who wouldn't know a modem from his ass; extremely disgruntled knowledgeable employees desert in droves for a job that will actually get them some respect ASAP. The low pay and high stress means that for the most part, only people desperate to hold down jobs apply. Call centres are desperate nowadays and take just about anyone who can fill out an application.
No, i'm not saying that every tech support agent is like that. there are SOME who enjoy this work, and all the more power to them. But it's not easy, and it's not going to get any better. Career advancement potential is limited and so are the pay and benefits.
I think I've ranted enough for now so i'll just leave off there and let someone else pick it up later
Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo - H. G. Wells
One problem I see with tech support is that they water it down to the lowest common denominator. This is probably in part due to the need to have a set script for the non-technical staff to read through to catch the most common problems, and partly to handle a lot of the customers that call in wanting to know how to turn on their computer.
I've called tech support a few times with connectivity problems, and they always want to step you through the most minute of details. (Click on the start button. Click 'control pannel'. Click Networking. etc.) If the support had any respect for the end user, they might first ask, "Do you have DHCP enabled?" and then proceed with details if the user says "Huh?"
Perhaps, to cut costs, software and hardware companies should take a hint from the open source community.
1. Write useful documentation.
2. When someone asks a question that is covered in the documentation, ask if they have read it.
2a. If No: Politely (This is where we stray from the OSS model. Try asking stupid questions in #linux. I dare you.) direct the caller to the correct documentation, and ask them to call back if it does not solve the problem or they still have problems.
2b: If Yes: Continue the call to find out what the caller didn't understand, or what may have differed from the documentation.
This would save lots of time, and at the same time teach users that, yes, they can learn to fix these things on their own.
I once called a tech support line for a (now defunct) DSL service. The woman I reached was incredibly knowledgable, friendly, and helpful. I'm thinking now that it would be cool to make a web page with a list of great tech support reps, with extension numbers. Then, someone could look up the list, and call someone who is _good_.
:).
Obviously this would present problems with the suddenly immense call volumes these people would get, but I'm ignoring that for now
Unfortunately, I have to concur with your observations.
It's frustrating to see truly talented and superior tech. support people slowly burn out underneath a system that doesn't recognize their value.
One of my good friends did phone support for a large financial firm for 6 or 7 months, and all of his co-workers quickly figured out he was the sharpest one there when it came to difficult-to-solve problems.
Unfortunately, the call-center manager was under strict order not to pay anyone more than a fixed salary cap that was unreasonably low. Therefore, he had no way to reward my friend for his hard work. He tried doing everything he could think of, including taking him out for Friday night happy hour and buying all the drinks and food - but let's face it -- that doesn't exactly pay the bills.
Then, management changed, and the new call center manager wasn't even made aware that my friend was doing an above-average job. Even if raises were eventually offered to the group, he would have been stuck in a rut for another 6+ months just to re-prove his value to the new boss! (The new guy wasn't even technically minded. He said many times that he "really had no clue about any of this technical, computer stuff". He was simply a "people person".)
Think over!
--
Error 500: Internal sig error
One man, about 70 years old, would call in about once or twice a week (looking back through the call logs), and he was simply inept at using the computer. This man had been sent a video card, sound card and motherboard. This was a simple case of techs not wanting to deal with this guy and his lack of aptitude.
you mean that if i just pretend to be a true computer illiterate i can get enough free hardware to build additional box's for no cost?
woohoo where do i sign up!
When prepping for the divisional sale, corporate redlined ALL training. PHBs now have the attitude that development can send out a quick e-mail on all the new stuff. Between the layoffs and job hunters anyone calling in for help is pretty well doomed. The medical keeps me around for the family, but as third tier guy, I remember solving problems and not forwarding calls.
It's the age of cargo cult computing . If A happens type A-Response. If B happens type B-Response. . . If you're not on the script pass the buck and whine.
What's going on above them, usually they are the last to know about changes or marketting decisions, yes they are to blame as a group for not having the initiative to better this situation, but then again, some companies will fire people "telling the truth" because they simply don't want to hear it.
There's also the fact that tech support is perceived like a receptionnist, Executives point of view: We need them, but they aren't "valuable assets". So who, that is competent enough and knows his stuff very well (and wants to help) will settle for a low-pay and crappy condition job with no gratification?
Usually they take some interns or people that just finished school to do this, Most of these people don't have real job experience and they take 3 months to a year or two to realize that they have a crappy job. Most that stays are doing so because they don't know better, but the real competent people soon realize that they can do better, have better conditions, job and pay. Executives don't acknoledge that and they loose all their competent people (minus one or two that will be kept as group leader or trainers and will get ok conditions). And by the time the employee knows his stuff very well and knows how to answer most problems and get the "feeling" of the problem and not just looking up questions/answers sheets, they switch jobs because of what I just mentionned before, so basically they have a high cycle rate and almost no knowledge from the start.
To sum it up: You get what you pay for.
And to answer the question, one place you get very good support and tools is with National Instrument. I use their labview software and the tech support are knowledgable staff with CS degree or similar. Why are they doing this? I have no clue, but at least these people knows their stuff.
--- Metamoderating abusive downgraders since my 300th post.
The trend nowadays is that a majority of major corporations are using offshore call centers, specifically located in India, to handle most of the calls. Talking to these people, you wouldn't even realize that they are not American. The reason this trend is picking up is that India has a great abundance of cheap labor and has a high population of highly technical people. In addition, it is rather cheap to do this with Voice Over IP. Typically what happens with these tech support is that, as many of you have mentioned, they read from a well prepared script. Any question that they can't handle, they pass on to "Second Level Support" ... ie back to the real support at the home office.
_______________________________
"I'm not Conceited...I'm just a realist..."
Having worked on the first-level support phones for a while, I can tell you that an increasing number of callers LIE about the nature of the problem.
eg:
"I can't print."
"Is the printer you're trying to print to turned on, has a green light, have paper in it, etc??"
"Yes, I just checked that."
- printer settings (in Windows) seem OK, path seems OK, etc.
So, a tech gets dispatched, and finds the printer was either off or out of paper.
This has happened more times than I can remember.
Sprint - Excellent - it takes a while to get to talk to the right person but when I have, they are always quite helpful.
AT&T - not so hot
Cisco - OK
SonicWall - ASS! : Based on what they call support I would never buy thier product. It's all web based & email. Unless you wanna pay a shitload of money to call some guy who gives you a ticket # and supports emails you. I think they have 1 guy who answers the phone the hold was like 30 minutes. Id like to smack the previous network guy.
I've found that some of my best teachers -- in any subject, at any level -- have been those with learning disablities. They've had to find such a number of different ways to explain something to themselves that they're better prepaired to explain it to others. The people who got it on the first try never had to spend time finding another way around the problem. This is why people who are geniuses in their fields often make such horrible teachers.
So it's "those who have had to do more, should teach."
In mathematics, one does not understand things, one merely gets used to them.
--VonNeumann
What would you like to see improve about tech support?
I never got paid enough to deal with the screaming a-holes or the shumck-o network admins that wanted me to do their job. But if i got paid enough i'd give up my current development position and go back to phone support, but...
i want to be able to say what ever i want to who ever i want
i want to be able to hangup on customers
i want a button programed into Remedy that one click will automaticaly search teh internet for the cheapest contract killer and send him/her the callers personal information
to get paid 2 hours of work for every hour on the phone
to not get hassled about my call time! look do you want it fixed right or do you want this schmuk calling back?
the ability to hire and fire my own managers
etc...
The only reason you need tech support any more is to get an RMA to return something. Everything else is useless. Woe to you if its a software problem because 9 times out of 10 you'll get a "we're aware of that and working on that fix for the next release.."
Dell: the motherboard on my boss's latitude died, got on the phone with dell, went through a a quick test to see if it was really the motherboard. Tech ordered a replacement mobo and I also told him the hinges were a little loose, the tech said no problem, we'll throw new hinges in also. A few days later a Dell tech showed up to replace it.
Gateway: School order around 200 desktops. Nic's died on a few of them (nic's built into the board). Called Gateway, told them the nic was dead, gave them the machine model and a new mobo arrived a few days later with a shipping label to send the dead one back, no questions asked.
Microsoft: I won't go into details since it is a long one, but if you ever have to deal with mSexchange problems and have to call Microsoft, the Exchange group with Microsoft support is the greatest to deal with, they actually know their stuff, and will, at least in my experiance, go to great lenghts to helping you through fixing your problem.
In the last month, I have had two experiences with tech support. The first was with HP in which I hosed up my Pavilion notebook's bios. One call to tech support and I had a RMA in less then 5 minutes. The best part though was that I sent it out on a Friday and had it back, fixed, on a Wednesday. All covered under warranty I might add.
The second was when I was giving a friend, whom I had recommended buy a Dell, a hand. (I always recommend a major manufacture to my non-techie friends) He had trouble with the packaged software and called Dell for help since he's still under warranty. The tech of course told him to reinstall the software and when he inserted the CD, it was unreadable. So the tech told him to expect a replacement CD in the mail. About a week later the CD comes and then a few days after that, he gets a bill for 19.95 for the CD. So I call tech support for him this time and the tech was a total jerk, he wouldn't give me his employee number (I always ask for my own records and I tell them that) he yelled at me like it was my fault I got the bill... Well in the end, he tells me that accounting always sends out a bill and I should just ignore it because it's under warranty. After I hang up, I wonder how many people would just have sent Dell the money and what Dell would do with the money if I did send it in.
In the last 6 months, I know 4 people that have bought Dell PC's or notebooks on my recommendation, but that's the last one.
This is one of the reasons why customer support is so awful with high-tech products. In order to deal with the complexity, the companies have to simplify the situations in which they spend time helping customers. The troubleshooting scripts that the reps use are not designed to find out how they can help you, they are designed to find out if there's anything about your setup that they don't support. Said another way, tech support is not designed to help you, it is designed to determine how *not* to help you. This is the entire goal, which you will know if you've ever had a real problem. Real problems take much much longer to help with (days, weeks....), so to eliminate costs, the Customer Support architects try to eliminate as many ways of helping as possible.
When I was a kid, we only had one Darth.
When times are tight, a middle management hit squad is set up to look for dead wood (by definition "the other guy"). If you've got a bunch of 20 year veterans on customer support, it looks like a real smart move to lay them off and outsource it the lowest third party call centre bidder.
My employer did that about a year ago. As I said, it looked real smart - at the time. Something that occurred to me was that the same management cadre that laid off the guys with 20 year relationships with our most valuable customers were probably not the same clique in charge of tracking customer churn, or listening to the wails of the sales guys as word of mouth kills them before they get a foot through the door.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Seems that if Windows 2000 Pro workstations connect to SBS 2000 server, the licenses get gobbled up until no one else can connect, even though there's only 7 computers connecting to a 10-licensed server. The patch still doesn't work properly).
Microsoft typically sells server licenses for a given number of terminals that may access the software. Perhaps the software logged more than 10 MAC addresses in one week.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I am part of the problem, and so are most of you.
People who find it easier to simply solve the
problems themselves by finding info on the
Internet have little reason to pay the extra
cost for good tech support.
Too bad "pay-per-incident" support isn't more
socially acceptable, and the pricing more
competitive.
Demon Internet actually has pretty good technical support. I've always got onto a real person within a few minutes (normally less than 1 minute), and though they only officially support PC/Mac, they'll try and help with anything.
Last time I was talking to them, it was because of problems connecting from my Ericsson R380 smart phone, and Zaurus PDA. About as unsupported a combination as you could get, but the guy on the end still tried his best to support me (as it turned out, we tracked it down to a problem with my phone, which still persists, which gives a good excuse to get a P800 to replace it).
I'm a number, not a free man!
- their hardware is high-quality, and usually has a very easy way for the user to add RAM or an 802.11 card (little doors you open with a quarter and there's the RAM slots, etc) ... you call up and they fix your problem, pretty much no matter what it is ... you can buy an iBook for $1100 + extended warranty and be certain that it will last you for the next three years (unless you abuse it) ... helpful, polite, working hard to help you out ... consumer products are iMac (desktop) and iBook (notebook), and pro products are Power Mac (desktop) and PowerBook (notebook), so it is easy to know what model you have, and find out what features and capabilities it has ... easy on the eyes, easy to navigate ... Dell blames Microsoft, Microsoft blames Dell, but Apple takes responsibility for all of their users ... completely plug-and-play if you have a Mac-compatible device, which is most of the brand-name stuff out there, and almost all of the USB and FireWire stuff ... many of the things that aren't compatible are things you don't need (since all Macs have Ethernet, FireWire, 802.11, TV out, etc. built-in, there's no need for that kind of stuff as add-ons) ... Mac OS X 10.1.4 means Mac OS X 10.1 with four patches applied ... put two Windows 2000 machines side-by-side and tell me which one has the more-current set of patches and fixes ... it's hard for most users to know what versions of Microsoft stuff they're running) ... I know people who complained directly to Steve about some support issue and got quick responses and then had the issue fixed ... since Mac OS X 10.0, many of the improvements to Mac OS X are just what the users asked for and Apple provided it
... the original AirPort Base Station had a problem where a capacitor would blow at about 15 months of use and it would stop working, so Apple just replaces those no questions asked when you call up.
... they're a great, great company these days, with fantastic products and a wonderful platform. It's like having your own personal computer consultant going that extra mile for you.
- their OS just doesn't crash (and it's running multitrack audio software and high-end video editing, DVD burning, other heavy realtime desktop apps)
- the OS and included apps update themselves (and it really works, and all the user has to do is say "go ahead" when they're asked if they want the updates) and Software Update keeps a log of each update so you can see what a machine's history is right from the Software Update panel
- for $200-300, they'll extend your warranty by two years with free phone support the whole time
- their phone support is great
- their product lines are easy to understand
- their Web site is excellent
- they don't blame somebody else when you call tech support
- it is easy to add or remove applications (no install is necessary), each app has its own preferences file in your own home folder (which you can trash to make the app like a fresh install), and apps are actually folders that hold all of the executables, libraries, graphics, audio, etc. that the app needs, so many things that you'd need tech support for on Windows you don't need it on the Mac (registry stuff, DLL hell, uninstalling apps)
- there are easy troubleshooting steps you can take, like booting with a certain key combination to see a screen with all of your bootable drives, or booting with T held down makes the Mac pretend to be a FireWire hard drive, so you can hook it up with FireWire to another Mac and admin the hard drive (install the OS, apps, get data, whatever) if the machine is not booting (for example, when the video system failed in a PowerBook, I booted it with T held down, plugged it into my Power Mac and copied all the data off the PowerBook in about 10 minutes and sent the PowerBook for service and it was back in two days)
- installing new hardware is dead easy
- their versioning and the way they name things encourages easy understanding for even the non-technical user (they use three numbers
- Macs have security built-in such that viruses and being hacked are not nearly the concern that it is on Windows (in fact, the most-common Mac viruses and security exploits all run on Microsoft software, mainly MS Office and IE)
- Apple executives, even Steve Jobs, have public email addresses and they all read their mail personally
- There are numerous feedback avenues for Apple products where you can make suggestions or detail where the product didn't meet your expectations, and they really take this stuff to heart
In short, Apple has done a lot of hard work to make their systems reliable and easy to use so you don't need tech support, but if you need tech support, it is excellent. They replaced two products for me in the past few years that were totally out of warranty as well
Couldn't recommend Apple more
Just this last week, I was attempting to set up the VPN in a netscreen 5xp. I got all the IPs from my TI company, set my router up, and then got down to the 5xp. First, the documentation was absolutly horrible, as in almost non-existent. The extent that I had was in the WebUI, (accesible via the IP address of the router) They had a help button and a support button in there. Unfortently, the buttons just opened up a web browser pointing to a section of their web site. This didn't work all that well, the the firewall decided to block all my outgoing traffic. I call the tech support, average hold time of 10-15 minutes. I called a total of 6 times, and talked to 5 differnet people. Mostly they would read from scripts (I did get 2 people who seemed to know a little), telling me to do things that had no relation to the problem. Then they would tell me that it was my T1 providers fault, and to call them, and then call back. That was over 8 hours spent, and the problem still isn't solved. I got so sick of talking to them, I gave up for the week. I think the most annoying part was I would say something, and the "tech" wouldn't say anything for a minute or two, while he read his script. I probelly spent over an hour friday just listening to silence!
Sig!
But it helps that I *am* a tech support guy. I have frequently lied to the tech about what I see, I just quote what they want to hear from memory. I have led other people through the same kinds of procedures so often I can see the screens in my mind.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
I had a dell laptop (Latitude), and I called dell for tech support. I got the usual run around where I tried to convince them I am a technically competent person. Naturally, they percedded not to take me at face value and asked me irrelevent questions that had nothing to do with my problem (my com port was literally dead, I needed a new motherboard, and no Windows setting was going to fix that.)
One of the many questions they asked me was if I had ever dropped my laptop. I foolishly answered yes, since sometimes I would pick up the front about a quarter an inch to release the cd-rom drive or battary and then let it drop.
They told me that my warentee was void because I *dropped* my laptop! I said bullshit. After some intense arguing, they went back to their taped copy of the conversation, where I specifically admitted to dropping the laptop "half an inch", and the dell support policy said that anything up to a full inch was ok. They gave me such a hard time about it. That soured me against dell tech support for a long time.
I still own a dell laptop (good machine), and every once in a while I have to call them because of some obscure problem. They still ask me all the standard questions. So annoying. Sometimes, I wish I could just yell "Look, here is the problem. Fix it.", but my mom taught me to be polite, so I usually have to go thru 5 good minutes of crap before we can actually talk about the problem.
Lawrence Lessig is my personal hero.
We sound a problem (ie: the antivirus forced us to use a compromised Sendmail version, no SSL and the NEED to use Red Hat). After solving all the issue ourselves (slackware, sendmail 8.12 and ssl where "unsopported") they wanted us to send them all the answers. Is this what we expect to receive from paid services or software?
I'd rather preffer using free solutions. I'd have contributed back if the haven't charged us $900 for 1 year use of this product.
From: Byron Go (TS-PH)
To: Federico
Subject: RE: InterScan VirusWall
Date: 03 Mar 2002 12:47:34 +0800
Dear Federico,
Greetings.
I know that this may sound inappropriate but is it possible for you to send me the sendmail.cf, submit.cf, sendmail.cf.delivery and submit.cf.delivery?
I have been trying some things out but I am not sure what I'm missing. I am hoping that your 'assistance' could help me create the appropriate sandwich configuration for VirusWall with Sendmail 8.12.
Thank you very.
Sincerely,
Sincerely,
Byron James Go
Trend Product Support
Gateway Team
TrendLabs
-----Original Message-----
From: Byron Go (TS-PH)
Sent: Sunday, March 03, 2002 10:37 AM
To: Federico
Subject: RE: InterScan VirusWall
Dear Federico,
Thank you for the reply. I will have to be honest with you.. We have been encountering the 8.12 problem since the sandwich config is only for the
8.9 to 8.11. The startup for the 8.12 is different and so far, only linux consultants and gurus have been able to let it start correctly. I will personally study the startup scripts for 8.12 and work out a sandwich configuration document that can properly start sendmail 8.12 to be disseminated in trend.
Regarding SSL, this is a current limitation in the v3.6 of VirusWall. v3.6 doesn't have
the 'internal' capability of supporting SSL. However, I will make a feature request for that. Whether it is already be implemented to v3.7, which will be released in a month or two, or will be implemented in the future, I'll let you know.
I hope this reflects a positive action for trend.
Thank you very much.
Sincerely,
Byron James Go
Trend Product Support
Gateway Team
TrendLabs
unfinished: (adj.)
I've had pretty good experience w/ Direct TV. There was an access card problem with one of my recievers and the tech support person stayed on the phone with me for almost an hour and a half working out how to diagnose and solve the problem.
Needless to say, I kept offering to hang up and call back.. (Some of the steps took 15 minutes for the sat to sync up and stuff..) She said, no thats fine.. your satisfaction is more important than our call times.
Needless to say I was very impressed they were will to deal with me.
In a small company, developers and support are often the same people. That's where you get really excellent support. Our provider domainfactory has the best support I have ever seen. They're a small bunch, but its customers routinely give raving reviews of their service. That's how we chose them and I hope they can keep up their support as they grow.
Along the same lines, my own company ej-technologies tries to provide an excellent service to its customers and evaluators. We sell a Java profiler which is a complex product and requires a lot of support. And guess what - it pays. People whose problems you solved come back to you and buy something. High quality support is a great confidence builder.
Speaking from experience most Tech support workers try to the the best job they can. End users or EU's seem to do everything in their power to make the job harder. For example: You are asked numerous times to have your serial number ready, why did you think that didn't apply to you? Your AOL isn't working and you blame your computer not their crappy software. You install twelve hundred different pieces of software and then wonder why the computer starts to have "issues"
And BTW I still don't know why your porn aint working DAN.
Rant off
I did a RMA with Compaq for a customers Presario (dead MoBo).. While i was working with the lady i found out that the extended warranty had expired a month ago, so i asked them is there was a grace period for renewal. She said yes so i asked for renewal. Beep, beep, beep, i get transferred to their warranty dept and coughed up 100 bucks for a new hardware warranty. Then beep beep beep back to the same techie then processed the order and sent a P3 Coppermine 800 to replace the one that croaked (PII 700). I got the package next day fedex with prepaid waybills.. The board worked, the new processor worked. The customer was extremely happy... Pity i didnt get to keep the broke board, they wanted it back..
First rule of holes; When in one, stop digging.
I work at a small ISP (only about 10K customers or so) in Wisconsin. I have the luxury of not having anyone count my call time... I can spend three minutes with a customer, or thirty, and nobody cares.
:-) and that's ok, because I also have the most customer compliments.
I have the highest call length average in the call center ('call center' being a euphomism, since there are only 5 fulltime techs and 10 employees
I truly enjoy my job, I like helping customers, and it shows. I'm never flustered, no matter how upset the customer. I am good with computers in general, good at sales, programming, etc... but my true talent is in Customer Support. I could work in Customer Support (of some sort or another) for my entire life and be satisfied, hehe.
As long as I don't have to do paperwork... I literally PAY one of my coworkers to do my paperwork for me, I hate it so much. If I can't type it, I won't do it.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
1. Leave your number and someone will contact you shortly. (This is for expensive 24/7 coverage)
2. Please use our Web site for automated help. (Humm, Net connection down...)
3. We sold that product to another company, you can contact them at...
4. Sorry you reached the wrong department, and again, and again.
6. We are only open 9-4pm EST, closed on weekends.
7. Your product id doesnt match your record in our datebase..
8. Please upgrade your product support to super duper gold plus, with cherries on top.
9. Our product is not ment to be used that way.
10. Tech on Call (Sorry, im out dinner, it will take me an hour to get to a computer..)
11. You can only use product X with our product Z, but we will gladly port it for the cost of your first born child.
12. Honest, this will do exactly what you want!
And the most common!
13. I cant figure it out, let me get with the developers...
for simple problems, at least, Palm is great. I emailed their tech support with a simple problem (I believe it was even in the FAQ, whoops). I recieved an immediate autoresponse email saying "you will be contacted by a tech support representative within the next 48 hours, blah blah" so I figured I would wait a few days and see what happened. I didn't expect a quick reply since it was a Sunday. Well 5 hours later, I got a reply that totally explained my problem. my m100 worked fine with jpilot until the first time I used palm's windows software. I figured it was some weird hardware thing because the reason I got the m100 was because it would no longer sync on his computer using palm's software and neither he nor their tech support could figure it out, and he just didn't wasnt to deal with it. He gave it to me and it worked fine in linux, so I was happy. As it turns out, what I had not noticed is that palm's syncing software messes with the baud rate set on the palm without telling the user, so it obviously wouldn't work in jpilot anymore since the baud rates were now different. I'm really not sure why it stopped working in windows as well, but lets just say it works now, and Palm's tech support was both helpful and quick, something many other companies could learn from. I almost felt embarrased by how concerned they were with my problem, I'm really not used to a large mega-corporation caring about a single user in the least. They sent me a customer service satisfaction survey as well asking questions like what method of contact do I prefer best (usually phone, but email is fine when dealing with Palm), and others that gave me the impression the company is really trying to get their reputation up as a good support providing company.
I used to work phone tech support for a very large and famous chip company. I supported PC cameras. It was horrible. I had no problem with dealing with the customers, it actually made me feel good to get grandma's camera working so that she could video conference with her grandkids! I worked for a large subcontracting company, and they were the cheapest bastards on earth. My lab machine to do test calls was a P166 with 32MB of ram. (keep in mind i quit just after this last Christmas!) the minimum specs for the camera I was working with was a 266Mhz P2 with 64Mb of ram. Customers had to connect to us over a modem line because the company did not want to open up the correct ports on the firewall to let the connections through.
The worst part though was the subcontracting company's only focus was that we get our average call time under 14 minutes. Sounds like a lot of time, until your walking joe NewUser through his registry deleting keys. All the company seemed to care about was call times. I can't tell you how often (and frustrating) it was to get a customer calling in on their 10th call, all of them right around 15 minutes apiece. To see that the last tech sent them to upgrade their audio drivers, when they obviously had a video problem. When I'd question the other techs, they'd say "I had to get them off the phone, my average call times this month are getting high, and its not likely that they're going to get me again!" I couldn't stand it. Our job was to help customers be happy with their product, at least in my opinion, and the suits were only interested in making a buck.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Human genome = 3 billion base pairs = 6 GBit. Windows + Office = 20 Gbit. Which is more impressive?
I described the problem and told them what OS I was using. Their answer was "I'm sorry, we don't support that operating system. You shouldn't be able to access the internet at all."
It turned out that the web browser they supplied didn't have the javascript support for the webpage where you signed up for the email.
I couldn't help by reading the comments, but think of this earlier story by Slashdot staff, depicting Cisco delivering the best damn support of the industry ! Way to go Cisco !
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for life.
Keep him stupid about the technology he is using and sooner or later there are going to be far more asking for help then is capable of goving it.
I have earthlink screw up and bill me for multi-connections (which I physically cannot do) and it took way to much to get them to finally figure out it was their fault (after a half dozen or so false solutions they gave me)
But the worse part is that they billed my credit card and when I asked for charges to be reversed that said they credited my account....only it wasn';t the credit card account but the earthlink account.....Which I never agreed to pay them that far in advance, or pay interest on such charges.)
A one point I let customer service send me to tech support who sent me to customer service who sent me to tech support (It was my intention to see how many times this would happen before they caught on.)
Next thing I know I was disconnected.
The total experience cmmunicated to me that earthlink has gone totally brain dead and that lack of any mentality is spreading to ISP earthlink has aquired (Also have a mindspring account that began becomming brain dead in tech support too..)
The problem was in fact on their end and I even watched as more than once their tech people proceeded to scan my system without telling me. Now that's worse than brain dead....that's smelling rotten. For who would want such brain dead help messing with your system?
The problem is not going to get better, for by the inherent nature of creating false constraint in the way of unneeded complexity, it can only get worse.
Anyone having problems dealing with web pages that have CSS added where it really isn't needed?
I find that the best tech support I have ever used is my 3 year Apple Care plan. Just 3 days ago they answered a serious problem of mine, mean while a well know Mac Msg board (*Cough* MacNN) had know idea, how to fix my problem. But that is only in my expereance.
"You win again Gravity!" -Futurama (Zapp)
Granted they're not a pay service, but now they stoop to using popups, so they should pay some attention to their tech support. Things have only gone downhill since Microsoft bought them out (years ago).
For instance, when a URL is used in a message sent to a Hotmail user, the URL is modified, and then, when clicked, it opens up that page inside of a Hotmail frameset. I've sent three separate emails to tech support asking how to fix this, but I always get the same response, which goes something like this: maybe you typed the address in wrong--try typing it in again.
Now I no longer use Hotmail for my email.
So highly trained UNIX God me has to explain to the f-ing windows idiots how to mount a cdrom. The instructions are in our huge manual. They are are on our great tech site. But no, they call me and I have to waste my time walking them through the steps in the manual. RTFM.
I know that this is what I get paid to do, at twice the tier 2 salary but WTF. Helping the great unwashed masses to lusers is killing me. We are pure UNIX, if you don't know 'nix please trust me when I tell you what to type. Or better yet, just open port 22 for me and get out of my way, I'll fix your damn machine faster that your poor excuse for computer skills can explain the wrong problem to me. If I can't I'll get all the info I need to send it to the tier 4 and dev guys. You'll have your answer tomorrow and a hotfix within a week. The fix will be in the next patch.
The reality is not that tech support is getting worse, we can get great people really cheap these days. Our occasional opening (2 currently) are always popular. But with customers who think just because I know our product like my own child, I will instantly understand where it fits into their network or the idiosyncrasies of M$'s latest protocol. I've memorized all the important RFCs, I have read our manuals (and quote them often), know the details of TCP/IP, routing
It is an employer's market, fire the idiots because there are boatloads of good people to hire who need a job through no fault of their own. Train them and remember that burnout comes fast in front line tech support. I still like tech support, I just don't want to answer the phones anymore. Please let me go back to escalations only. I only like the really hard problems.
We used to have no problems with Dell, but in recent weeks when we have called, it sounds like they're outsourcing their Tech Support to India now, and sometimes the people on the phones can barely speak understandable english... Last time I tried calling i got someone who told me i was in the wrong calling queue somehow (but i had pressed all the correct numbers), and told me this only AFTER she got all of my customer information. She said she'd transfer me to the right department, but i just ended up back at the main menu. We used to be able to call up and say "Our ZIP drive went bad, we replaced it with a ZIP from another Dell and it worked fine" and they would send us a new one, now they're making us jump thru 10 hoops to get replacement parts, and we don't even bother with their phone support anymore, we just email since when we try to call, we also usually have been put on hold for at least 45 minutes... Dell's Support used to be pretty good, and now it's just terrible. Oh yeah, and i forgot to mention once when I called and asked for a replacement zip drive, they send a replacement CDROM instead...
In my experience, this is quite simply an oxymoron in the United States/Canada. I've dealt with several large ISPs, hardware manufacturers, and a number of other groups.
The only good thing I can say about a tech support rep was when I was working as a PC repair tech and reloading Windows on a old ASUS motherboard. Apparently, there were three different onboard sound chips used, and the website only documented and provided drivers for one. So, after numerous attempts with different drivers I ended up calling the US tech support office. 45 minutes later still without getting a live person, I called the office in Taiwan (you can do these things when you aren't paying the phone bill =). I got a live person within three minutes. He spoke english much better than most US ISP support monkeys do, and knew exactly what driver I needed and where to download it. THAT is what I call service.
The best tech support, bar none come from Adtran the maker of CSU,s DSU's.
They offer a Toll FREE suppport phone number, which usually gets routed to a knowledgable tech in less than 5 minutes! And I have even had a tech help me with a Cisco router configuration to fix the problem.
In the last 20 Years I havent found anyone that can top them. When I spec an external CSU it is ALWAYS Adtran, because their tech support is the absolute best.
Second runner up goes to the small company Slim Devices, www. slimdevices.com maker of an incredible ethernet based MP3 Player. No 800 number, but prompt responses to emails again with an eagerness to get the problem resolved.
If a small company like SlimDevices can provide good tech support why can't others?
'falling out of the useful category.'
When, can I ask was it ever in the USEFUL category? This news on slashdot is a bit ahead of its time. It has to be useful before it can actully fall out of it. Mmm.
Mod me down, fine with me, it's my real karma I try to keep up.
Part of the problem is that the products are designed so badly that there are many things they simply don't do right. So too often it simply cannot be fixed at all. No support script, no brilliant but rare techie, can have a hope of getting it fixed.
The reason these things are too often designed bad is because marketing (via CEO) puts pressure on engineering to release products before all the designs are fully implemented and tested. Or the engineering department itself is understaffed (Most CEOs prefer to hire more people into marketing than in engineering, because engineers are more likely to tell it the way it is, while marketing people are better at lying and brown nosing). The result is a crappy product, with poor documentation (for both the customer and the tech support people).
Unfortunately, the business climate requires this sort of practice, especially when it is growing rapidly, as was the case in the late 1990's. You have to release products quickly for no reason other than to prevent the customer from buying from the competition (which is certainly going to have similar problems, do to the same business pressures). The problem here is the business success models favor making the early sale and shipping garbage.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Convergys is one of the biggest employers in Utah. They do tech support for Microsoft, take incoming Discover card calls, and telemarket unsuspecting cell phone callers. They are scum. They hire at $9/hr for tech support and actually pay you $7.50/hr! Most of the "techs" they hire have never had a job before and are college students at BYU in art or business majors. Life in Utah is bad enough, Convergys makes it worse.
Very funny post. I've dealt with HP support and its
more worthless than no support. Its sad their response
to any question is reinstall the drivers (I use Solaris).
I've tripled my annual salary since I worked there. What a fucking shithole that place was/is.
Go Here. Play File. Make with the enjoyment.
The_Shadows[LTH], out.
Might as well insert an ad here for Protonic. It's basically volunteer run tech support, and is surprisingly effective. I signed up for it a few weeks ago, and it's quite good fun. The users seem to appreciate it too. Worth a look.
One ISP that I found to have superior tech support is KDS Internet (kdsi.net) always a fast/accurate response. Sadly this stands out
I don't really have the perseverence for programming, I don't have the work ethic for long projects, and I am not self motivated enough to do most jobs that have you working on your own.
But Support... I can program, I can manage servers, I can do networking (I was sole techie at a very small ISP for 6 years), but I would RATHER help Susan from Spokane get her ISDN line up and running again. I would RATHER teach 84 year old James how to view a picture emailed to him by his granddaughter. I just get such a warm fuzzy helping people use their computers.
And I'm lucky to be working at a business that allows me the luxury to take the time and help where I choose.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
They will stall and lie and stall and lie and stall and lie. Fuck 'em.
I think one of the main reasons tech support is crap is because of the endless droves of morons.
I am serious. People just don't make judicious use of a tech support number; they make no "reasonable" attempt to solve their own problems. I know this is a generalization and doesn't always hold true, but talk to any tech support operator and see if they don't agree.
If tech support wasn't spread so thin, maybe the quality would improve. I hear a lot of hoary old unix hackers reminiscing about tech support back in the day, but keep in mind computers didn't used to be so mainstream. These days the majority of people use a computer for a specific set of tasks (typing, email, etc) - they don't know about the inner workings and don't care to know.
I propose that anyone routinely using a computer make an investment and learn a little about it. Probably half of tech support calls, at least, result not from problems with the product, but from the user's computer illiteracy.
This anti-spammer link needs to be posted on slashdot, but an appropriate story is not available. Please do not mod it down.
Ace
I started my career in the tech field as an onsite tech for HP ( HP in the middle East, not US ). HP had business contracts with major companies and my morning shift was as the main tech at a large communication company taking care of all HP equipment (PCs, printers, Servers and the big HP-9000 machines). The Communication company also paid a lot of cash for the contract so if we could not fix a piece of hardware in 24 hours we replaced it and had it operation and live in that 24 hour period. Needless to say we never had a bad review from ANY of our corporate clients.
As for end users, we also gave them a 3 month onsite and 1 year offsite support plan. For all new HP PCs if the PC didnt work, we had a tech drop by to their house after 5pm and fix their problem. After 3 months they could bring the machine over to our support center and we would fix it for them by Monday provided we had parts available.
We were also given training in all new products, in fact a customer liked our support so much he negotiated a contract for us to fix the Apple machines, so we were all sent to Apple clases as well.
Now this was 1995-1996 when I worked there and since then from what I have heard, support quality has definitely dropped. Not just with HP but with almost every company. For example, when i started with @home as my ISP the techs were very knowledgeable, now they are complete script readers. I use Linux at home as well as Windows XP and when I had a problem with the cable modem ( hardware failed ) and I called up they wanted me to run winipcfg. I ran ipconfig to give the person the same info and he asked me are u using Winipcfg? I said I am using ipconfig but I can give u the same information from there. He said no you HAVE to run Winipcfg cause his scripts say Winipcfg. In the end I just asked for a level 2 tech who confirmed that my cable modem had a hardware problem and had one dropped off at my house the next day.
Who gives good support now?
I would have to say Dell, Apple and IBM. They dont assume that the end user is a complete computer illiterate and will ALWAYS forward you to a level 2 tech if they cannot solve the problem. All 3 have had my problem fixed in less than 24 hours and in these days where tech support is so pathetic, they are a welcome relief
dvNuLL
I work for a medium to small web hosting company (~30,000 customers, 100 employees) that prides itself on some of the best customer support available. (go figure, we're profitable too)
:) Large salaries are nice, but they don't replace a company that listens to, supports and recognizes its customers AND employees.
Both the support department and NOC are run by young (early to mid 20s) geeks, which I think is key. They know who to look for in the hiring process, and it sure shows. This company works by the motto if someone can do the job, we hire them. If they can do the job exceptionally well, they're recognized and rewarded.
Most of the tech support team is made up of 17-23 year old geeks, with little or no previous phone support experience, but are willing to learn. The customer compliments roll in to mangement. Most if not all compliments are forwarded to all staff giving recognition to the parties involved, talk about a morale booster.
However, the largest advantage we have over the bigger companies is that our NOC is a 1.5minute walk from Tech Support. Questions they can't answer are brought to the person who can. We go out of our way to solve our customers problems. Doesn't matter if they are a $30/month shared hosting, or $2000/month colocation. Because of this its not uncommon to trace problems back to other ISPs and sit on the phone with _there_ tech support for hours trying to get the problem fixed.
I know from my own experience, I sure remember and prefer the companies that offer great support, and recommend them to friends/family. We must be doing something right as we just posted a 30% revenue increase along with a 6% profit margin increase. Not to mention the company is sending the entire staff body to Mexico for a week!!
Face it, QA has to have someone to look down upon, right?
I've been having a problem with Comcast ever since @Home went out of business. When the problem (which consists of me not being able to access my web space on any subaccounts) first occurred I was told it was going to be fixed in a few days. I called back a week later and the tech had no idea that there was a problem. I called back a month later after that with the same response and the obligatory instructions to call them back if the problem wasn't fixed. I just called them about the problem again today and it still hasn't been fixed and the tech handling it still had no idea about it until he asked his manager and told me it was a widespread outage. My question is how does a widespread outage not get fixed over the course of months? Not that it's the fault of the techie but they had no idea it was going on at all, which makes for a very unpleasant experience for me.
They were the exemplar of tech support - free phone call, knowledgable support people. Too bad MS erased them. It's been downhill ever since.
XXX sucks! Switch to some half-assed fly-by-night company run out my friend's garage!
This is such transparent hype.
for my money, McAfee has the worst, $60 later and still McAfee firewall will not function on my system. Zonealarm worked the first time, and they are helpfull.
IMO, the best way to cut support costs is to increase quality! So many companies release their products too early, filled with bugs. This makes problems more difficult to troubleshoot (adds to the list of possible problems), and obviously makes calls more plentiful.
If you have a high quality, you can hire fewer, but better, support people. They will be less frustrated, and it is easier to keep a small group well trained.
The only athletic sport I ever mastered was backgammon - Douglas William Jerrold
Hey fuckwad, if network installations aren't supported figure it out for yourself. Be a man and point-n-click your way to a boot floopy for your network install.
For shit's sake, give us a break. We all know that you aren't bright enough to diagnose a "faulty BIOS". If you were, you wouldn't be a grunt running a Windows network.
Their tech support, though, is without equal. When they had a bad run of hardware on a new device last year that resulted in many devices cracking, they exchanged hundreds of devices for people at no charge. HandEra has a few people who frequent the various User Group mailing lists and occationally answer questions, or in some cases will even respond to someone's problem with "Yeah, that's a flaw, email [tech support guy's name] and have him exchange it." They're that personal, and they actually do. I've had to send a device in before, and if I got it in the mail by Tuesday I generally had it back before dinner on Friday. That's the travel time for BOTH directions. Amazing.
The reason they can do that, frankly, is because they're so small. Large companies don't have the time/money to train decent tech support people. At a smaller company, they can spare the developers for an hour a day to train tech support people, or even BE the tech support, so you're talking to someone that really knows what they're doing rather than someone who's NEXT job will be "would you like fries with that?"
--GrouchoMarx
Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?
switched to Wintel because it was cheaper than DEC!
I've actually had uniformly good tech support from my cable ISP (Rogers, in Toronto, Canada).
This surprised me too.
The wait time for support can drag on to quite some length, but in all but one case, I was talking to a fully-clued person on the other end, with real ability to prod the network from their end.
The one other case was someone only marginally clued, but who was still polite and as helpful as he could manage.
It might just have been fluke, but whatever it is, I'll take it...
Look around - the market is dominated by specific brands and product series, which don't have any competition. MS Office, Adobe Photoshop etc. have a firm grip on the market and other products are not even granted a closer look. People don't even mind paying more for products of inferior quality, as long as they are "compatible" with what is considered the "standard". So, it's just logical that companies invest more in sales & advertising than quality assurance. :-)
"I love my job, but I hate talking to people like you" (Freddie Mercury)
Back when my family got its first PC, a 1993-era 486, we bought the standard Microsoft mouse with it. It works for a while, but by spring 1994 it had developed a problem where the pointer would "stick" on screen when moving horizontally, as if it hit the edge of the screen. (It only happed in Win 3.1, though, not in GeoWorks Ensemble. Hmmm...) So, I called Microsoft.
Over the course of the next two months, we bought mouse cleaning kits (didn't fix it), downloaded new drivers (didn't fix it), had MS send us a new mouse (didn't fix it), changed mouse pad (didn't fix it), and otherwise, well, couldn't fix it. Finally, I called MS tech support for the 119th time and explained the situation again. The rep. on the other end replied, and I quote:
MS Tech Support Rep: "Well, I suppose if you don't like it you can just take your business elsewhere."
The next day we went out and bought a Logitech mouse. It worked flawlessly for years, and we have used nothing but Logitech mice since without the problem ever recurring. This is also when I first began to dislike Microsoft, long before the question of business practices or monopolies came into the picture.
--GrouchoMarx
Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?
[B][P]
"The Management" (Corporate and Government) is their own worst enemy (in most, not all organizations). They are in charge of it all, can do no wrong, receive recognition for success, and can blame any subordinate or contractor persons' performance for failure. Today many in management are "Mary Antoinette" Stratocracy capitalist theorist ("Subject and Situation Unaware" Commander) failure is not something to be learned from, because failure is not an option. "The Management" in the USA has become success and excuse oriented. Failure will not be recognized, but labeled. Success for USA "The Management" is becoming more a paper dragon that is slain by others. Enron, Global Crossings, Anderson, --- many others "The Management" walk away with millions of dollars, no penalties, no penal (Yep, I know -- sounds like), no character, no constitution, no skill but BS or better degreed and applauded smoke scams. "The USA Management" can manage business processes, but are totally incompetent at delivering real mission success, because most cannot see/forecast the mission/goals, they can not recognize and retain key personnel, they contract out (whenever possible) anything that is to complicated to understand, and recognize four important points: (1) there is no one working under-them that is their mental or corporate-value equivalent (every one is replaceable, except themselves), (2) if something that they do not understand is not contracted out, then they or their subordinate may be blamed for problems, (3) have no faith in the skills, character, and integrity of the people that work for you, because employees can not be managements' better or equivalent at anything and if they were they would be working somewhere else, therefore (4) only they could provide any success, only they are worth more-than their pay check, and nothing is more important than the next promotion (employees are expendable tools).
[/B][/P]
[B][P]
Now how does this type of nature relate to "Tech support"? Well simply stated: When there is mentally, emotionally, and organizationally fucked-up management which provides fucked-up decisions (based on fucked-up self-serving premises), then the fucked-up confusing failures accepted by the gullible individuals become the defended truth protecting institutions and systems from failure. BOOM! The house of cards collapse upon US all ---
[/B][/P]
[B][P]
Yep, this was just done for some honest fun poked at those (management folks) that make the decisions, but should be endorsing and supporting the decisions with business management skills. The pure capitalist/stratocracy organizations fail where true democracies with honest associates succeed. The pure democracy wants US to succeed as a community/tribe/family/kith/kin, but the good capitalist is a team player that seeks assured dominance of the market and the customer becomes the profit generating consumer of products and services.
[/B][/P]
[B][P]
More simply stated: You can never blame management for failure, but the fact is they are failures all to frequently. Poor customer support, contract it out, pay the worker-bees and pack-mules who love to do a good job less than the poor performing managers is proven capitalist/communist theory. I have known many organizations to be fully functional in spite of management demigods.
[/B][/P]
[B][P]
Jadi Ba - Reality is a self-induced hallucination.
[/B][/P]
Reality is a self-induced hallucination.
Yes, you should send them the answers. Seeing as how you're using unsupported versions, you're not entitled to complain about not receiving support. However, since you have the answers, giving them to Trend would probably change your versions to supported. And help out others in the process. Oh yeah, and you don't lose anything in the process. What's the problem with that?
You've just convinced me to go back to flipping burgers. After 4 years in the computer business (2 years tech support with MS and 2 years of IP Conferencing and NOC positions at Akamai) it's just not worth it anymore. I've been unemployed 6 months and apparently I'm not qualified for anything let alone tech support positions as I'm getting 0 response to my resume (yes I'm actively looking for a job not just waiting for a response from a web service and my resume has more to show than what I've stated here).
:) Seriously though, I'll take a drug test, just not for a $10/hr position. You have to pay me a lot more than that to do a stupid pee-in-the-cup trick for you. I suppose McDonald's isn't any different iwhen it comes to respect, etc. but at least I wouldn't have to answer the damn phone every 5-10 minutes to fix another windows problem.
I did have a job very briefly at an ISP as a "Unix admin", but how many "Unix admins" do you know that drive 100 miles one way to work, 6 days a week, for $10/hr, that have to troubleshoot windows dial-up and outlook configuration issues all day long? I think it's pretty obvious why that job didn't work out, especially when I had been avoiding tech support jobs that I know I was qualified for and paid better.
This btw, has a lot to do with why tech support sucks... How helpful would you expect an underpaid, overworked, overdriven, "Unix Admin" to be when you ask him to help configure Outlook or troubleshoot this god-awful 'dslbuster' service that he/she has never seen before, has no documentation, good luck finding what company makes it to get more info or refer the customer, no computers on site that have this software installed, and of course it's windows only with very minimal config options to toy with from what I've heard... I've still never seen it. (FWIW, dslbuster is a windows program that connects to a proxy with compression thus providing a connection "3x faster than a normal modem" and cheaper than broadband at $5 more a month than normal service)
Anyways, I usually don't pay much attention to the opinions here on slashdot (some are definitely worth reading and thinking about), but this time I think you're all right. Tech support just plain sucks. It's a shitty job and nobody respects those that have that job. On top of all that, many tech support positions (Apple has a few openings) are drug testing now. Unfriggin' believable! How are these people supposed to get through life with a job like that and no drugs??
Well, I'm off to McDonalds to fill out my application
Here's "The Deal". I work at a technical support shop, and I have a few things that might help you make sense of tech support, as it is now.
First of all, 90-95% of the people who purchase or use our product never call us. It's the 5-10% who do who use up all of our time, and some of those people call us repeatedly, up to 5-10 times a day. These people may not be stupid, it may be that they have a computer they've used and abused until it doesn't work anymore. I notice it's been 7 years since windows 95 came out, which seems like a long time, and it is. There are a lot of people who've been running thier 95 machine since then, and have never restored it, upgraded it, or done ANYTHING to make sure it keeps running. They change thier oil every 3k miles, but assume something they paid 2000$ for 7 years ago will keep working like clockwork. That cuts out about 1/2 of the calls I take. The other half are the idiots who don't understand that you have to be able to click with the right mouse button, double click, click and drag, and copy-and-paste before getting on the internet, becoming a multimedia developer, or programming. Sounds harsh, right? Not at all. I deal with the same people 3-4 times a day, and call them back 3-4 times, just so that as I walk them through step-by-step, they feel like someone cares that they can't figure out how to dialup, then double click internet explorer.
As to outsourcing:
I used to work for a VERY large outsourcer. They hired just about anyone that could pass thier very easy tech test, and then trained them. They didn't train them to do troubleshooting, they trained them to follow scripts. They trained them to follow a flowchart designed by someone NOT in the tech support department, but in management. That's how they work, and make money. They spend a lot of time developing things that don't help, especially when, in a lot of cases, they don't even give the techs the product, and show them what ACTUALLY happens when some of the errors that they know about happen. Companies I'd stay away from include Qwest DSL, who, if you know what you are doing 100%, you'll be fine. Dell and AT&T Broadband, I'd stay away from. 100% scripts, and they don't know what they are doing. 3com: Good company, they let the techs use the products, but they've cut so much from support they are almost dangerous. Companies I've liked?
HP. They give the products to the techs, and they make them LEARN the product, and be able to take it apart and put it together again. Adobe: They give thier techs all the software, and tell em to take it home to learn with. They aren't graphic artists, but they can usually figure out what you want if you need help. That's about it for now... If anyone has any questions about outsourcing or anything, I'd love to answer.
Karth
This is just a variation on the commonly used honeypot scripts that first turned up in news.admin.net-abuse about a decade ago.
The trouble is, most modern day harvesting software won't go more then 2 or 3 layers deep on a domain specifically to avoid these bots.
And even if they do get the fake email addresses, the spammers don't care that 95% of their email addresses are fake, because they just onsell them as "20 million email addresses, checked and verified", and the end load falls on whoever's mail server is attacked, while the spammer just walks away looking for a new machine to abuse
I am freelance. I go to people's houses and offices and fix their computer problems on site. For example, I get a lot of calls from people who are sick of trying to get their Internet connection working.
So I guess all this trouble is good for me in a way, because it means I get more calls. On the other hand, it makes it more stressful for me to solve certain problems, but then, if I can't help, I still ask for my minimum charge.
Microsoft must really take a large part of the blame for the slowdown in PC sales!
.NET, meanwhile laughing at the rest of the world!!!
And the reasons for this are not superficial. The MS business plan simply cannot work over the long term.
Their business plan simply has not allowed for the need to support their products. The situation must get much worse before it gets better.
Microsoft, partly because of money saved by not providing service, also by paying employees worthless pieces of paper, i.e., stock options, has accumulated ~$40 billion in cash.
Let your mind boggle over the fact that they can avoid providing service for decades before running out of cash, or they can alternatively spend billions on boondoggles such as
Follow the link and mod this guy up! Hilarious!
God is imaginary
After sitting on the phone for over two hours with D-link, talking to three different people (including a supervisor), explaining that I set up wireless routers several times a week for a living, and that this defective part needs to be RMA'd, I was told they'd have a tech call me back. One would think that RMA'ing an obviously defective product would be cheaper for the company than letting me sit on the phone with someone who has a double-digit IQ, only to have a "tech" call me back at a later time, when they'll end up having to RMA it anyway.
In any event, my boss has already decided we're using Linksys from now on, and it's been 3 business days without a call back from this mysterious "tech". Needless to say, I had no problem understanding where this article was coming from.
The one bright spot in all this was the fact that I spent two hours on wednesday doing nothing but chit chatting on the telephone, sitting on my arse while getting paid.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
The guy in the article says that he does not have one hour to spare in the day. I'll bet that he doesn't have an hour to RTFM, either.
I disagree, but you're right it is offtopic. I would like to continue this conversation. Maybe at the site? spaminterceptor.solidblue.biz - they have a forum.
Who to say you have to be free of disabilities to be a world class researcher? Look at Stephen Hawkings... by far one of the most intelligent scientists on the earth IMHO.
When people talking about "Tech Support", most often forget about the "Built-In Tech Support".
So what's that "Built-In Tech Support" all about ?
Intuitive-ness !
That is, something akin to MacIntosh's GUI, or (once upon a time) Compaq's way of packaging their hardware in a box.
If a company takes great care on the "Built-In Tech Support", that is, make the unpacking, and installing process INTUITIVELY, as the case of the (once upon a time) Compaq, or the intuitive GUI of MacIntosh, the need for EXTERIOR Tech Support (that is, the call in, hand-held session Tech Support) will be lessen.
It's often the tech developers' fault that the tech support comes at the high level need. That is because, the developers don't care enough about how their product will do to the users, that the users got confused and / or annoyed, then they (the users) call in and screaming at the poor Tech Support people.
I've participated in many software projects and developed enough softwares on my own to know that if you DO NOT CARE ABOUT HOW YOUR SOFTWARE WILL APPEAL TO THE USERS, you will get TONS AND TONS of ANGRY USERS, demanding to know HOW THE HELL THIS WORK, and WHY THE HELL YOU MAKE YOUR SOFTWARE SO DARN DIFFICULT TO USE / UNDERSTAND ?!
One time there were people (users) demanding why my software runs so SLOW, and after asking the users why they say my software runs "SLOW", I came to realize that the users EXPECT everything to appear on the screen, AT ONCE !
I learned my lesson
I know, it's kinda cop out, but if that means making users happy, I will do it.
In addition, letting users see SOMETHING ON THE SCREEN rather than wait for the ENTIRE RESULT AT ONCE is part of the Built-In Tech Support.
My software is no longer consider "SLOW", because the users get to see "SOMETHING" on sceen. It's little stuff like this that matters.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
What companies need to start doing is ditching phone tech support. Not entirly, but just using phones is hard. It's so intangable. You can't see anything that's going on on the other side. What I propose is using Terminal Services. If they're using Windows XP or Windows NT you can connect to their computer, and be able to control their computer on the other side. This can solve almost any software problems. (Maybe even some hardware). Of course, this would be useless if it's an "Internet is down" related problem. Another thing to consider is a strong Online Tech Support. Where the company posts up all questions they are asked with their answers on the website, to create a knoledge base. Or, you can go as far as installing an ALICE Bot and configure it to answer common problems the customer may have. They may never know they're talking to an AI instead of a human :)
I work for Stream, an outsourcer who handles other companies tech support. I am on a very high profile contract of which if I said the name of the company you would instantly recognize it. We have certain metrics we must attain, such as an average handle time, etc. Most of our techs on my contract are competant. My handle time is less than half of the contract specified metrics and I take double the amount of calls of almost everyone else. Not because I "punt" (as we call it), but because I know what I'm doing and I fix issues very quickly.
These are my big pet peeves when taking a customers call:
1. Rambling on and on about how you're not technical and not computer literate. If you were you probably wouldn't be calling me.
2. Repeating yourself during your explaination. I'm a very smart individual and I generally get something the first time you tell me. You do not have to say it 4 and 5 times.
3. Spending 10 minutes to explain the issue. I don't care if you had five issues before this. No it is not necessary for you to tell all of them to me. No I do not care what you did to fix the previous issue. Just tell me what it is and shut up, if I need information I will *ask*!
4. Going ahead of me and doing the wrong thing. No, I did *not* want you to restart your computer before we changed the sittings requiring you to restart your computer.
5. Bitching about warranty. The warranty starts when you buy the unit. Just because you sat it on your shelf for a year and a half and just started to use it does not mean your units one year warranty is still good. Just because you have never called before in 4 years does not mean the 90 day free tech support warranty does not apply to you.
6. Incompetance. I realize you may not be the most technical person in the world however I do expect you to know how to use a mouse, how to read a serial number and how to count. "But I told you, I don't have a last 6 digits, there are only 14 digits!", "No I never called to get return authorization, I just put it in a box with a letter and shipped it to you, it's not MY fault you can't track it, how am I supposed to know you have to call in first!"
There are many more. If you want to know why tech support is horrible it's because the job is shitty and the support person - in the most part - does *not* want to be talking to you because all he/she ever hears is bitching, moaning, complaining and whining.
-- iCEBaLM
Okay, this is a small-medium sized ISP in the area, really our biggest competitors were AOL and MSN giving away free hours with the computers sold at wally world and staples. Anyhow on to the point. We took calls on a first come first serve basis, or we were supposed to. Our management never had any way to keep a log of people who called, unless we kept track of the phone msg slips. The phone lines in this area (mostly rural) suck balls and make connectivity a nightmare. Our "marketing" people lie. Our equipment, and the equipment of one company we outsourced roaming connections to had KNOWN ISSUES with the Winmodems put in MANY OEM PCs...This made for the following scenarios-
/. and AIM'ing after a long period of looking busy. The higher ups moved everythign else we could possibly to do help out in slack times to another location, so i was happy to chew bandwith
1. At one point i spent an entire afternoon at an old fellow's house. great guy, but we DONT DO HOUSE CALLS. i was there because he was a friend of the management and couldnt figure out why he couldnt burn MIDI MUSIC TO A CD. btw did i mention we were an ISP? I only got paid 7$/hr but that was still company money.
2. Many problems we simply couldn't fix. One customer called in about once a week for several months because he could not get connectivity in one of the more remote parts of the county. Bellsouth insistd his phone lines were fine. he swapped modems at least once. brought his computer to the office, it worked like a charm. To this guy's credit he kept his cool through it magnificently, but it is horrible for morale to have issues you can't fix and be TOLD you can't fix.
3. My afternoons were spent reading
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
WHAT? We've lost about $6000, because WE had to self support us (hire someone knowlegeable). The prodcut didn't specify it was not Sendmail 8.12 compatible, not that it wouldn't run on anything other than RedHat, nor that SSL was unplanned. I ve'd have known on advance this wasn't support we would have found a better solution.
In fact, we had a RedHat server and was more trouble than installing it under Slackware.
I contribute to free solutions and am happy to help when something does not work. For a paid, supported product, i expect a profesional answer and a working solution.
Trend had a bunch of customers unable to use the product when they upgraded to sendmail 8.12, and the solution must come from us? NOT SO. Hire someone and solve the customers problem.
unfinished: (adj.)
I've got to admit it's getting better, ...
... wait, that third digit should be an E?"
a little better all the time.. it can't get no worse
.. oh wait, it just did.
Tuesday 11:45 PM, my "cable" light on my cable modem starts blinking:
Place call to tech:
Me: "Any outages in my area?"
Tech: "No. We can schedule a tech to come out on Wed"
Me: "Ok"
Friday 5:00PM - it clicks in my head:
Me: "You've been calling me for two weeks because apparently someone can't figure out how to write down my provisioning info on a piece of paper (I gave it to them five times). I haven't heard from you lately, did you perhaps provision my cable modem with the wrong MAC Address?"
Tech: "Please read the MAC address to me
Me: "Yes..."
Tech: "Check your modem.. it should work now"
Me: "Gee, thanks."
Imagine, my ISP (not a big one) has NO tech support during the night ! It happened to me a few times that calling back severall times to get them to solve something involved speaking with a different person, telling a completely different story .. to the point that I once had to threaten them to sue for incompetence to get my line back up.
..
:) at least you sometimes get a chance to tell them how much their support sucks.
Oh yeah, and they also mailed a word macro virus to all their customers a year ago, and I had to call them to explain the problem.
On the other hand uber large companies are not much better at handling tech issues, I'm still trying to figure out how to get that RMA number from IBM europe for this clicking 46gb drive, and everytime I get to speak to someone they want some obscure system part which my drive hasn't
What also pisses me up is when email to tech support goes ignored. They apparently feel like it's ok to delete the few requests they cant/dont want to handle, seriously damaging the whole company's image. I've sent unanswered mails to many helpdesks, and I know prefer to call (from work of course
I cannot even start to imagine how I would have felt If I've had to listen to 45 minutes of 'we value your call, please hold' bullshit from network solutions on an international call from home.
Tech support can be fun tho (well, sometimes), provided you're getting paid correctly and you're free to investigate the issues yourself. You can learn a lot from finding a way to fix the thousands of issues that come up, not from blindly following braindead scripts. I'm currently working as an operator for a large company's datacenter and do some tech support on a few applications we host, and beeing good at helping people out is quite rewarding. Granted, that's very different from large call centers work.
How much value do you place on knowledge of:
.htaccess and how to upload, and how to design a website, and how to keep the kids away form your porn and why alt.kiddieprn is not on our news server and turn off fuckin zonealarm and no you're being hax0red and we are currently having an outage and I'm sorry your DSL speed sucks why dont you get your fucking cats away from the phone cords, and why do you have 3 hardware firewalls on your 1.5Mbps ADSL sir and please stop spamming on our network no I wont instruct you how to harvest mail addresses and I'm sorry but your domain name has expired no we didn't know because you never listed us a technical contact and desperately trying to remain friendly while helping people that think turning off the monitor is rebooting their PC and I see that you don't have your OS CD and I'm sorry but if you formatted your drive you won't get that email back and 5.1.1 relaying denied and you can't send 10MB files through our mail server and it appears that we are not your ISP please call them not me and let me get this straight you want an additional subnet that is physically separate from your internal LAN that is also logically separate that begins before the demarc point but you don't want to purchase extra IP's and you're the network admin at your company HAHAHAHA and the reason you're mail is not working is because your domain host is not pointing your MX to your Exchange server on your DSL line and you think the problem is our DNS cache and you're the network admin at your company HAHAHAHAHA and you're an MSCE then why the fcuk are you calling me to config your 2k dialup settings HAHAHAHA and I can see that you haven't even bothered to run a fucking trace to the destination IP because it is clearly a problem that originates with you because your 192.168 address can't even touch the LinkSys gateway you have in your office and again I see that you are the netadmin so you keep telling me and who in the flaming blue christ set up your network well why the fsck are you caling me instead of them oh I see it;s because our support for your unsupported fuckup is free whereas you would have to pay the assholes you hired to setup your lousy NT box $40 and hour minimum to fix your shit and on and on and all the other shit that I have to deal with in any given day?
win95 and 98 and ME and 2K and XP and OS8 and OS 9 and OSX, and linux and FreeBSD and Apache and IIS and CGI and PHP and qmail and sendmail and SSH and FTP and POP and SMTP and DNS and HTTP and TCP and UDP and HTML and ASP and ICMP and mail readers and IE and Netscape and Opera and routing, subnetting, addressing and OSPF and BGP and Cisco and Juniper and CAT5 and Cat3 and domain names and contact handles and domain tranfers and *SQL and Coldfusion and Javascript and right-click and left-click and open a new window m'aam and drivers and Modems and routers and DSL and Wireless and ISDN and PPP and PPPoE and NAT devices and nslookup and traceroute and ping and dig and whois and
Apparently the net value of tech support is zero because it comes free with your internet connection.
I don't use that much tech support but I know it's been going bad for a while. Two years ago my aunt bought a shiny new compaq presario something or other and within a week the keyboard began to malfunction. She called the helpline, as most common consumers do. After unpluging and pluging the keyboard, rebooting the computer, and other unsucessful steps, the following conversation ensued:
Tech Support: Now, listen very carefully...
Aunt: Ok.
Tech Support: Is your keyboard on a hard surface, like a desk or table?
Aunt: Yes, it's on my desk.
Tech Support: Good, now I would like you to pick up your keyboard and hold it four inches above your desk making sure to keep it parallel the surface of your desk.
Aunt: Ok.
Tech Support: Drop it.
Aunt: Ok. (crash in background)
Tech Support: Does your keyboard function?
Aunt: No, it's still not working.
Tech Support: Ok...again, raise your keyboard four inches above your desk but tilt it at 45 degrees to the right.
Aunt: Ok.
Tech Support: Drop it. Ma'am, does your keyboard function now.
Aunt: Yes! it does, thank you very much.
Well at least they knew how to fix it...
Intelligence is the Art of Masking Stupidity
I work for a major telco's ISP, which rhymes with DUHrizon, and let me tell you the second, and third level tech support don't have a clue. My favorite issue was when they were telling us "transport not available" is related to the mail system and IS NOT a network error. And Austin has a huge tech pool to pull from, so you would think they could hire some decent people. But I guess the company doesn't want to pay it.
physical disability != learning disability
The guy can barely move any muscles but his brain is just dandy.
This message brought to you by the Council of People Who Are Sick of Seeing More People.
(Note the period at the end of the subject line.)
:)
There has rarely been another technology-related company--anywhere--that has had better tech support, with more timely responses, with more knowledgeable support staff (about their own and related products) than Perforce.
There is little to nothing I'd change about them, and the rest of the software industry can take a few lessons from Perforce.
Take heart; not everyone is downsizing their tech support force. There's a difference between the good and the bad, and if the good are just harder to find, then don't give up and keep looking.
:) Yes, I'm an AC. Lemme be.
is only as good as the people who are doing it and their management.
I used to work at a certain very large ISP (not AOL or MSN) that hires people with little or no qualifications whatsoever to do the job of technical support.
The environment in the call center is ludicrous. Employees and managers regularly buy and sell drugs at work. Employees frequently sleep with other employees (a *lot* of other employees).
One employee who was involved in a sexual harrassment investigation recently posted on a website that he didn't think there should be an investigation and resented his personal life being interfered with by HR because the problem was reported anonymously and didn't "come through the public scene" at the ISP.
An employee of this ISP recently pulled a gun on someone during working hours at work.
Being friends with people is a lot more important to many of the people there than being professional and creating a safe work environment. It's kind of sad because if you don't party a lot and you don't play the games of the in crowd, you don't go anywhere in the company and either leave after you get sick of it or get fired.
So yeah, seeing that that's the environment in at least one call center for technical support, I can see how the quality is slipping.
Similiar happening. Turning the phone off then back on took care of the problem.
As a tech support guy, who fixed PCs at AT&T, Lucent, Merck, Credit Suisse First Boston, Oppenheimer Capital, MTV, Prada, & Barclay's, I can tell you three things I know to be universally true:
1. All users are stupid
2. All developers are stupid
3. If all else fails, refer to number 1.
Quite simply, we are charged with the worst possible situation: supporting incomplete, immature technologies with undertrained (PC incompetent) users.
"Stupid" really means "ignorant" - but "ignorant" is too kind. An ignorant man will acknowledge when proven wrong, as to prevent further ignorance. A stupid man refuses to learn anything, and with management level arrogance demand their ignorance be maintained.
The stupidity angle is really demonstrated when a vocal lower person with friends high up demand the impossible.
Case in point:
My former manager (burn in hell you bastard) Joseph Edwards (go ahead, call him and tell him Kurt says "burn in hell you fat miserable cocksucker"), at Merck & Co. is the meanest sob in the universe. This man had a temp fired (in a completely different department) because they asked too many questions (hence, breaking the invisible rules). But when a VP (just another loser) complained that he couldn't dial in - RIGHT AFTER HE INSTALLED AOL - I had to fix it - WITHOUT REMOVING AOL. When I told the user that AOL was against policy (it was) I got yelled at by his manager after a closed door meeting. Net result: pissed off righteous tech who proved the validity of a corporate policy being judged by incompetents who didn't understand why the policy was put in place in the first place - EVEN THOUGH THEY WROTE IT.
There you have it: stupidity in action.
While none of the other firms had people quite so stupid on board - generally speaking all the problems came from there.
Like MTV. They use an access token (SecureID) to generate time synch'd logins. Only problem is, noone bothered to incorporate a time synch program - so 95% of the login issues had to do with clocks being off. Another piece of immature technology (SecureID) combined with inadequately trained users.
The same thing happened to my girlfriend, and after a lot of investigating I found this proggy called GetDataBack which worked great! Of course you need to boot from another HD with windows installed, and it only works for FAT/NTFS partitions so if you're a l33t linux-only user or something, you're screwed :| ;)
Of course if you don't want to fork out 69/129 dollars, depending if it's the FAT/NTFS version, there's a cool trick that i discovered in the free version, where every file you open is actually saved to the temp folder with a screwed up name. If you're pacient you can recover all your files one by one, renaming them manually... or you could also get a crack, but I didn't say this and I wasn't here
There are still a few companies doing good tech support. With all the comments here about crappy support, I figure I ought to weigh in with who is doing a good job.
1) Adaptec. I bought a DTC SmartRAID VI Century controller off eBay. The card is probably a few years old, but I have no idea. I got the sucker into my machine and the card wouldn't finish its POST. I tried all sorts of things, but couldn't get it resolved. So, I called adaptec (which bought out DTC a while back.) After a little while on hold, I got a tech support guy. He was very helpful and walked me through some steps and troubleshooting. (The problem ended up being that on my mobo, if video was set to AGP init first, the BIOS didn't init PCI devices properly. I have dual videocards, so I set my PCI to init first. Wierd I know...) Anyway, they were very helpful. They didn't care that the card was old, or where I got it, etc. They just helped me with my problem. You can bet that future SCSI card purchases will be Adaptec cards for me.
2) Maxtor. Where I work, we get dead hard drives on PCs from time to time. Maxtor has always been the best... I call, explain that I am a tech, and tell them what the problem is. They don't give me the scripted run-around about this or that. They acknowledge that I know plenty about PC systems and have already determined that the drive is bad. They immediately issue an RMA.
As far as software goes though, the only good experience I've had was with Microsoft support. They tend to do a good job, at least in my experience. All the rest I've ever talked to are pretty much a joke.
Natural != (nontoxic || beneficial)
And you still have lost that amount if you keep the fix to yourself. There's no loss to you in reporting the fix.
Okay, I'll give you SendMail 8.11 and only working with RedHat as requirements that should've been mentioned. Or was it before SendMail 8.12? It kind of sounds like it was from the email exchanges. In that case, you've only got the RedHat bone to bitch at. Nobody ever states whether a particular feature is unplanned! Now, if they said SSL support due in version 2, or whatever, then you could make a complaint about that.
You got your solution, it just wasn't the one you wanted. The solution was SendMail 8.11 and RedHat.
It's the best I've ever experienced. Their phone techs treat you like the geek you are and don't try to dumb it down.
I'm currently going round and round with Creative Labs. Had a Audigy Platinum loose all it's Firewire ports as well as my Live drive. I send it in (of course at my cost) only to receive an el cheapo card in return. Not gold connectors and connectors so close together you can't hook up a GameVoice. So I call them tell them that if I wanted a cheap one I wouldn't have paid $199.99+tax for one. At which point they tell me "We are so sorry sir, just add notes to this new RMA and send the old card back. Explain that you want your Platinum card" and all will be well. Nay....I return from great week in Seattle, hoping to see at least a refurbished Audigy Platinum! What I got was the SAME cheap p.o.s value card, along with a note that stated Dir Sir, we have received your card (Model & Serial) and have replaced it with an exact model you sent. Don't that just bite ya in the Customer Service rear! Now I have to call them back, talk horribly (cause if I didn't use this as some form of therapy) or I wouldn't get the money I had vested in RMA's back!! Lets just hope they do the correct thing on Monday!
I've nothing of importance to say, now go away before I taunt you with a second sig!
If you're hiring a manager of techies and they can't do the job of the people they're managing, they aren't qualified.
I believe this, but I also know the entire management paradigm is built around the idea that you don't have to be an expert in XYZ to manage people who do XYZ. You have to be an expert in managing.
I'm trying resolve the two ideas, but I can't -- just being a generic management dweed somehow seems inadequate in a technical environment, yet somehow ultimately someone has to make strategic decisions involving specialists without knowing a zillion specialities.
Or is this just one of the fundamental conflicts of management?
Huh? Marketing people never blow smoke and we all know how much they understand. They understand things like sales, markups, flattery and, "have you tried rebooting your computer? Oh, I see. We don't support that product anymore, the new version only costs $250." But I suppose it's better to put tech support under people you say are dishonest than it is to put them with people who can answer questions when they have to. What the heck, the sales people try to be polite, that's good in tech support when they can't tell you how to fix the problem or tell someone who can.
Tech support needs to be it's own organization with heavy ties to engineering and lots of good advice for marketing. A good tech support group can educate marketing like it does the real users of software. It can also make nice bug reports and helpful suggestions of what customers want from their sofware. Marketing people need to be concerned with the sofwares cost and capability relative to competing software. They might contribute to sofware design by making reports on why people prefer other software and what they like.
This really makes me laugh:
Sales/Marketing was intensely interested in these areas as it helped them design products.
Did your company have an engineering group? What did they do? The other problem with that company you used to work for is that it might have been driven entirely by marketing.
The whole problem with propriatory software is that things other than performance and suitability to a particular purpose can be trumped by marketing concerns. That's how you end up with a ten year old OS that STILL has bugs and always will but will also always lack basic funtionality like grep. If it did not break, no one would ever buy a new one says marketing. Hmmmm, gotta spend a billion dollars on XP cause it sucks? Ha, ha. When you have honest engineers in control the company may stay small but it will produce an honest, useful and continuously improved set of programs. Do a quick Slashdot search on ID Software for how things should work. Just look at MicroShaft to understand what happens when greedy morons with MBA behind their names run things. Or think of how bad things got when that dope from Pepsi took over Apple. If you put Tech Support under an Engineering organization then the best Tech Support people always get moved into Engineering before long, leaving only script readers manning the phones.
If you don't give tech support a place to go, they will work for someone else. If your training sucks that bad, and it's driven by marketing, and it does not encourage and reward personal growth, it will fail and you will be working somewhere else. Oh wait, you don't work there anymore do you?
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
They made us lose time and money. The told us to weaken and revert to NO SSL and no Sendmail 8.12 (sendmail as root, no antispam, etc).
...". I found it irritating, we lost time and money.
If they make you wait in McDonalds, they offer you some simbolic free coke or whatever (i don't care). In this case, they just stated the email with "I know it may sound inapropiate but
That comes after literaly FIGHTING with the product to get it working.
Also, i do NOT find it usefull if a product that is supposed to enhence your (Windoze) security it forces you to weaken security in you secure box (Linux). It's not funny sending plaintext logins to a box where you actually have shells under those same accounts (thus SSL).
Also, RedHat my ass. If they call it Linux, it should suport Linux, not RedHat. When did this all started I don't know but I don't like it...
As for Sendmail, we what can i say. Go ahead, revert to a weaker version of sendmail because the guys haven't learned how to EVEN CONFIGURE IT at least. Then why am I even talking to this support personel?!?!?!?!
I don't need you to agree with me. I just KNOW a big corporation the size of Trend, that is providing antivirus solutions to other big corporation should know what support is.
Anyway, the post was to ilustrate how bad support can be, even for a company that is supporting high cost, corporate products.
unfinished: (adj.)
I work in tech support. You already think I'm weird to do that? I do it as a volunteer. That's right, I do tech support and I don't even get paid for it. Why on earth would I do such a thing? Well, first of all, the company (www.dyndns.org) is mostly volunteers - it started as a hobby, and the core of our services are still free. Up until a few months ago, we never had enough money to afford to pay any of the staff; now, we do have one full-time member, the man who started the company 5 years ago.
There is another reason why I volunteer at this, however. I think tech support is really important. Software, in particular, is not designed to work well for the user. I want to help design software that works so well, it doesn't need tech support... but until that day, I also want to help users understand the software they have.
Have you read the Moderation Guidelines Addendum?
I work for a call center for a cable company and while I agree with a lot of what is being said, I feel I must stand up for myself and the handful of non-brainless tech support representatives in the business. Yes, a lot of reps are about as technically inclined as a shovel and follow a script to the letter but a few of us know our shit. I think a lot of it depends on the company and how important customer support is for them. I know where I work they put us through a 2 month training period that was a lot more extensive than I had thought it was going to be.
People complain about technical support day in and day out about the long wait times and about how our service is basically shit and yet 80-90% of the questions they ask can be gleaned from just paging through the user handbook! I hate babysitting. I actually like it when I get a question outside of the norm and a customer with an actual problem other than being born lobotomized and can't figure out why his DVD remote control won't operate his VCR, although, "It has for years!" or why she has no picture just because her TV is not plugged in. Get rid of the idiots who call in asking why their pinball game isn't working on their computer when we are only providing their internet connection. I'm not saying that tech support will get better if this happens - that is still up to the company's game plan - but you will get a dramatic increase in the speed of receiving a rep who can help you. Whether they will put the resources into to training and KEEPING good help is up to them. Management always likes to say, "You're the front line. To the customer you ARE the company!" yet we get kicked, stepped on, treated badly and given little consideration. So how different are we really from the customers calling in complaining about that very same thing?
I don't understand how people can (and they do) stay in this job for 10 -15 years. I took this job because I want to use it as a springboard to get to something bigger and better and hopefully this will look good on a resume. Three things I'll take with me from this job are :
A) People are frighteningly unintelligent.
B) Common sense is a rare thing.
C) Get a job where you don't have to deal with the masses.
After working tech support (and managing a Help Desk) for many years, I am convinced the problem lies with management.
For a Company, they have a product.
Money is spent on Developing a product. A product means people will have something to buy. This means money for the company.
Money is spent on employing sales people. This sells the product. Money for the company.
Both these can be easily measured.
But when doing "free" support, most companies see it as a black hole. They throw money in, and don't get direct, supported proof that it brings them money. There is no direct corelation between good support POST-SALEs, and more Sales...
So the company attempts to minimise support costs. Hire non-trained staff, pay minimal wages, have salery caps, have minimum staff on duty, minimal training etc.
In times where cash is hard to come by, the company needs to stop spending money. It has no choice (or thinks it has no choice) but to stop bleeding money, and Tech Support is the obvious choice. No immediate drop in sales or new products.
Yes....we do know that bad support will end up hurting sales, but you have to be thinking long term to see that, not short term.
Also, think of ISPs who do $20 a month unlimmited internet, with 24 hour support. $20 a month will hardly cover network and infrastructure costs, let alone 24/7 support. It is SO competitive, with such low margins, that something has to go. And Support goes first.
I do believe that whatever product you go for, be it hardware, Software or an ISP, if you want support, be prepared to pay for it. You get what you pay for. If you want high quality support, pay the premium.
5. Tell the truth. Don't layoff 30% of the staff due to "economic hardships", then anounce record-breaking profits the next week. Besides being ethically questionable, it's in poor taste, and kills your team's morale faster than a 44 magnum.
All through last year, and the first few months of this year, the President if the company I work for has been raving about how much we are gowing, how much revenue is up, and so forth. Then, I got the smallest raise I have gotten, dollars and percent-wise, since I started with this company, citing slow business, low profits, etc. At the same time, the president is extolling my virtues, and how much they need me to my family, who happen to be friends. Anyone out there that would NOT feel shit on in this situation?
Needless to say, I am polishing the ol' resume.
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
I use to work for a small ISP that did chug-all you can Internet account for something like $20 a month (Australian).
If a customer needed more then 5 minutes of phone time a month, they weren't worth having, so my boss encouraged me to encourage them to go elsewhere...eitehr by telling them to rack off....or hanging up on them.
It meant over a period of time, clueless customers were weeded out, and as our ISP grew, our support costs didn't.
It is amazing when you realise that only a very small percentage of customers will repeatedly call support. We kept the profitable customers, and dumped the others.
Sure, maybe not the most customer friendly thing to do (for a clueless customer), but my boss was realistic. Our low cost meant we couldn't afford support.
to be honest, it isnt microsoft's fault. microsoft has superb tech support for anyone who has ever bothered to look up the answers on the microsoft knowledge base. perhaps one should think before one opens up one's mouth... moreover, from an experianced tech support agent's viewpoint, i have consistently tried to give the best support at all times, it is really a matter of the agent more often than not. put a moron in the chair and give him a phone, of course he wont know what to do. i however gave customers call backs on my own phones in extreme circumstances, often following one problem, always calling the customer back for weeks, to make sure that the customer got consistent support and never had to wait on hold (which, on my team, was about 3 hours...). the problem is the outsourcing companies shipping the labor to where they can get it cheaper, like canada and montana. one problem. the people they hire are idiots, because all the smart and qualified people are in better paying jobs because they pay them minimum wage. ask any employee of stream international about that one.
-Jarhead
I recently had problems setting up an Intel Digital Movie Creator. The Intel tech support guy actually did research and called me back -- 3 times -- with more suggestions. Eventually, we got it going (I'm going to fly mine on top of a model rocket) and he called back AGAIN to get more system info for their infobase. Total time was about a week; we're talking about a support guy who would actually set up a phone appointment 3 days hence, and keep it. More than once.
This on a discontinued product with a $30 street price.
There's also ATI. I haven't had to call them in a while, but every time I have called the phone is answered by a tech who immediately gets to work on the case. No phone jail, not even an operator to put you in a queue for the next available tech. From dialing to fixed in 5 minutes. Only downside, and it's minor IMO, is that it's a non-free call to Canada.
Do not *even* get me started about my current place of employment. Were you on Qwest? I was. It sucked, primarily because the managers were morons and Qwest didn't give a hemorroidal rats ass about their customers. Now I am on another team, and as soon as I get my certs I am out of there like dung from a horse's booty. In the meantime, check out this site. It promises to be faily entertaining once it gets going.
http://www.techtales.com/
'Nuff said.
I managed a support department at one time.
May I humbly suggest that the amount you lose by being "cheated" will be significantly less than the amount you lose by assuming every paying customer who calls you is out to cheat you?
As has been pointed out several times, working the phones is a terrible job. Overworked, underpaid ($10-$15/hour? Yeah right, I make $8 and I've been around a while), and under constant pressure. AHT (Average Handle Time) is expected to be short. 15minutes per call is the norm. Billable Utilization (that is, the percentage of time you're actually on the phone vs. waiting for a calling or receiving training) is expected to be as high as possible.
Oh, and lets not forget that you're chasing a moving target. I work tech support for a major computer manufacturer and the upgrade cycles mean a new product ever 3 months with new sets of issues to deal with. Do they train us? Do they work with QA? Of course not. So we're put on the spt, essentially having to *research* the damned issues ourselves, all the while keeping the call time short.
But it gets better. My major computer OEM also has devised this brilliant marketing strategy called OST. This has got to be the most unethical thing I have seen in a long time and I am simply not going to play ball on this one. OST = Opportunity Sales Transfer. As in, we are supposed to convince EUs their problems will be sold if they'll buy an upgrade from our company. And our company just happens to charge TWICE the going rate for the same product. It's a dirty pressure tactic and I wonder if it is even legal. We're techs damnit, not sales people. We should *never* be placed in a marketing position. It is not our job, and a potential conflict of interest since many issues (especially slow performace on your typical overloaded PC) can be resolved with some very simple, FREE steps. But instead we're expected to push an overpriced memory upgrade. Blah.
Basically, all these damned policies, plus the fact that because 1st level support is a horrendous job you do have high turnover rate means you get crap support across the board. I honestly can't say I love my job, but I need the money.
Basically, to fix the tech support, you need to get the standard wage back up where it was 2-3 years ago so you can attract more qualified people. You need much more investment in INTENSIVE training, with consistent RETRAINING because the tech industry IS a constantly shifting target. And you definitely need much better communication with all the departments. And tech support contractors need to stop focusing on easily measured metrics like handle times, number of calls pushed through, etc, and more on "second tier" metrics like percent FCR (First Contact Resolution) and percent Issue Resolution. Those two are the biggies from an end user point of view.
End users in turn need to understand that there isn't a 10 minute fix for every problem. Many problems on Windows PCs can only be resolved with a format/reload because, well, Windows SUCKS. Also, free tech support's focus is on functionality, AS IT SHOULD BE. You want a tutorial? Pay for it. Go RTFM. Leave the techs to the real teching work of figuring out how you horked your system, or whether or not a piece of hardware has failed. And keep in mind that some failures really require a bench test to be properly identified. People get amazingly bitchy when told they have to bring their computer in for service. I mean, hello? We're not God. We can't just magically hit a few buttons and make a burned out power supply start working again. And over the phone we can't tell if your motherboard has fried in the process. And if your expecting a tech to come out and fix it, think again. Onsite replaces parts, but to send onsite techs out to actually troubleshoot would be financial suicide. That is a service that BUSINESSES get when they create a few million dollars worth of business. Joe blow with his $800 Super Special Marketroid Deluxe Winblows PC isn't going to get that level of service, period. So stop pestering us for something unrealistic and things will be a lot less stressful.
I work at a computer store.
What I love.. is when someone comes in and says, "What's the cheapest thing you have" and then comes back complaining about the lack of support. Duh.. They had to cut cost somewhere. If it's not in the hardware, it's in support.
As I am sitting here right now serving the masses of idiots, I can fully identify with what you speak about.
I feel this problem will burn itself out as more computer literate people are released into the marketplace and more computer illiterate people die.
Let's hope so.
I think the main problem is that computers are 102371 times more complex than the most advanced car. I mean, think about it; you put the key in, turn it, and then there is one wheel, some pedals, and maybe a lever or two. It's natural and simple, so easy anyone can do it. Yet there are still fucks who CAN'T drive and who kill people and keep insurance rates high. And I would bet this is the same 10% of the population that calls tech support when their caps lock key is on.
Really, I hate to say this, but I'm starting to agree with the Scientologist's notion that we should do away with the bottom 10% of society. Sometimes when I'm working here, I wish I had a button I could press while I'm explaining what I mean by "task bar" that instantly sterilizes my customer.
Ah, one can dream. Shit, the phone.
Cool! Amazing Toys.
It was rather funny... I'd wait about 5 minutes after I noticed we were down, and call the ISP up.
The tech guy got on the phone, and I told him they were having a problem.
He was so clueless, the conversation on his end went something like this:
"We are? Oh... wow... I don't think so... Err.. I can ping yahoo.com just fine... You sure? "
It was always the same tech support guy which led me to believe that they only had the one.
The day Microsoft creates a product that doesn't suck, it will be known as the Microsoft Vaccuum Cleaner!
Probably the most challenging type of product to perform technical support on is a product where the source code is delivered. In my company we've had both good and bad experiences:
Good Experience: Stingray. My colleague once said in a team meeting that Stingray hadn't answered one of her questions she had sent them about a day ago. She wasn't worried though. She said that when they don't answer immediately, they had found a problem and would deliver a fix in a couple of days. Otherwise we often get same day response, despite the fact that the time difference between us and them is 7 hours, and despite the fact that they've already released a newer version of the software to which we haven't yet upgraded.
Bad Experience: Dundas. We once bought a product from them called Hyperview (within their Goldrush packet). First problem was their immoral (and in many countries and states illegal) sales strategy of saying only x left, not decrementing the number when a customer bought and then setting it back to 250 three or four times. Second problem was that they had a section on their website which said in effect: "Tech support? Our tech support is great!! You don't want some small pissant company doing this for you." And then in fine print somewhere unrelated to tech support mentioning that a tech support contract wasn't included in the product but you could call sales if you wanted to buy a tech support contract in addition to the product. That far we got before buying the product. But then we bought the product, and called about that tech support contract only to discover that they don't offer one at all, ever with that product -- except as an actual consulting contract or on a per incident basis ($100-$150 a pop). And when I found a problem with their software (when compiling with 1-bit alignment) and the solution for it and sent it to them, I got a sarcastic thank you note and it didn't even get entered in their on-line FAQ for the product. Needless to say I didn't bother sending them the fix for their Unicode problems, or mention all of their hardcoded language-specific resource strings to them.
Stingray and Dundas have a lot of overlapping product offerings. My company at least has decided to stick with Stingray where they have the option, pretty much regardless of any price tag (or even to some degree feature set) differences.
Disclaimer: I don't work for either of these companies. I'm just trying to reward a company that has helped me out, and harm a company that through its dishonest marketing and poor customer support has made my life hell for the last year and a half.
I'm not sure I agree about HP providing good support. I had a 4100C also, and when they told me that the chipset in my USB controller card didn't work, I asked for an upgrade. They said they couldn't do that, I should just go out and look for another USB card with an OPTi chipset or some such nonsense. Why should I have to buy a $40 card when it's a problem with HP's scanner?
Their method of obtaining support was difficult. Forget calling. THey have e-mail forums which, depending on the product line, might be frequented by postings from an HP tech support person. If you're ever thinking of buying an HP printer/scanner/computer, read some of these forums first. My aunt has a Pavilion laptop, apparently there were some BIOS upgrades that turned it into an Omnibook accidently which in some cases would turn the laptop into a paperweight.
After a couple of these experiences, my conditioned response is to avoid HP. So maybe that's another area of improvement... consistency. Why does Sivar get an upgrade to a 6100Cse scanner and I have to go change my hardware?
First:
(Polically correct statment)
Tech support people should fluently speak the language of the country they service.
(Outright rant)
Tech support people shoule #%^!#^@$@ speak ENGLISH!!!! I shouldn't have to say "Excuse me" or "Could you say that again?" or "What?" 10,000 times during a support call.
Second:
Would it be too much to ask for companies to train their tech support people on their products?
"...the shortest distance between two points may be straight line, but it is by no means the most interesting."
The other problem with customer support is caring.
AT&T Broadband knows they are usually the only game in town, so they don't have to care about the customer.
A little caring would be very nice.
You provide an Internet service...why not care about the service you provide?
Your customers will be greatful for that.
"...the shortest distance between two points may be straight line, but it is by no means the most interesting."
I don't want to press '4' to speak to a customer service representative. I just want hardware labelled completely, precisely, and plainly. I want to know who really manufactured the item. I want to know the complete and succinct list of features on the item I bought. After that, I want the URL of a site that has a complete, meaningful, and well-organized PDF documentation. The time I can spend getting and reading that document will most often lead me to a solution or workable conclusion more quickly than time on the phone.
- Sig this!
He then said, and I quote:
I was disappointed that they wouldn't just ship me a new drive. I called them on Monday and by Tuesday morning I had a pre-paid laptop shipping box in my hands. I packed up the laptop and sent it out. They received it on Wednesday morning, fixed it (which I could monitor on the website) and I had it back in my hands on Thursday.
Based on what I know from other people's experience, this is pretty darn quick.
--- Jason Olshefsky
Karma: Poser (mostly affected by adding this line long after everyone else did)
Then return all of your products and don't ever buy from that company again. It's as simple as that. Each and every manufacturer that treats you unfairly should be avoided in the future. At some point, they'll all screw you and you won't be buying any equipment that you don't understand, and everyone will be happy. As a former Tech Support Rep, it really pisses me off that people complain about this shit. Really, now people, if you don't want to understand the technology, you are never going to be able to use it to it's fullest potential. It all goes back to the well know "Magic Box" problem. "If you think of your as a magical box that will do whatever you want/need it to do for you, without any effort, knowledge or study on your part, you don't deserve to own ." This discussion will go away when the general public (that vile, despicable mob of generally sane individuals who lose all redeeming quality when they walk into a computer store) finally grows up and realizes that the "I don't have to understand it, I'm paying you to do my understanding for me" attitude doesn't work with this stuff.
Take your car to Jiffy lube, you deserve it if they put the wrong kind of oil/filter in. You could have avoided the problem by doing your own oil change or at least learning enough about the car to watch them and know whether the grease monkey in the pit is doing stuff right. Stop bitching and take some personal responsibility for your own shortcomings.
The company that I work for probably has the worst tech support in the industry. I get several calls a day from them because they can't figure out how to fix the customer's problems. 90% of the time it's an issue that is either trivial, or one that I have explained to them numerous times (it's only 4 guys, so I can quite easily walk the whole team through an issue). I always wondered why can't ever remember how to fix very simple problems, especially when they come through several times a week. Then I found out that they don't even use the software they have installed to keep track of phone calls! They have absolutely no record of who's called, when they got calls, and what the problems were! Furthermore, out customer base has very little choice in software, so we have no real incentive to give good support because they probably won't return the software anyway. While most people realize that this means they will avoid us in the future, it seems to me like we simply ignore the customer because we already have their money. Sad, sad, world.
I worked for a computer company for three years. I cannot say what company (moo), but I can tell you what is was like. We were constantly being told that we were an expense to the company, while sales people were being given luxury vacations and other things for sales volumes. About 20% of a class of new technicians made it past their first year - most burned out by then. Come the fourth quarter if profits were not where they should be, there would be layoffs. To maximize the bottom line, the techs making the most money were usually the ones let go. Then in January, new technicians were hired and trained. That is why tech support was at it's worst right after the big Christmas rush.
Mod up this guy as a TROLL
"Be kind, courteous and respectful of the tech support person with whom you are dealing."
Just to give an example where this is really evident due to industry...
I work as T1/2 tech support for a two-industry software company. We have two teams for technical support, each dedicated to one of the two divisions.
On the one (my) side, the clients are surprisingly easy to get along with. A lot of times, it's the same client calling again and again over the months; some actually need the help that much, but others do it for clarification and verification of new rules government commissions have lain down, etc. 95% of the time, it's a very friendly, first name basis; or if it's not first name, it's a very easy call socially, as they're polite and thorough in explaining the problem, patient while you fix/investigate, and appreciative of the help and work. Our surveys on performance constantly return positive compliments on the quality of the support we give, which is due in good measure to the quality of the clients we have.
The other side is, unfortunately, a turnaround. More often than not, they get clients that are irate due to lack of understanding or interest, and the frustration builds on the TechSup side in attempting to, in good nature, repair a problem for them that they may themselves have caused. Training in that department becomes a struggle to tell the client what they NEED to know while they banter about their time and only listen to what they think they WANT to know.
It's a matter of Type A or Type B in this case; one side of clients takes the problems personally and vindictively, the other side sees them as hurtles they can always come to us to help them overcome. One side sees Support as the problem; the other side recognizes them as part of the solution.
As soon as I hear this:
"Well sir, I can certainly understand your frustration..."
I ask for their name, badge number, and supervisor
Worst tech support known to man:
Gateway, Dell, Bellsouth (DSL)
You set aside a certain reasonable number of minutes a month for customer support (say 5-10) for each customer or a yearly amount. Those minutes are free, after that they pay a surcharge. This way you give reasonable support that the majority of customers deserve but the clueless minority who are problem customers pay extra to cover the cost of supporting them.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
I don't think it is vain to expect positive feedback for good work. After all, you certainly get negative feedback for poor work.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
I'd say the real problem is your awful grammar and spelling.
Hilarious tech-support read:
http://chroniclesofgeorge.nanc.com/
A person can really only keep proficient/current a small number of OS/Hardware combinations. Tell me how much you *really* know about CAT5/3? Can you recite the specification from memory? How many turns per inch?
If you really had rock-solid knowledge of half of the technologies that you claim to know then wouldn't have to work in support ever again.
I disagree with the opinion that tech support probs are the fault of the consumer. Yes, the customer is looking at price. But most new computer shoppers are clueless as to the amount of help their new toy will require. Most people are used to a world where appliances (i.e. stereo, tv set, etc.) get plugged in and you dont have to think about them again for a decade. Computers are marketed to beginners.(It's so easy, anyone can do it!) They ship with NO MANUAL and then we IT folks are surprised when they ask for help. The industry needs to stop marketing to beginners or include a good manual and expect phone calls for help.
Also, please stop calling these people idiots. They have thier areas of expertise, I'm sure. I'm not stupid but I am clueless when it comes to getting my car worked on. That doesn't make me an idiot.
In a past life, I worked as a phone tech at Dell. Looking out at the 400+ techs around me, there was definitely a *large* disparity in technical skill, uptake, and general troubleshooting process. For those looking to receive quality support, my main recommendation is to act like a decent human being when you call, instead of an arrogant jerk. It's very rare that a technician actually enjoys working on the phone, and it's even doubly rare for the strong techs that know they could be doing more complicated work. The job is not fun. The pay is miserable. A little bit of politeness will get you a long way, and if you get a tech on the phone that obviously doesn't have a clue, just hang up and call back -- it's best for all involved parties. For the technicians out there still on the phones, carry with yourself the two rules I was once taught: 1) Hey, I still get paid. 2) When I go home, *my* computer works.
i work 'tech support' for the 3rd largest cable internet service provider. we have the most sophisticated phone queue monitoring system available. last year our queue exceeded 5 minutes on hold less than 6% of the time (the entire year!). our tech staff is highly trained, and well paid. we have the ability to on-site technicians, and manage over 100 individual markets in the US.
the problem is not the support, it's the users. they aren't satisfied, because they don't understand why we can't help them in many cases. people call for printer support, application support, or support when they don't even use our products. they call with early pentium computers, using windows 98, with a USB-NIC, a freeware firewall installed, and more software loaded on startup then i even use. they are rude, and uncooperative...or they want something for free. most of them seem to think we're here to teach them how to use their equipment. customer satisfaction has gone down because the consumers have become lazier, and in many cases it seems less intelligent. over the past 5 years i've watched the curve of user intelligence slip more and more, while we as a call center get better and better.
in my opinion, if you want better support for your purchase, do your research before you buy it. make sure it will do what you want it to do, and make sure you're willing to pay the price for the product. don't expect us to take a loss because you made a mistake.
the odometer lives!
I used to do tech support for a domain registrar that moved its support department from the IT side to the Sales/Marketing side. After years of telling us that "TSRs people don't do sales, tell the customers to order online", Sales decided that TSRs do do sales, but didn't bother to give us any sales software (or real sales training). If we convinced a customer to buy a .biz domain, we had to log onto the customer site and use the customer's password to order it for them.
Then, a month later, the company started firing TSRs who didn't meet a sales quota that they never told the TSRs they had. Bastards.
(For the record, I'm not bitter. I'm consumed with hate and anger. My therapist says there's a difference.)
Proud to be / Smiley-free / Since Nineteen / Ninety-Three
Last summer, I signed up for DSL. After about 2 weeks, I got the self-installation package, attempted to install the DSL modem, and couldn't get it to work. I called tech support, and after waiting about 20-30 minutes, finally talked to real person. We went thru a few things, and discovered that the modem was bad. The tech then assured me that a replacement modem would be sent out, and I should get it within a few days.
After about a week, the replacement modem hadn't shown up, so I called back. Waited anotehr 20-30 minutes to talk to someone. They had no record of my initial call, but assured me that a new modem would be in my hand in a few days. Fine...we'll see.
After a few days, I call back to sheck on the status. Again, no record of a modem being sent out. I think I got very angry with the tech then. I ended up talking to a manager, who personally sent out a replacement modem.
A few days later, the modem shows up....a few days after that, another one tried to show up (UPS, and we weren't there to receive it). Installed the new modem, and everything seems to work fine (other than their driver suck!).
Second part of the story: the modem was $150 with a $150 rebate (which is why we showed up). We filled out the paperwork and sent it in, expecting a check in a few weeks. After about 3 months, I get concerned. No check. So I call tech support, who forewards me to sales, who tell me that they've outsourced their rebates to a "gift card" company in NY, and I'll have to call them.
Fine, I call this company, and cant get a hold of anyone. I keep getting kicked in voicemail, and because the mailbox is full, the system hangs up on me (this is customer service?). Over the course of a week, I call about 6 times, finally get hold of a rep. They check their records, and cant understand why I haven't got my gift card, but they'll send a new one out right away (gee, I think I've heard this before...)
After 2 week, no card. So I call back. Same problem as before, and it takes about 3 calls to get to a real person. Still no idea why I haven't gotten my card, but the only thing they can do is send another one. Fine.
This goes round and round for about 2 months. I've now had my DSL for almost 6 months, but still haven't gotten my rebate.
Finally, I got fed up, and call. I argue with the rep and finally talk to a manager. She ASSURES me that a replacement card is getting sent out, and I should have it in 2 weeks (about a week after Christmas, at this point). I heard this song-and-dance before, but there isn't much I could do...
After 6 months of waiting, and 3 months of beating my head against the wall trying to get a replacement card, the card finally arrives in January. Great! Resolution at last. But then, in the first part of February, we get a CHECK (not a gift card, but a check from the company). It's for $150, but doesn't come with any other paperwork, so we have no idea why we got it (since we'd already used the gift card).
Guess who deposited the check and didn't say a word?
Guess who's not renewing his DSL account unless they clean up their tech support?
-Ed
Ed Wedig
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