rant about company help

rovingcowboy · Joined: Jan 26, 2003 Posts: 1279

okay heres one for you.

my sister got a belkin router.

its been on one computer for years.
she just got another computer given to her where it needed
a new hd. and OS. so she got xp pro cheap from college
and a new hd put them in then got a belkin adapter to connect
to her router.
she's been having trouble with the connection not working.
so she calls me and i try to help but i don't do networking. unless
with wires or cell phone cards. but we tried and had no luck.
she calls help at the belkin company service to try and find out what in
the world was going on with it, since they were both belkin items.
the punch line,

belkin told her to remove xp sp3 cause it was not compatible with their stuff. Shocked

all it took was her trying to connect a little longer so that she realized when she was typing that she was using the wrong password.

but yet belkin said xp sp3 was not com-pat.. with their stuff, now it don't take less then a dumb person to know that belkin would be out of business if that were true, but that help tech must not have been as smart as a dumb person. Wink

goretsky · Posted: Fri Jan 09, 2009 2:12 am Post subject:

Hello,

Many companies measure technical support staff productivity by volume and require them to "solve" X% of calls in Y minutes. Since continued employment is typically based on meeting or exceeding these goals, some technical support people will tell the customer to perform an action that they cannot do while on the phone in order to get them off the line, regardless of whether it may help solve the issue or not. If the problem persists, the customer will likely reach a different technician when they call back who may take them through the next Y minutes of troubleshooting an issue before leaving them with a complex operation, and the process repeats until the call is handled. The fact that it probably costs more to have someone call in four times for ten minute calls than to provide them with support over one thirty minute call is typically lost on management.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky
.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

rovingcowboy · Joined: Jan 26, 2003 Posts: 1279

thats true but that was not the case for the above, the guy should have known not to say something so stupid as that.

zlim · Joined: Mar 11, 2005 Posts: 2636

Tell your sister not to waste time calling tech support.

If I need help this is what i do:
1. google the problem and read solutions posted at forums
2. ask for help at one or two forums if I can't find a solution
3. email tech support
4. do a live chat (never a phone call) with tech support

I follow those steps in that order.

tbernstein · Joined: May 16, 2003 Posts: 1576 Location: London

She's lucky to even get tech support.
The usual system says something like;
Go to the website and search the FAQs.
You won't find what you need, but this will give you a link that says, say "Trouble shooting".
Clicking on that will give you a long list of problems, none of which are yours and most of which a six year old could have guessed.
At the bottom will be a link that says.
"Need extra help? Contact tech support"
You will click on this link, and it will take you to the FAQ page........

Evil or Very Mad

rovingcowboy · Joined: Jan 26, 2003 Posts: 1279

zlim · Joined: Mar 11, 2005 Posts: 2636

If she needs to contact the company, never call. You are on hold and then sometimes you get someone whose accent is hard to understand. It is easier to email or do a live chat session. You don't need chat software installed because I have none. A window pops up and you type then the tech types. At least you do not have the accent problem and the tech has time to go through the help manual without wasting phone time.

tbernstein · Joined: May 16, 2003 Posts: 1576 Location: London

I have to say, the one exception was Nintendo.
I did have to find an alternative number ( in the UK numbers that start 0870 are "national Call Rate" i.e. expensive and the company takes a cut - and of course Nintendo use one of these). Once I got through they sorted out the technical issues for me really well.
That being said, the main advice they gave me was to ignore the instructions in the online helpfile. Rolling Eyes

PhotoCarp · Joined: Sep 06, 2007 Posts: 109

rovingcowboy · Joined: Jan 26, 2003 Posts: 1279

well dumb would be typing in the wrong password and not remembering it or noticing it for along time.

stupid would be telling someone calling you for tech support that their windows computer is not compatible with your hardware items.

so does that clear up your being confused a little there photo carp? Cool

tbernstein · Joined: May 16, 2003 Posts: 1576 Location: London

Good tech support is systematic, even scripted, which can be irritating to the experienced user, but then we've all done dumb things, so maybe we need to accept that..
Poor tech support jumps from " I have a problem " to "not compatible with our system" or "reinstall Windows" as quickly as they can get away with.