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Less Than Worthless Reply From Take 2 Interactive

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tinjaw:
[attachthumb=#1][/attachthumb]

Ralf Maximus:
My initial take: not evil, just stupid.  Typical customer support fuster-cluck overseen by ill-trained, low-pay, front-line "support" techs.  Chances are your real issue never ran the gauntlet to somebody with any real power to fix anything.

Like that makes you feel any better...

tomos:
I've had that experience with apps that actually have very good support -
except I didnt have to wait 10 days of course  :)

They look at the first line of your mail & presume you havent a clue, dont read any further & send a reply requesting for more info.

Next time I contact any support I'm going to start off by saying
Attatched is x, y, & z logfile or whatever,
I KNOW that § is an option BUT ß didnt work for me - whats the problem -

I guess most of them are under pressure be it cause they small operations, or
big operations with stupid management & underpaid/unhappy(probably) staff who
dont give a toss more often than not cause their management doesnt either...

tinjaw:
I have no sympathy for technical support/customer service. I was a Senior Developer Support Engineer for Borland for many years. Yes, customers are jerks. Yes, customers are stupid. Yes, most answers are RTFM. However, it is your job to put on the fake smile and honestly try to assist the customer.

Let me throw a word of advice out there for anybody that might stumble upon this thread via a search engine.

The sales and marketing divisions of companies spend millions of dollars trying to get two seconds of the customer's time. They try advertising, mailing lists, etc. When a customer contacts a company with a problem, you have a genuine opportunity that absolutely should not be passed up. You have somebody who has identified themself as a customer with a bad feeling about your company or product - and we all know that unhappy customers are more likely to speak up in public than happy customers - and (this is the key) you have been provided an opportunity to change their opinion about your company or product. Most unhappy customers will just rip your company or product and you will never even know who they are or that they did you harm. It is your job to turn their poor opinion of the company/product around and make them an advocate for your company.

But when you are a support rep, that it is your job. They know what they are getting into. They chose to interact with the customer on behalf of the company. So, yes, it is a pretty sucky job most of the time, and even I had my bad moments/days/replies/postings/calls/etc., but it is the job of the seniors/mentors to monitor and watch for those and help the representative improve.

As for this particular posting of mine, it wasn't anything in particular other than I knew, going into this, that I was probably not going to get any helpful advice, based on dozens of contacts with support people in the past. It was meant to be more of a "look, the industry as a whole still sucks" posting, than anything in particular. The only hope I had was that, at best, multiple people had the same issue and so they had found an answer but hadn't posted it online yet, and if not, I would be adding a +1 to help the issue onto tech support's radar.

And last, a company's rules/policies/procedures are a huge part of customer support/service. You can have excellent people in those roles, but if you don't provide them with the proper tools, and atmosphere, to do their job well, they can't. A support department is a multiplier that can be positive, and raise the level of support a customer receives, or it can be a negative, driving down even your best workers.

KenR:
I have no sympathy for technical support/customer service. I was a Senior Developer Support Engineer for Borland for many years. Yes, customers are jerks. Yes, customers are stupid. Yes, most answers are RTFM. However, it is your job to put on the fake smile and honestly try to assist the customer.

Let me throw a word of advice out there for anybody that might stumble upon this thread via a search engine.

The sales and marketing divisions of companies spend millions of dollars trying to get two seconds of the customer's time. They try advertising, mailing lists, etc. When a customer contacts a company with a problem, you have a genuine opportunity that absolutely should not be passed up. You have somebody who has identified themself as a customer with a bad feeling about your company or product - and we all know that unhappy customers are more likely to speak up in public than happy customers - and (this is the key) you have been provided an opportunity to change their opinion about your company or product. Most unhappy customers will just rip your company or product and you will never even know who they are or that they did you harm. It is your job to turn their poor opinion of the company/product around and make them an advocate for your company.

But when you are a support rep, that it is your job. They know what they are getting into. They chose to interact with the customer on behalf of the company. So, yes, it is a pretty sucky job most of the time, and even I had my bad moments/days/replies/postings/calls/etc., but it is the job of the seniors/mentors to monitor and watch for those and help the representative improve.

As for this particular posting of mine, it wasn't anything in particular other than I knew, going into this, that I was probably not going to get any helpful advice, based on dozens of contacts with support people in the past. It was meant to be more of a "look, the industry as a whole still sucks" posting, than anything in particular. The only hope I had was that, at best, multiple people had the same issue and so they had found an answer put hadn't posted it online yet, and if not, I would be adding a +1 to help the issue onto tech support's radar.

And last, a company's rules/policies/procedures are a huge part of customer support/service. You can have excellent people in those roles, but if you don't provide them with the proper tools, and atmosphere, to do their job well, they can't. A support department is a multiplier that can be positive, and raise the level of support a customer receives, or it can be a negative, driving down even your best workers.
-tinjaw (October 15, 2007, 10:34 AM)
--- End quote ---

Interesting and thoughtful (as usual) post TinJaw.

Ken

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