 Many of our customers have complained about the support they receive
from the vendors of their computers and add-on programs for those computers. Daily, we get calls from the customers of other ISPs asking us for assistance, because we have no voice menus and actually answer the phone. (Imagine that!)
According to this
article and this
article
(and many others) customer phone support is getting worse industry wide.
Why?
Part of it is the marketplace itself.
There are a number of reasons, but here are some highlights:
Companies already have your money by the time you call for support. Therefore all support is a cost. To maximize profit they need to minimize cost, so they construct mazes of phone menus and hire as few support people as possible creating long waiting queues of callers. They also hire the cheapest people possible for the support lines and reward them to keep the calls as short as possible, regardless of whether your problem is solved. These companies actually hope that you'll give up, because if you do they save money.
Computers are complex, but they have been marketed as simple. Next to a pet a computer is probably the most complex item you own. When something goes wrong with your automobile, do you call up techincal support get marched through adjusting the fuel injection?
Of course not. Computers are even more complicated than cars, but somehow you are supposed to repair them yourself via instructions read to you remotely off a screen over the phone, by someone who generally does not know what is wrong or how to fix it.
The products sold are far from perfect.
Software companies only make money when they sell software. From their point of view, it is better to release buggy software and get customers money than it is to wait and release fully tested working software. This locks the customer to their software and prempts any competitors that enter the market on the realization that it is better to sell buggy stuff that doesn't work first, than it is to sell working software later. The company that gets there first collects the most customer money and locks those customers to it. It can then promise to fix the problems later or usually just ignore them publically and create a service pack later. This makes customers think that the problems are only with their systems.
Hardware companies are also guilty of this one, but less often, because they never can just point you at a patch on the web. A software company hopes that a later patch can rectify an early release.
Most phone support personel are unqualified. In order to reduce supports costs to a minimum unqualified personel are hired that do little more than listen for keywords from a caller and read scripts off a computer screen. The script being read does not even apply to the real problem in many cases.
Phone support personel are paid based on how many calls they can handle per shift. It does not matter if your problem is solved, only how quickly they can pass you on to someone else or otherwise close the support incident. If you hear "We don't support that!", you've just been closed. The objective is to go onto the next call *NOT* to solve your problem! They will lie to you about the solution to your problem to close the call. They are paid to complete calls. That is their primary and sometimes only metric.
Even under the best of circumstances where the support person knows what their doing, the odds of success are long. Think about it. What are the chances that you could perform a successful a medical procedure from diagnosis through surgery by being directed over the phone?
Companies use their software to steal each others customers. Some software, like Quicken, AOL, Realplayer, Microsoft Media Player and many anti-virus packages will alter core system services so that their software will control or alter resources on your computer so that they can eliminate other software. This can cause many problems for the user and the companies do this on purpose.
Users don't read manuals. If a manual is provided the consumer won't read it. They'll call first. There is also a correllary to this. Companies have learned that it is better to provide products without manuals or with very thin manuals, because this promotes the view that the product is simple. Many times this is not true, but again the company already has your money by the time you figure that out.
The "combinations problem." There is no way for any company to predict all the different possible combinations of software packages and hardware may be placed on a given computer. Given that many of these products alter core portions of the computer operating system, the combinations of components can cause everything from annoying glitches to complete system failure. Under these circumstances, it is very difficult to determine even who of the many vendors should be called. These are the situations where reformatting the hard drive and re-installing everything may be the only way to get things working again.
There are solutions to many of these problems, but they require that the consumer carefully pick their vendors. If you want good support, pick vendors who you can visit face-to-face and create a relationship with. Buy your computer from a local "white box" manufacturer who has been around for at least 5 years, where you can take the system if you have a problem. Avoid national Brands that pack their systems with proprietary components that cannot be serviced locally: Dell, Compaq, Gateway, HP, IBM, etc.
Microsoft, Apple and the other computer and operating system makers are a big part of the problem, because they can only continue to reap ongoing upgrade fees by keeping their systems internally secret. This makes it very difficult for anyone outside those organizations (including the vendors who write software for those platforms) to determine what to do when a problem is encountered. This is why businesses who need reliable systems are moving toward 'open source' solutions like Linux. Linux is fully open, there are no secrets. Any qualified technician can alter, repair or enhance an Open System. Much like plumbers, accountants and lawyers can work in their respective specialities. This is not true of closed systems. Open systems also don't force customers to upgrade.
This is also why A-Street runs only on 'Open Source' systems for all critical services.
At A-Street, we won't fix other vendor problems as part of your service. But we will make sure you can connect and use our internet services. We also can't hide. We have a local retail prescence. You can meet us face-to-face. We are like a gas station with service bays. We'll fix problems associated with the "fuel" (access) we sell you and we can also work on your vehicle (computer) if you bring it in. It's much easier to diagnois and repair a problem when the device with that problem can be physically examined and tested, so in many cases we will recommend that you bring your system in rather than waste your time going through the many possibilities on the phone.
A-Street also provides open source server solutions for businesses that need to securely connect their offices and employees to the internet. We support these systems remotely thus they require very little onsite support, saving significant time and money over standard (vendor barely supported) closed systems.
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