Dealing with Tech Support

Furthering my articles on tech support; If you have ever called a tech support line, I’m sure you been frustrated to no end. Just getting to a live person seems to be a secret. You have to learn to navigate silicone sally’s virtual menus. Sounds like an adult movie title, ok, ok - don’t get excited. You can’t avoid the stress though. Press one for sales, 2 for support, 3 for support in English, then you’re in the support menu… press one for desktops, 2 for laptops, 3 for both…

If you are a wearing a clown suit; press 4, if you are not, press 5. You get the picture.

Eventually, you’ll get a live person.

• Step 1 – Did you write down all those menu choices you made to get here? Better do it now. You’re going to need to call back, and you might as well save yourself some time. By no fault of the technician on the other end (mostly)

I have been known to – accidentally - hang up on some callers. Purely by accident… cough.. cough..You will either be cut off, or put on hold, transferred and put in another queue.

• Step 2 – remain calm, you’re going to be on the phone for a while. If you have a cordless phone, switch to a corded phone. If you have a headset phone, use it. Go get a coffee, or a drink and relax.
• Step 3 – capture as much pertinent information as you can possible comprehend. Be ready for the technical support you are calling to receive! The more information you can offer, the better your chances of a successful resolution.

You’re probably wondering why I used the word ‘chances’ in regards to a tech support call? As if it were a contest? Well it is like a contest, sort of. The prize is you get your problem resolved, quickly and properly the first time.

If you tell the technician “My internet doesn’t work” that doesn’t help him at all. Try going to your mechanic and saying “My car makes a noise” see his response. Now, try that over the phone, where the technician can’t see anything. My point is he is trying to help you, so help him by getting as many details as you can.

• Step 4 – do some research beforehand. If you see an error message, try searching google for it. Use the exact phrasing and put that in your google search. You may find a little more information to help troubleshoot the problem – you might even fix it yourself.

Technician’s have a difficult enough time dealing with the different possibilities and configurations of computer hardware and software. To make matters worse, they can’t see your screen, so they are working off experience and memory. There are some remote support utilities to enable them to access and control your computer, but that in itself requires technical support to get working.

The possibilities of software and hardware problems are endless, so in gathering information to help troubleshoot the cause, you can help in the solution. One important consideration is to only capture the relevant information of an error message. Some error messages are paragraph upon paragraph. The technician doesn’t need to know or hear you repeat that information back to him. Give them the summary. If there is a specific mention to a file name, or a location, relay that information.

• Keep your cool and remain polite! Technicians are people too and a polite and friendly voice will do wonders to getting the problem resolved in a manner that everyone will enjoy.

How eager do you think the technician is to help you if you’re angry with him? Did he actually cause the problem? Don’t shoot the messenger! If you’re angry and confrontational, you’ll get nowhere. Not only in tech support, but pretty much anywhere.

Think of the technician’s role. He just got off the phone with someone just like you – frustrated, in a hurry, and completely unaware that they themselves most likely caused the problem in the first place. Although that may not be a completely accurate statement all of the time, it’s pretty true MOST of the time. A good technician will fix the problem without laying blame, or complaining. A good technician is of course hard to find.

To be continued…

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Consumers vs. Technicians (Part 2)

We’ve all had to call technical support at one time or another. We’ve all had good and bad experiences with them. Looking in from the consumer’s perspective, we have complaints abounding. Most complaints can be summed up:

-          The technician had poor people skills and didn’t care about me or my problem

-          The technician had poor language skills or spoke too quickly to understand

-          The technician had poor technical skills, and didn’t know anything

Imagine that? A technician that doesn’t know it all! In my IBM days, it was a common saying that if you could walk and chew gum, and you were polite, they could train you to fix computers. Oh, how sadly untrue!

And for the record – it’s the other way around! If you can fix computers, we can teach you to walk and chew gum – virtual gum, and walking through a cyber-world. - Just kidding.

I’ll start out with some scenario from the Consumer’s Perspective, then I’ll give the Technician’s Perspective.

Consumer Scenarios

1) You’re an Idiot, and we know everything.

As the customer, we’ve become familiar with that drab and monotone voice on the other end of the phone. They condescend you in every word and even mock you! You can easily imagine the tech’s face and actions akin to “whatever” I’ll bet you’ve often felt like they put you on hold to get their colleagues to listen in, and have a comedy central riot at your expense. Or worse yet, they put you on speakerphone. All the while, claiming to be getting their 2^nd level support team involved. As for 2^nd level support, he’s most likely the guy in the next workstation pretending to be the go-to-guy. Oh the tricks and webs we weave…

2) Passing The Buck

You’re on the phone for an hour, and the problem still exists. The technician told you to download the drivers and call back – your problem that you could access the internet. How can you download the drivers without an Internet connection?

3) He said, She said

You have a computer, a modem, a router and a VOIP phone. The phone doesn’t work, so who do you call? The ISP says, it’s not their problem and al is working fine with the lines in your house. How does he know, did he come out and check them? Taking his advice, you call the VOIP provider. They say it’s your ISP’s problem. You call back the ISP and relay the information, although you have not been given any reason, or information to convey, you just say – it’s your problem. ISP says it’s your computer.

The point? Well, the technician is basically trying to get rid of the idiot on the line. Pass the buck, find a place to lay blame, somewhere that the consumer can’t refute. Somewhere in techno-babble land. The customer won’t know what hit him!

4) Stats baby Stats!

Call Centres run on statistics. Plain and simple. More calls in less time, be polite so that the company look and sounds professional and that they care about you. Etiquette over technical abilities. Heaven forbid – a likeable technician? Although rare, they do exist, and I’ve personally been told this thousands of times. It is the technician’s job to take inbound calls, complete them as quickly as possible. Politely and courteously. If a call goes beyond the average talk time of say 3 minutes, it starts to impact his personal stats. Lower talk times are better, and he who handles more calls looks better to management.

Although technical abilities are nice to have, a good talker can get you on the line, confuse you and get you off the line without fixing anything. It should work - is the term that technicians use to get rid of you. They have either reached their personal limits of technical abilities, they’ve been on the call too long, their supervisor is waving his arms, or pointing at his watch, or the tech just doesn’t care any more. 

5) Where am I calling for support anyways?

You may have noticed the trend in the last decade where technical support is outsourced overseas. My opinion of course, nevertheless – the reason for this trend is as I stated above. If you can walk and talk politely, we can train you to take technical calls. There are countries overseas with exceptional educational systems and language diversities. The technical infrastructure can be brought to these countries, and the training can be scripted. North American IT companies have already laid the foundations for tech support protocols, procedures, flow charts and problem resolution tools. These can be converted into online training and resources. Call centres simply need the manpower to field the calls, and use the problem resolution tools to fix the problems. Technician’s technical troubleshooting abilities will come later. This is not the case now, however it was 10 years ago. Lets face it, it’s cheaper for manpower, foreign governments welcome big business, and will help with incentives, training, location, land, resources, and of course tax breaks. If you wonder why the technician is overseas – now you know.

North American workers want too much, benefits, holidays, regular raises, perks, benefits and so on and so no. I should know, I am one too.

Overseas workers, well it’s a completely different ball game. It’s Cricket actually.

Technician Scenarios

Ok, lets start by first getting the usual stories out of the way.
PEBKAC – problem exists between keyboard and chair
ID 10T Error – spell it out - id10t, coffee holders, why is there 2 power buttons, my computer isn’t working…let me get a flashlight to see why etc.

1)      If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.

How many calls have you taken in a case like this. The customer says, well I was looking through my programs and uninstalled everything I didn’t need. You of course roll your eyes, and wonder where this is going. Of course under your breath, you have to ask why?

If your car is working fine, do you start removing parts? So, now the caller wants you to help them repair everything. Of course this can go several ways – is the computer even in warranty, is it your company’s product, what exactly is wrong with it and so on.

It takes a special gift to be able to repair something without seeing it. Think about that next time you need technical support.

2)      Your error messages are unique

Windows is known for some of the most ridiculous and useless error messages (sorry to all the programmers out there) but it’s true. Fatal error, Fatal exception, Illegal Operation and so on. SWAT or the ETF should be here any minute. Callers have no idea what they are or how to fix them, so they call for support. Of course they have to read every single word of the error message, or worse yet, the terms and conditions of a EULA. ( Tip: stop them before they start, politely say no need to read the entire message.) The consumer feels that they are helping you, and the company make a better product, and you NEED to know this information.

3)      Why do I have to give you my information?

Ever had a customer raise a fuss about giving their information, or even the machine information? Why is that, got something to hide? They don’t realize that everything needs to be tracked in the call centre’s tools and utilities. The information is used to call up history, case numbers, and previous calls. Technicians could care less about your personal information. They want to see the technical details to get the problem fixed.

4)      I want your name and extension

Yeah right, you bought a laptop computer and that earns you the right to call me whenever you need? I’ve purchased cars and homes with not even an extension number. I’m not referring to security and Information privacy, but rather customer expectations.

As far as privacy and security concerns go, each country is different of course. In Canada where I live, we are not required to give first and last names. As long as you can give the customer a way to refer to your case, or to you with an alias, or a employee number or a reference number, that is good enough. I’ve actually had customers look me up in the phonebook and call me at home. This was when I first started in technical support at IBM. You learn real quick after that happens!

5)      Salesman will say anything to close the deal!

The customer calls to say this computer was promised to have xray vision! More often than not, big box store salesman work on commission. They need the money just as much as you. Their employers don’t want to pay for product training and considering how quickly technology changes, it’s next to impossible to keep up. Sales staff often have to learn products on their own time. They may have made an honest mistake, or did what they had to - to get the deal done. Of course this leave the customer with false information and you are a representative of the company tat makes these products – whether you like it or not. Fix the problem, make it do what was promised or bear the wrath of the misinformed customer. Your only recourse is tell the truth and set the record straight, or escalate to Customer Care. Of course, you get dinged for the escalation, or for telling the customer their laptop can’t make ice cubes.

6)      You know everything about software

The customer complains that his computer won’t synch with his digital camera, or his home design software doesn’t work. Of course it’s your fault. You’re supposed to know about these things. The customer has no idea that there are support limitations. If it connects to your product, you have to support it. Customer Entitlement is not clearly defined. Sorry marketing and sales teams, this falls on you. As a technician, you’d love to say, does the computer turn on and operate properly? Thank you for calling our company, have a nice day – but you can’t. You have to at least try to offer some sort of assistance – without knowing a thing about the product. Like a Honda mechanic working on a photocopier.

Finally, Some funny (or stupid) questions
Can’t you just loom at my computer from there and fix it?
Can I see if my kids have been surfing adult sites?
Can you clean my computer of where I’ve been and my cookies?
Why do I have to pay for support, MSN comes with windows
Why don’t I have Microsoft word, it’s part of windows
My casino software stopped working
My stock market programs are not working
My kids did this and broke something
I get this error message, I don’t remember what it says, can you fix it?
My computer won’t power on
My monitor won’t show anything, it just blinks, or has no green light
Smoke is coming from my monitor, what should I do
I spilled coffee on my laptop and it started to smoke, is it ok?
Can I have your number so I can call you back?
I demand to speak with your supervisor, I want a new computer
If you don’t fix it now, I want a replacement
What do you mean not supported? It came with the computer

Just look at yahoo’s new answers for some of the typical questions. You’ll be sure to get a chuckle!

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Consumers vs. Technicians (part 1)

We’ve all had to call technical support at one time or another. We’ve all had good and bad experiences with them. Looking in from the consumer’s perspective, we have complaints abounding. Most complaints can be summed up:

      -          The technician had poor people skills and didn’t care about me or my problem.
-          The technician had poor language skills or spoke too quickly to understand,
-          Often, a common complaint is plain and simply - just poor technical skills.

Imagine that? A technician that doesn’t know it all! In my IBM days, it was a common saying that if you could walk and chew gum – but were polite, they could train you to fix computers. Oh, how sadly untrue!

And for the record – it’s the other way around! If you can fix computers, we can teach you to walk and chew gum – virtual gum, and walking through a cyber-world. - Just kidding.

As the customer, we’ve become familiar with that drab and monotone voice on the other end of the phone. They condescend you in every word and even mock you! You can easily imagine the tech’s face and actions akin to “whatever” I’ll bet you suspect that they put you on hold to get their colleagues to listen in, or worse yet, put you on speakerphone – while claiming to be getting their 2^nd level support team involved. And as for 2^nd level support, he’s most likely the guy in the next workstation pretending to be the go-to-guy.

In the end, you’re on the phone for an hour, and the problem still exists. The technician told you to download the drivers and call back – your problem that you could access the internet. How can you download the drivers? How about the reassuring “it should work” reply.

To be continued!

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Temp files? What are they good for?

Temporary files - or temp files - as they are commonly referred to, are everywhere. When you add software to your computer, change a setting, browse a webpage and create a document, a temporary file is created. Some are beneficial, most are a nuisance and take up precious hard drive space. What’s more, cleaning them is not so easy because they often reside in many different folders. It can be quite a task locating them and deleting them. Some of them are can even be operating system required files. Delete one of these and you’ll quickly learn the hard way that temporary files cannot haphazardly deleted with a fell swoop of the delete key. For the most part, yes they can be, and if they are needed by the operating system, they won’t easily be deleted.

Some say that temporary files are the droppings of bad software; when a developer forgets to include the instructions to clean out the temporary files. When a program is installed, or requires large amounts of data, they will often create a temporary file. These usually end with file extensions such as tmp, or a leading ~ tilde in the filename. Internet explorer and Microsoft Office utilize capitalized alphanumeric folder names to store temporary data. If you are working on a word document, a temporary version is opened as well until you save it.

Not all temporary files are bad though, you may often find log files that signify the process of an installation or an update to a piece of software. One example may be installing Microsoft Office, and then reinstalling it to add or remove a component. Office leaves temporary files that are used to aid users in modifications, upgrades, un-installations and so on. Microsoft is not the only software designer to use temporary files and you will find temporary files in Linux as well. Just as dust mites grow and multiply, so do temp files! The million dollar question – how do you get rid of them? There are some computer data-swiffer’s and electric broom’s to clean up the data-mites. If you care to use the 3^rd party route, then look here for some great cleanup utilities. If you are curious as to where to look for them, and what they look like, start off:

-          Your local user profile (c:\documents and settings\(your username)\local settings\temp

-          Same as above, but temporary internet files (easily cleaned by opening Internet Explorer, selecting Tools\Internet Options\Temporary Internet Files – delete

 

You may also locate more temp files in the following folders:

-          C:\temp

-          C:\windows\temp

-          C:\windows\system32\temp

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Windows and Ubuntu play nice (NTFS)

If you’re like me you have 5 computers. 1 running Vista, 2 running XP and 2 running Ubuntu (dual-boot with XP). Windows has by default used the NTFS for 2000, XP and Vista. You may have run into problems while trying to read & write on a NTFS mounted drive in Ubuntu. That’s normal because off the bat Ubuntu didn’t support NTFS. There were beta NTFS drivers but they weren’t a stable release. With the release of Feisty Fawn it’s quite easy to overcome this problem and access your windows partitions using stable NTFS drivers.

To do this you must:

• Enable the “universe repository”
• run this command (without the quotes) ” sudo apt-get install ntfs-config”

Enjoy,

Dr. J

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