Best and Worst customer supports
Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 12:18 am
Here i will start listing companies who have either very good customer support or very bad.
Good / Best
* Alfa Networks - http://www.alfa.com.tw/ - I really like their customer support, very fast and detailed replies, they don't seem to speak very good english, but they are able to manage it just fine. They even offered me support over TeamViewer, not many do that. They actually work towards solving the issue.
* TamoSoft - http://www.tamos.com - I contacted them about CommView, their response is fairly fast and detailed. I once reported a bug in CommView and few days later, in next release it was fixed. I haven't had much experience with them, but they reply fairly fast and are interested in solving the issue and help you figure stuff out.
* Elcomsoft - http://www.elcomsoft.com/ - maybe not the best, but i still consider it being good support. i contacted them about several things, mainly about EWSA and EDPR. Even tho im not a customer, they help quite a lot and try to fix the issues. This is the kind of behavior i expect from support. It doesn't matter that i am trial user or that i use cracked versions, what matters is that i take the time to report the problems so they can work them out and have more perfect tools.
* Kaspersky - http://www.kaspersky.com/ - again not the best, but good enough. I've had lot of arguements with them in past, but at least they take the time to explain and help. In past they listed almost all Luigi's tools as malware (aluigi.org) and i contacted them, asking why? because none of those tools are malware. They finally explained it is "riskware" that MAY cause damage to your pc, but is not malware ..etc. Fair enough .. i guess. But reason why its listed under best/good, is that there was this idiotic virus out there, that blocks out your windows and overlays a window saying that you have violated the law and that you have to pay in order to get your PC unlocked again. It looked quite "scary", with the police notice and all and had an account number where to send the money, for about 3-4 months it was undetectable, but finally one of my skype contacts got infected and it automatically sent this virus to everyone in her skype list (including me), i instantly knew it is virus, because only such viruses send over skype/msn ..etc. So i never opened it, instead i sent it to Kaspersky as potential virus. 24h later they released a database update with that virus listed as "ransom". 24h to list the virus and update database, quite impressive i have to say. This also includes the time it took them to read my email, it probably took less, i checked my pc about 20-25h later and once i updated the zonealarm anti-virus (it uses Kaspersky database), it was listed and detected.
Acceptable / Normal
* Hosting24 - hosting24.com - This is the hosting company we've been for about 3-4 years by now, they usually reply within 1-5 hours, but often their replies are very idiotic and they let some sales managers reply to technical questions and that is just unacceptable, however if you keep on pushing with the issue, they will sort it out eventually. This is why its in the middle, because customer has to work towards the solution of the issue, they just try to blame it on customer and get rid of the support tickets as fast as possible. but fast response time and cheap web hosting prices makes it up for it i guess.
Bad / Worst
* Skype - skype.com - First of, it took me over 30 minutes to find a fucking contact form on their site, it keeps forwarding and linking me and i kept on going in loops. I click on contact us and it takes me to some self search half-wiki shit ... then i put my question, it won't find answer and says contact us if you can't find what you looking for and there goes the loop again. very annoying.
They support is also quite slow, 1-7 days response, well its understandable cuz skype is big, but their replies are retarded. for past few months ive been trying to understand WHY skype secretly downloads the 30mb update even tho when updates are turned off, support keeps on telling me same crap without even reading what i write, they keep on saying turn off auto updates and that windows updates may also install skype updates, i don't even have windows updates, its completely taken out, yet it still first downloads the update and then asks if i want to update. They support doesn't work toward the issue, i don't think they even understand what i'm after. Year ago, i would have listed skype in normal section, but now its beyond bad, making it one of the worst.
* Microsoft - generally their products - Well first of, you can't even directly contact them, you can call their super expensive line and even in there, they pull your chain and just waste your time by not even trying to solve your issue, they just care how much money they make from your call.
* Acer - http://www.acer.com - Even tho their products seem to be quite good, at the moment i have 27'' IPS Monitor and small 10.1'' Netbook (acer aspire one d255e) from Acer and both are good, netbook gets bit too hot, but its ok, but support is almost non existing. I contacted them in past about something which i can't remember, but when i bought my netbook about 8 months ago, i contacted them about Bluetooth drivers on XP. They have about 4 different Bluetooth driver versions on their site, so i said that i have 32-bit windows XP professional and gave them the netbook model and asked "which driver do i need". simple question, right? they just have to tell me which one from their site is the driver that goes with that OS, instead they start asking me what country i'm from, where did i buy the netbook, what is MAC address of my netbook, what is serial number of my netbook, what is my phone number ...etc. WHAT THE FUCK ??? can't they fucking answer a simple question?! After about 10 emails, i still did not get closer to solving it. I asked WHY on earth they need any of that info, they say "so we can better forward you to your country support and make sure your netbook is compatible" .. DA FUCK??? my netbook uses US for everything, US drivers, US operating system, US keyboard layout .. and i only speak english, so how the fuck any of that info is relevant ? I made it very clear that i want to be dealing with US support only! they still keep asking me ... that shit pissed me off bad, this is why Acer is listed in one of the worst customer supports ever.
If you know any, list them here, but make sure to explain your decision, why do you say it is worst or best support.
Good / Best
* Alfa Networks - http://www.alfa.com.tw/ - I really like their customer support, very fast and detailed replies, they don't seem to speak very good english, but they are able to manage it just fine. They even offered me support over TeamViewer, not many do that. They actually work towards solving the issue.
* TamoSoft - http://www.tamos.com - I contacted them about CommView, their response is fairly fast and detailed. I once reported a bug in CommView and few days later, in next release it was fixed. I haven't had much experience with them, but they reply fairly fast and are interested in solving the issue and help you figure stuff out.
* Elcomsoft - http://www.elcomsoft.com/ - maybe not the best, but i still consider it being good support. i contacted them about several things, mainly about EWSA and EDPR. Even tho im not a customer, they help quite a lot and try to fix the issues. This is the kind of behavior i expect from support. It doesn't matter that i am trial user or that i use cracked versions, what matters is that i take the time to report the problems so they can work them out and have more perfect tools.
* Kaspersky - http://www.kaspersky.com/ - again not the best, but good enough. I've had lot of arguements with them in past, but at least they take the time to explain and help. In past they listed almost all Luigi's tools as malware (aluigi.org) and i contacted them, asking why? because none of those tools are malware. They finally explained it is "riskware" that MAY cause damage to your pc, but is not malware ..etc. Fair enough .. i guess. But reason why its listed under best/good, is that there was this idiotic virus out there, that blocks out your windows and overlays a window saying that you have violated the law and that you have to pay in order to get your PC unlocked again. It looked quite "scary", with the police notice and all and had an account number where to send the money, for about 3-4 months it was undetectable, but finally one of my skype contacts got infected and it automatically sent this virus to everyone in her skype list (including me), i instantly knew it is virus, because only such viruses send over skype/msn ..etc. So i never opened it, instead i sent it to Kaspersky as potential virus. 24h later they released a database update with that virus listed as "ransom". 24h to list the virus and update database, quite impressive i have to say. This also includes the time it took them to read my email, it probably took less, i checked my pc about 20-25h later and once i updated the zonealarm anti-virus (it uses Kaspersky database), it was listed and detected.
Acceptable / Normal
* Hosting24 - hosting24.com - This is the hosting company we've been for about 3-4 years by now, they usually reply within 1-5 hours, but often their replies are very idiotic and they let some sales managers reply to technical questions and that is just unacceptable, however if you keep on pushing with the issue, they will sort it out eventually. This is why its in the middle, because customer has to work towards the solution of the issue, they just try to blame it on customer and get rid of the support tickets as fast as possible. but fast response time and cheap web hosting prices makes it up for it i guess.
Bad / Worst
* Skype - skype.com - First of, it took me over 30 minutes to find a fucking contact form on their site, it keeps forwarding and linking me and i kept on going in loops. I click on contact us and it takes me to some self search half-wiki shit ... then i put my question, it won't find answer and says contact us if you can't find what you looking for and there goes the loop again. very annoying.
They support is also quite slow, 1-7 days response, well its understandable cuz skype is big, but their replies are retarded. for past few months ive been trying to understand WHY skype secretly downloads the 30mb update even tho when updates are turned off, support keeps on telling me same crap without even reading what i write, they keep on saying turn off auto updates and that windows updates may also install skype updates, i don't even have windows updates, its completely taken out, yet it still first downloads the update and then asks if i want to update. They support doesn't work toward the issue, i don't think they even understand what i'm after. Year ago, i would have listed skype in normal section, but now its beyond bad, making it one of the worst.
* Microsoft - generally their products - Well first of, you can't even directly contact them, you can call their super expensive line and even in there, they pull your chain and just waste your time by not even trying to solve your issue, they just care how much money they make from your call.
* Acer - http://www.acer.com - Even tho their products seem to be quite good, at the moment i have 27'' IPS Monitor and small 10.1'' Netbook (acer aspire one d255e) from Acer and both are good, netbook gets bit too hot, but its ok, but support is almost non existing. I contacted them in past about something which i can't remember, but when i bought my netbook about 8 months ago, i contacted them about Bluetooth drivers on XP. They have about 4 different Bluetooth driver versions on their site, so i said that i have 32-bit windows XP professional and gave them the netbook model and asked "which driver do i need". simple question, right? they just have to tell me which one from their site is the driver that goes with that OS, instead they start asking me what country i'm from, where did i buy the netbook, what is MAC address of my netbook, what is serial number of my netbook, what is my phone number ...etc. WHAT THE FUCK ??? can't they fucking answer a simple question?! After about 10 emails, i still did not get closer to solving it. I asked WHY on earth they need any of that info, they say "so we can better forward you to your country support and make sure your netbook is compatible" .. DA FUCK??? my netbook uses US for everything, US drivers, US operating system, US keyboard layout .. and i only speak english, so how the fuck any of that info is relevant ? I made it very clear that i want to be dealing with US support only! they still keep asking me ... that shit pissed me off bad, this is why Acer is listed in one of the worst customer supports ever.
If you know any, list them here, but make sure to explain your decision, why do you say it is worst or best support.