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0 pointsethbr04y ago0 comments

> The entire concept feels like it's driven by managers trying to impress their managers

It's cost cutting. Customer contact is always treated as a cost center.

Therefore, the only relevant question for its management is "How can we provide the minimum acceptable level of service, at the lowest possible cost?"

In general, the answer to "Why does X suck?" is to ask whether the company sees it as a profit or cost center. See: HR.

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hutzlibu4y ago· 3 in thread

"Customer contact is always treated as a cost center."

"How can we provide the minimum acceptable level of service, at the lowest possible cost?"

Not with all products. Some companies understand, that good support keeps the people loyal to their products. But they are usually in a higher price segment.

ethbr0OP4y ago

The most surprising example I found was Dell Alienware support. Not sure if it's different from Dell consumer support, but I'd guess so.

Had to RMA an ultra widescreen monitor I use for work, and the experience was as smooth as silk and always in the hands of actual humans, who would follow up and push things forward.

seanp2k24y ago

Dell has always had good support, especially for business. I once bought a laptop second-hand that still had a few months of their highest support plan on it. Needed a screen first because of a few dead pixels. They had a tech come out to me at work and repair it on-site. A month before the warranty ended, the motherboard died. Same thing, replaced on-site. In both cases they offered to either send me the parts and DIY repair instructions or just send someone to do it. This was on a laptop I paid like $300 for (probably $2-3k new back then, it was a nice Latitude).

I’ve had their enterprise support on the phone with me for a dozen hours over the course of a week trying to get this SAN working. Their support remoted into it and had me manipulating physical stuff when required. They eventually got it going through a combination of hard resetting everything and updating firmware on half a dozen components + some software updates.

Dell doesn’t always have the greatest hardware, but their support really doesn’t rest until you’re satisfied. “No one ever got fired for buying Dell”.

y4mi4y ago

Do they use chatbots for support?

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