technical support
By trruk1
@trruk1 (1028)
United States
February 7, 2010 9:34am CST
Have you ever had to contact technical support? For your phone, your computer, television service, or whatever? Did they help? I have spent several years in technical support, most of that as a supervisor, and I have found the competence of tech support personnel appalling. Many do not understand the product they are "supporting", and the worst part is that knowledge and competence are not encouraged or rewarded by management. Corporate executives want two things out of technical support agents: sales and customer retention. I am pretty knowledgeable about the products I use, so I have rarely found it necessary to call for help. When I do, I almost invariably get somebody who knows less than I do about what is going on.
Technical support agents are taught to use "troubleshooting flows". This is basically a Q and A process that could be handled by a computer. Any deviation from one of those flows is punished by management.
It is a short-sighted and destructive attitude at the executive level, and it permeates American business. If somebody calls that is having a problem, she wants the problem solved. What she gets instead is an overt empathy expression (which agents are required to state) and some cookie cutter "help" that might accidentally solve the problem. Knowledge of products and solutions is actively discouraged and using that knowledge in an innovative way can result in punishment or even termination, even if it fixes the problem.
In brief, "technical support" is usually not technical and does not provide much support.
3 responses
@bunnybon7 (50970)
• Holiday, Florida
17 Feb 10
oh my goodness. i always wondered why they are so hard to reach and so hard to make sense with when you do reach them. i have had to stay on the line with them for 30mins to an hour just to get someone to finally answer. then like you said they seldome really help. doesnt it seem like the company should want them to help? or is it they want to send someone out, which usually ends up happening.??
@trruk1 (1028)
• United States
17 Feb 10
The companies (nearly all of them) require their technical support personnel to be first and foremost "customer service" agents. To them, that means selling products and services, soothing ruffled feathers when a customer is upset about something, and in general providing a pleasant experience. To me, a pleasant experience for a technical problem is to get it fixed. Customer service managers do not see it that way. As a matter of fact, they tend to look down on or just tolerate those agents with really good technical skills. There is no reward (I mean nothing--no certificate, no expression of thanks--nothing) for solving a particularly difficult technical problem. Even if the agent saved a customer that would otherwise have moved their business to a competitor, the agent involved may well get reprimanded because the call took too long. It is short-sighted and stupid, but that is how it is.
@arielbsn (199)
• Philippines
5 Nov 10
It's true, I worked as a technical support in a known phone manufacturer and I don't really understand the product that I support because they seldom provide us the trainings for our products so when a new product is released we don't know how to handle issues. Supervisors and all in higher positions don't really focus on resolving the issues, they focus on our stats, meaning the whole stats or metrics of the team. We are just trained on how to establish rapport, empathy and all of that which has nothing to do with technical issues.
@magtibaygom (4856)
• Philippines
9 Jul 10
Thanks for bringing this up. I call technical support every time my Internet connection is not working properly. It looks like I am not paying my bills, and I am really mad because I pay my bills on time. When I call him, I express my anger and threatens them that if they will not help me solve my problem, I will visit the main office of the company to file a complain, and I will defame them in forums all over the internet. I never give up calling them as many as I can until the problem get fixed. Maybe because of my persistence, my problems are often solved by them.
