Customer Service Questions Concerning International Customers
This question relates to a generic message I received to a couple of questions I emailed the customer Service team last week stating that because the team were so busy there would be a delay in responding to my questions. Firstly, let me say, this is totally understandable. (please note this is not the normal confirmation message i receive when i send an email rather, a second message I received a few days later from Steve Workman)
However, the email stated that i could call the service centre if the matter was urgent. In this case it isn't and I can wait, however, as an international customer calling the US isn't really an option and although the forums are good they do not always answer my questions.
Therefore, Bob and the Logos team, is it possible for international customers to receive some sort of priority in regards to email questions? Especially relating to Logos 4. Personally it is a miracle I was able to install the product because I it was difficult to find clear and precisie instructions. If not for the forum i might well have called the states in sheer frustration! As some one who is not technically savvy, it would be nice to know I can have questions answered quickly. Software and computer problems stress a lot of us out, especially because we don't understand how computers "work".
Finally, let me add my congratulations to Logos on the release of 4 - it is a wonderful product. I know this is a ridiculously busy time and I appreciate your commitment to your customers.
Comments
Sarcasm is my love language. Obviously I love you. I meant it was Damian's fault they were good. That they can't answer every question must surely be Philip's Fault.
While I agree 100% on the latter part of your statement and wonder why they haven't yet blocked Philip's incessant email demands to customer service that he be invited to Bob's mother's place for breakfast, I'm not sure how I've made any positive contribution to the forums - all I do is post silly pictures.
is it possible for international customers to receive some sort of priority in regards to email questions?
I lived in Poland for 11 years and I must say, I sympathize and agree with Mark. If I were in Poland, I would not have been able to download L4, and I would not have had an easy or cheap time calling customer service
Mark
I'm in Australia and emailed last Wednesday regarding an activation problem. I finally got a personal response today to the effect of "We're busy with calls, check the videos".
If the guy had taken time to read he would have realised that all I'm after is to have a resource activated that my system won't. videos can't do that.
Needless to say that my hounding the wife to let me buy a decent package is waning sharply.
This matter may need to be raised with customer service and sales staff.
I know that I've had some funny contacts in which it appeared to be assumed that I was working on the same time zone as Logos Headquarters and I felt forced to to explain that in between emails I had managed to sleep for 5 hours....
Mark, if we respond to this thread in public, everyone in the world will see that we love our overseas customers so much that we give them priority. This is a dangerous topic for us to respond to. We run the risk of creating fueds and nationalistic pride battles, turf wars, and preferential treatment debates. There is no way to please everyone all the time...
so here goes...
First let me address phone calls. Normally, you are in good shape to give us a call, it's just a little trickier with Logos 4 release timing.
We actually already give preferential treatment to international callers. When someone calls and identifies themselves as calling from overseas, we send a message to the entire staff asking for the next available agent to take the call. This usually works out great. Our international callers who are paying very high rates to call us at their own expense, and don't have the luxury of the USA/Canada toll free line, get helped asap.
Right now, this is a little tricky, because we are in an "all hands on deck" situation with the flood of calls we are dealing with from the Logos 4 release. We would still treat an international call with the same urgency as we always do today, the only difference is that there may never be someone readily available to take the call on the spot, and there is no way to hold that call in limbo and not put it into the queue. So right now it is a risky call to make from overseas if you don't want to wait on hold for a potentially long period of time.
We find that the majority of our international customers are already using email as their preferred method of contact right now. So what are the options for phone support? Well, we could set aside a dedicated rep or two for international calls only. That way all international calls would go to a separate queue. Unfortunately you can easily see the problem there. What if there are two reps and they both get a call at 10:00 AM and both calls last an hour? The next guy to call at 10:01 AM is still on hold for an hour. Then those three calls were the only calls that day, and the international reps are sitting on their hands doing nothing, while there are so many customers that we want to serve with excellence right away in the USA too. We can't dedicate a group of reps to sit idly by while no international calls are coming in and not help the US based customers...
You see the problem. There is no silver bullet.
So that brings us to your email question:
Again, same problem and the truth of the matter is that Logos 4 is a temporary bottle neck in the system. The problem will be over before we can spread the word enough to the world to fix it.
For now, the simple solution is to put the words INTERNATIONAL CUSTOMER in the subject line and we will attempt to prioritize those emails. Even so, as you can imagine we are inundated with communication in every department and in every form. Even moving to the front of the line may require a little patience with us.
We are trying to roll out the release of Logos 4 slowly and steadily, while still making a big splash, truth be told, we still have not even sent the NewsWire email message with the announcement, and we won't until things die down a little bit more first. (Die down, not "go away", we need to keep a little momentum going...and we can't keep loyal users from getting the new product just because we're busy!)
So if you actually live in a country other than the USA or Canada, feel free to put INTERNATIONAL CUSTOMER in the subject line to get priority, and remember that it may still take extra time right now to get back to you. Also realize that it is highly likely that some cheeky?/clever?/sneaky?/rascally?... Americans will most likely try to sneak their emails to the front of the line the same way. They may not feel anyone should get priority tratment and they may jump in there too.
I think you have a very good point.