Is it just me or have others had a terrible experience with the support Live Chat? One of my STBs died and rather than dialing the FSC and waiting 10 + minutes to get a real person, I decided to try the Live Chat. BIG MISTAKE. What I hoped would be pretty quick, was stretched out to over 40 minutes and they still didn't resolve my issue. 30 minutes into this chat with an offshore support (I suspect, don't know for sure) person, I dialed the FSC, waited about 10 minutes, got a live ONSHORE person, who remedied my situation in less than 5 minutes and even listened to me rant about my crappy experience with the Live Chat person. ...
Hi pl626, sorry you had an unfortunate experience using our live chat, we are always taking back suggestions. So what in particular made the session 40 mins long? Ineptitude? Delay in response? We value your comment. Thank you-Constance.
I think I can echo the OP's sense of frustration although not the tone evidenced in the chat session. Sometimes, even to a non-technical individual, the problem is obvious (and even more so when the individual happens to be a network professional) -- i.e. when smoke comes out of the STB and it will no longer power on -- well, it's pretty obvious that a new STB will need to be sent out. In the chat experience, you would first need to follow the script with the representative which ignores that background information the customer may provide and instead requires them to ask the customer to unplug/replug the box, disconnect/reconnect the cable, etc.
I had a recent experience which I won't detail here but which was an obvious Verizon issue for which I had all the material which given to a tech support person would allow them to immediately identify and dispatch the right resources to investigate the problem, but for which it took me 35 minutes of polite chatting and troubleshooting (which I had already done) before I got them to the point of escalating the ticket to tech support -- and then when I called in to talk to tech support, the information which I had sent in the chat session was not included in the ticket, so I needed to start over -- fortunately, as soon as I gave the info to the tech support person on the phone, they immediately recognized the problem and knew what needed to be done to fix it.
I can sympathize with the front line helpdesk troubleshooting techniques and scripts as I interact with helpdesk individuals in an enterprise setting helping them understand how better to troubleshoot network issues and so I know that patience and courtesy to these folks who are simply doing their job is the quickest way for everyone to move forward with resolving a problem -- but there seems to be no sense of empowerment (or it could be technical aptitude) to allow these folks to go "off script" to understand the underlying cause of a customer's problem and short-circuit or bypass the script when approriate.
Lasagna,
As an ITIL evangelist, I agree with you, you're spot-on about being empathetic to the help/service desk team and empowering them. But there's obviously a problem, if the agent repeats the same question multiple times and and doesn't pay attention to the input already on the ticket. I would think that after I gave the model number and told him several times, they would be able to see there is no adapter involved instead of asking me about the 'cable which goes from the STB'. Now if it's part of the script, then the problem is with the script and magnified by the agent's inability to listen and/or think outside the box.
I called the FSC during the chat and the FSC agent listened and fairly quickly started the process for sending me a new STB without spitting useless verbage to me. I got resolution within 5 minutes of talking with the agent. The fact that it took me almost 10 minutes to get to an agent is a different issue. But this is what I should have experienced with the online chat. The only difference would have been that it would be quicker to get to an agent via the chat than the FSC line. I will say, the chat agent did pick up the chat very quickly, but after that is was all downhill and a waste of time.
To me it seems the Chat agent was offshore, but I don't know that for certain, but there shouldn't be a night and day difference between the chat and the phone support. If only contacting V* sppt had the speed of the chat and the responsiveness of the phone support, that would be ideal.
I think we're on the same page here ... there seems to be no flexibility for the chat agent to utilize the information the customer can intelligently provide to better guide the troubleshooting session but rather instead they can only follow the troubleshooting scripts which are provided for them. This can be a training issue / aptitude capability issue or it could be a Verizon process issue.
Either way it's a gap.
In this case, it's pretty obvious you have a dead STB (reasonable questions being looking for a power light on the box, pressing the on/off button on the box, insuring it's plugged in, and insuring the outlet has power -- these may seem obvious, but you wouldn't believe the number of calls which ask these simple questions only to find out that the customer "can't test to see if the outlet has power because the lights aren't working in the house at the moment"). Once you get that far however, it's seems silly to continue the plug/unplug to coax, etc. line of questioning and this is where the script obviously breaks down. A little intelligence on the agent's part should tell them the right thing to do. I'm not so sure if the agents have ever actually seen or worked with the equipment being supported and the environments in which they are used -- and hands on personal experience can help tremendously here.
I don't care where the agent is located -- chat often can be much more efficient than a phone conversation particularly if you're needing to show an agent the output from a command -- but there is an expectation that the person on the other end is listening and understanding the information being provided to them rather than blindly following a script and in the posted script example, it doesn't seem like that is occurring. A classic case of follow the script, follow the script. But that said ... I'm not so sure I understand the tone in the script coming from the other side of the conversation either.
Well, in my experience I was told that I should contact Verizon directly at the 800# even after I told them I could not call the 800#s from my phone. That was part of my issue. Not listening to the customer and finding out what the problem resulting in customer contact is a major issue. It frustrates customers and honestly just makes us not want to deal with Verizon as a whole when we are unable to have our issues resolved. I'm going on 3 weeks of restricted phone service and limited assistance with barely any understanding from Verizon.
The tone is pure frustration. When I saw a quick response to my chat request, my hopes were for a quick resolution, which would have been a new and welcomed experience with Verizon. Unfortuneately, that was not the case. There is no reason why the response between the phone agent and the chat agent should be so different. And you're right about the potential for chat, especially when you're dealing with desktop support issues. However, to spit back a lot of text that says nothing only adds to the frustration of the communication gaps. I told the phone agent nothing different, yet he quickly assessed the situation and offered me a resolution. This is what should have happened with the chat agent.
The reality is location does matter. I've had more bad support experiences with off-shore call centers than I've had good. The fact that companies are switching back to onshore call centers is further evidence of that.
BTW, I'm not saying that onshore is the only way to go, because I've had my share of bad onshore experiences as well. Try dealing with Verizon's billing department. My point is that yes, as the customer, it would be good to be empathetic with the call center agent, but let's not forget who is really the customer. Service desk personnel should be trained to have a customer service oriented mindset. It's maddening to me that we have to be so pc as the customer, it should be the other way around.
I know that this is years later, but I just came across your post here and I have to say...you made me laugh out loud! I love how, early on in the conversation, you said, "you already said that." LOL That was awesome! That was very funny. You were so straight up and did not beat around the bush. Me on the other hand, am too nice, that I wouldve suffered through it and kicked myself after it all. I like your way better!
But, thankfully I have had good experiences. So good that tonite when I lost my chat buddy, {edited for privacy}., cuz my cmptr went bonkers, I researched all over the place on how to hunt him down so that he could get the credit for the purchase I was about to make. Never did find him again 😞
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