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Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#141

Post by Jensson »

orf wrote: post #131
ucm_edge wrote: post #47

For me the worst is you talk to someone at a company, be it phone or support chat, and it becomes clear the person wants to help but the policies of the company prevent their customer support people from doing anything meaningful. The support person has no power, may not even be employed by the company in question, etc. Then you get the salt in the wound customer satisfaction survey of "Did X resolve your issue today…

Why would you give credit card information over the phone to anyone? I’m not in the US but that sounds crazy.

Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store. They can easily memorize or take a picture the last secret digits and the system has written down the rest.

The whole system builds on trust and humans are pretty trustworthy. Bots are much less trustworthy, since untrustworthy humans can leverage bots or spam to contact millions of people each.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#142

Post by xboxnolifes »

pimlottc wrote: post #35

On a related note, please stop telling me about the website when I call for customer support. It's 2023, people know that websites exist. If I could do it on the website, I wouldn't be calling you.

Knowing people who work support, this is statistically not true. Many people know absolutely nothing about how to do anything with technology.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#143

Post by xboxnolifes »

zamadatix wrote: post #120
throwawaysleep wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I could do it on the website, I wouldn't be calling you. You might not. Most of my relatives over 40 will though. At my company it is incredibly common for a support ticket to be answered in the FAQ.

There is a split between "could" and "will" between these two points but more importantly: if telling people they could do it on the website meaningfully worked it wouldn't need to be said anymore by now.

Alternatively, it may continue to be said because it helps. Every day, new people are born, new people age into the position of calling support, and new people need to be reminded that they have the ability to help themselves.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#144

Post by wjamesg »

technick wrote: post #117

I've been trying to get a webex with elastic for support and they want me to use their ticketing system first, explain in detail the issue, attach logs and diagnostic files, and so much crap that it's not even worth asking for help. Just get on a conference and look at it. I'm paying them 12k a month for the crappiest support ever. Splunk was never this bad...

They’ll need diags…they would rather you do it than walk your through it on a call

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#145

Post by orf »

Jensson wrote: post #141
orf wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you give credit card information over the phone to anyone? I’m not in the US but that sounds crazy.

Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store. They can easily memorize or take a picture the last secret digits and the system has written down the rest. The whole system builds on trust and humans are pretty trustworthy. Bots are much less trustworthy, since untrustworthy humans can leverage bots or spam to contact millions of people each.

> Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store

But why would you let your card leave your sight? I don’t understand.

The waiter brings over a payment terminal or you go over to it, then you tap or insert your card. When could they take a picture? How would they even use the details without your PIN number? The whole system isn’t built on trust because that would be stupid when it comes to money.

Or are you saying the trust element is that they are not using a terminal that somehow clones your card and pin?

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#146

Post by hansvm »

orf wrote: post #145
Jensson wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store. They can easily memorize or take a picture the last secret digits and the system has written down the rest. The whole system builds on trust and humans are pretty trustworthy. Bots are much less trustworthy, since untrustworthy humans can leverage bots or spam to contact millions of people each.

> Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store But why would you let your card leave your sight? I don’t understand. The waiter brings over a payment terminal or you go over to it, then you tap or insert your card. When could they take a picture? How would they even use the details without your PIN number? The whole system isn’t built on trust because that would be stupid when it comes to money. Or are yo…

> why would you let your card leave your sight?

That's the status quo for how those transactions work in the US.

> When could they take a picture, how could they even use the details without our PIN, the whole system isn't buit with trust because that woudl be stupid when it comes to money

The average person with no training can remember 8 uniformly random digits, and an hour of training bumps that up to 20 -- more than enough to recall a credit card and its PIN, even ignoring the immense amount of redundant information in how those are constructed. Plus nearly invisible video feeds are a reality. Plus pass-through broken credit card capture systems are a cheap reality, and one that claims untold billions of dollars at US gas stations, and many multiples of that amount at european ATMs. Any system that depends on the secrecy of those digits is fundamentally broken, and our payment system does, so it's fundamentally broken. The only reason it doesn't appear that way is that most people don't try to exploit it, and most of the rest leave enough breadcrumbs that after enough 10s of millions of fraud they can be arrested. The remaining few percent of fraud is baked into the prices you see and the taxes you pay.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#147

Post by orf »

hansvm wrote: post #146
orf wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not more crazy than giving it at the restaurant or store But why would you let your card leave your sight? I don’t understand. The waiter brings over a payment terminal or you go over to it, then you tap or insert your card. When could they take a picture? How would they even use the details without your PIN number? The whole system isn’t built on trust because that would be stupid when it comes to money. Or are yo…

> why would you let your card leave your sight? That's the status quo for how those transactions work in the US. > When could they take a picture, how could they even use the details without our PIN, the whole system isn't buit with trust because that woudl be stupid when it comes to money The average person with no training can remember 8 uniformly random digits, and an hour of training bumps that up to 20 -- more t…

I wasn’t aware that this was the situation in the US.

> and one that claims untold billions of dollars at US gas stations, and many multiples of that amount at european ATMs

I’m interested in why you think this - from everything I can find US card fraud rates are at a minimum 10x compared to the EU.

The way the US makes payments seems very insecure/backwards, with a lack of chip and pin, relying on signatures and even using cheques still.

A 10x reduction in fraud by using basic measures other countries have adopted seems sensible.

Decrying them because there is no perfect system and “anyone can remember a pin” is a call to keep the status quo and the fraud that comes with it.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#148

Post by Doxin »

Scoundreller wrote: post #62
skissane wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a problem with one of my stock broker accounts-it has the wrong address on it. It is my old address I lived at years ago, before I opened this particular account-I never set it, but I think it somehow got stuck deep in their computer systems from one of my other accounts and got applied to this new account when I opened it. Anyway, go to the website, I see the wrong address - yet click the “edit” button to cha…

I love it when disliked utilities let me send in my complaints/changes/payments by snail mail. I know it costs them so much more to process, and that alone gives me comfort. (Of course, I'd hate it if this was by force)

To complete the experience I have a typewriter and sealing wax. Something about a wax seal seems appropriate for complaints to awful companies.

Re: Vanishing phone customer support is driving us all insane

#149

Post by Aeolun »

QuarterReptile wrote: post #100
Aeolun wrote: post #81

Vanishing ‘support’ is driving us insane. I could care less about getting it on the phone. I recently had my first bad experience with AWS support, where the agent immediately wanted to jump on a call to have me explain the problem I’d just written down to them. It’s not that hard to understand “Can you explain to me how to get your provisioned concurrency lambdas to keep track of system time correctly.”

> I could care less about getting it on the phone. couldn't

Damn. I fall for the things I critize others for.
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