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Leaving Google Fi

jasonatwood.io

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Re: Leaving Google Fi

#191

Post by ikeboy »

winningcontinue wrote: post #178
sbr464 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typically i’d agree, but aren’t they a customer if they are purchasing fulfillment services from Amazon (and paying platform fees)? I think the digital/sharing/on demand/fulfillment economy needs new definitions for these concepts.

Look at their budget. Most of their revenue comes from AWS. So their large AWS clients are their customers. The margins on the retailing e-commerce customers is slim and wasn't profitable on a cashflow basis until recent years. From a financial perspective, they're the people who are going to stock the items and take the risk for products where demand is uncertain. Once more data is collected about their sales, Amazo…

3p sellers sell more than Amazon themselves, and at better margins for Amazon.

It's absurd to think $160 billion in GMV is not important to the bottom line.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#192

Post by sockgrant »

jseliger wrote: post #25
paxys wrote: post #16

Sounds like a very standard Google experience. To anyone stuck in a similar hell in the future - once the company has demonstrated that they aren't willing to help, there is no point continuing down that road. Escalate it to your credit card provider (with documentation) and they will clear it up pretty quick.

It seems that anything that has any sort of customer service component is not Google's forte.

This has been known for awhile.

The exception is if you pay good money to advertise with them.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#193

Post by rfkashani »

Sadly, the only worthwhile way to get help for Google Fi nightmares is through Ziggy. https://www.reddit.com/r/ProjectFi/comments/72dcgh/reddit_re...

I had to pester him a couple of times, file a BBB complaint and finally ask Google for the registered officer of the company since I was literally going to sue. That's when they filed a "remorse exception" that actually helped.

Also - ask for a "Specialist" - they're the only ones who can help. Every other guy is a "supervisor" at Google Fi support and they can't do anything. Had to call in more than 30 times and exchanged upwards of 60 emails. It's a shame.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#194

Post by cuu508 »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #104
jaggederest wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is only one customer at Google, and it is the people buying ads. Astonishingly enough, even at moderate ad volumes there's still no customer service. You have to start spending truly astronomical amounts of money before an actual rep will attempt to help you with essentially any problem. So to Google, "actual customer" means "someone spending six figures per month on advertising on our platform". As far as I am…

I have lots of criticisms of Google, but let's not spread misinformation. GCP does offer paid support options, depending on your business requirements. If it's critical for your business then you can afford to pay a few extra hundred dollars a month

In my experience, their lower, "extra hundred dollars a month" range support plan was a waste of time, patience and money. They didn't seem to have any means to help me.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#195

Post by Dylan16807 »

HillaryBriss wrote: post #176
cletus wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They can't process the ramifications of their business practices on future business opportunities. Here's where that really hurts them (IMHO). Google, as a whole, has a very short attention span. A lot of things at Google began as bottom-up engineering-led projects, the poster child for which is probably GMail. This seems to work really well for things that are engineering problems. I think it works incredibly badl…

> after you finish the first 90% you need to finish the second 90% (I forget who said this). I don't know who said it either, but I heard an alternate phrasing: "The first 50% of the project takes 90% of the time. But the second 50% takes the other 90% of the time."

That formulation doesn't work. The early work goes deceptively fast.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#196

Post by dwg »

I've had a similar problem with Google Fi customer support when my phone suddenly stopped charging while traveling abroad. Sparing the details, the lesson I learned is not to buy a phone from Google. As a customer you are at a severe disadvantage to Google, because Fi is not their bread & butter and they don't seem to mind if you cancel. Furthermore, in the event of a dispute, Google will turn off related services on your account, for example your associated Gmail account. After learning this lesson the hard way I wanted to stop my Fi service, but unfortunately I still found the Fi plan to be the best choice for my present situation: I am outside the U.S. for most of the year. I hope other carriers will improve their international plans.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#198

Post by gaia »

International roaming at no extra cost is great, but if you leave Google Fi you can pay for that when you needed it.

The real reason to stick with Google Fi is: it's the only carrier (ok, MNVO) that requires 2FA for a SIM swap.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#199

Post by warp_factor »

Google Fi is a huge joke.

I had the same type of shenanigans with their customer service. Eventually after calling every day for about two weeks I managed to find a competent supervisor that managed to follow up on what he said.

Since then I moved my main number back to ATT and I keep a Google Fi account open for my international travels. I only ever use Fi outside the US and I pause the account whenever I'm in the US.

GoogleFi is a good deal financially but if there is something I learned after years dealing with shady companies is that you don't want any of those shady companies have any leverage by keeping something essential such as your phone number under control as a leverage.

Sadly I saw exactly the same type of issue with their Google Cloud customer service. I really think that Google employee still think they work for the best company in the world and that people cannot wait to do business with them. They need to get out of their little bubble.

Re: Leaving Google Fi

#200

Post by warp_factor »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #104
jaggederest wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is only one customer at Google, and it is the people buying ads. Astonishingly enough, even at moderate ad volumes there's still no customer service. You have to start spending truly astronomical amounts of money before an actual rep will attempt to help you with essentially any problem. So to Google, "actual customer" means "someone spending six figures per month on advertising on our platform". As far as I am…

I have lots of criticisms of Google, but let's not spread misinformation. GCP does offer paid support options, depending on your business requirements. If it's critical for your business then you can afford to pay a few extra hundred dollars a month

After using the big three clouds for a long time, GoogleCloud got the absolutely worst support. And by far.
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