If you receive a trouble ticket and can't resolve the problem quickly, how long do you let the customer hang without an update?

By this I mean are you periodically assuring the customer that you are still working on problem or a week or so later are your customers wondering if you are even working on the problem.

If it takes several weeks or months to find/solve the problem, do you update the customer several times during over this period?

Just curious.

Originally posted by KG
If it takes several weeks or months to find/solve the problem, do you update the customer several times during over this period

:eek: I would hope so.

How long would you let it go in between contacts?

About a day....

I used to work for a support company and that was just about standard.... But of course I have a bad habbit of not answering when I fix a problem.....

From a clients point of view (as opposed to a reseller / host)... always maintain contact. I had some problems with my Webmail setup with 34SP (http://www.34sp.com). I e-mailed them and they replied two days later, with not much help at all. After that I heard nothing. It was a break down in communications on their part (normally their support is good).

Always try to keep in touch with the client. It will reassure them that you are looking after them and their online business :)

I would agree that constant communication is essential. I would even go beyond once per day.

One essential element you must consider is what processes you have for dealing with support. They must be formal and structured so that you can keep on top of any case or situation.

Simply answering a mail and looking at correcting a problem is not enough.

If you do not have the required procedural setup for dealing with and mainting contact with clients, the number of cases you fail to answer will spiral out of control.


WaldoUK - my apologies for the problem you experienced with us. We to have improved our internal set-up to take account of my own advioce here!

I've decided to post this question because I currently have a few outstanding support tickets from 10/15 & 10/16 and last heard from their tech support on any of these issues on 10/17.

I have no idea if they are still working on the problem. I do know our site was down for several hours over the weekend and other customers were having server problems. While they may well be working on other issues, I would at least like to know that we haven't fallen through the cracks.
Even if we just got an e-mail once a week to let us know they are still working on a solution.


I just want to know if it is typical to leave your customers in the dark or if you at least let them know you are still alive.