> > THIS DNS CHANGE IS SOMETHING YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE.
> > ALL OF YOUR COMPETITION DOES THIS IN HOSTING.
> > I HAVE WASTED THE ENTIRE MORNING TRYING TO GET THIS GOING
> > PLEASE CHANGE THIS OR REFUND MY ACCOUNT ASAP
> >
> > I NEED TO GET THIS GOING RIGHT NOW, ALL OF YOU COMPETITION
> > CAN GET ME ON THE NET WITH IN 1 HOUR, THIS WAITING FOR 1 TO 3 DAYS
> > FOR DNS TO CHANGE IS TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE, I NEED A SOLUTION
> > OR A REFUND RIGHT NOW!


Verbatim from customer support ticket (caps and all)...
BTW, the DNS change is explained in the welcome email, in the manual, and the FAQ.:rolleyes:

Let them go. Someone like that is only going to cause more trouble in the future. They'll soon see that 1-3 days is going to happen anywhere.

On a side note, it's been closer to 24 hours for me lately, which makes me happy :) :D

I have had to deal customers like that.

Tell him to
KNOW HIS ROLE AND SHUT HIS MOUTH ;)

I'd do as BravoComm suggested.
If he doesn't, or isn't willing to, understand the dns propagation thing . . . . . . well, it's just going to be more trouble down the road.
:rolleyes:

If the competition is so much better, why the heck did he go with you? ;)

People should learn more about what is involved before they start paying for hosting.

I liked the people that email you and say they have read all of your site but still want to ask you a fw questions... then theres 50 to 100 questions. All answered on the site.

Wow I thought I was the only one that had that problem. I was starting to think that I had to re word the site.

My favorite is the lady who ordered $500 worth of hosting, last month. After we set her all up, her first email to support was "how do I get a website onto the internet now?" :eek:

I wanted to scream 'You bought $500 worth of hosting and have NO FREAKIN' CLUE what to do with it?!?!' :angry:

...but we just smiled and pointed her to HTML, FTP and other various tutorials for beginners. Fifty support tickets later - she asked for a refund because it was just too much for her to try and learn...especially during the hectic holidays.

*sigh*

--Tina

ROFL, welcome to my life!! I get **** like that on a daily basis. Today, I spent 45 minutes explaining over the phone to one of my customers that her reason for not being able to download email was not my fault, but her ISPs! (she couldn't get connected to the 'net and seemed to think the problem started happening after she signed up with me :rolleyes: ).

And BravoComm is entirely right...these same clients are the ones that continue to be the biggest pains in my pants on a recurring basis. :mad:

Originally posted by hurtdidit
ROFL, welcome to my life!! I get **** like that on a daily basis. Today, I spent 45 minutes explaining over the phone to one of my customers that her reason for not being able to download email was not my fault, but her ISPs! (she couldn't get connected to the 'net and seemed to think the problem started happening after she signed up with me :rolleyes: ).


OMG! I had that customer 2 days ago!!!!!! Swore up and down that we screwed up her AOL email - because her sister-in-law sent and email and she never got it.

I could not get it through her head that we have NOTHING to do with her AOL email. She kept insisting that she never had any kind of problem until she signed up for hosting and a new domain name with us. She cancelled the order because she JUST KNEW the new domain name had something to do with her lost email. :D

--Tina

Tina--the day one of us finds a surefire method to deal with such problem clients without pissing them off or annoying us to death, I think we should file a patent and go into business as consultants! :D

Here's what we say:

"New domain names can usually be set up within 24 hours.
If your domain name is already registered, setup time is often dependent on you, but we will provide you with the information that you need to perform the transfer."

Of course we could offer instant setup, if they didn't want to actually use their domain name.

Speaking of problem customers, I spent over an hour on the phone with this customer:

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28675

Even though it's not support that we pretend to offer.

Today, one of the customer's software vendors called us up asking for details. They've been dragged into it too.

I'm thrilled to hear I'm not the only poor fool that has the pleasure of dealing with problem clients! I was starting to think I was doing something seriously wrong for a while there...

Well...while we're at it....

How many of your customers can only "afford" your lowest cost package but if something "goes wrong" with their account they are suddenly loosing literally thousands of dollars per minute it's "down or broken or whatever the problem is"?

"FIX IT NOW!! I'M LOOSING THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS HERE!!"

Originally posted by Deb
Well...while we're at it....

How many of your customers can only "afford" your lowest cost package but if something "goes wrong" with their account they are suddenly loosing literally thousands of dollars per minute it's "down or broken or whatever the problem is"?

"FIX IT NOW!! I'M LOOSING THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS HERE!!"


Yes exactly!!!!!!!!!!!! That is so funny. We really need to start a website on this. I had a guy accidentally password protect his main page with .htaccess and then couldn't see it (it's a hidden file unless you know how to "see" it). He was mad because "we" locked his visitors out of his site. Of course, every hour it was down cost him THOUSANDS of dollars in lost sales. :eek:

--Tina

OMG You all have had some serious problems clients, most of my customers are pretty savvy. I feel for you all I have had a few that made me wish I had the power of Black Hole.

I posted this a while back, but I had a client that after a brief downtime demanded that I repay them for lost business and damages in the amount of $13,000. It was to be wired to her. She was on an $18/mo plan and at that point her account was 1 day old. Not even long enough for DNS propagation.

Anyway, I replied and gave her 48 hours find a new host before her site was deleted.

Patrick

Then there's the ever popular customer who orders hosting one day - and complains the next day because it's not working (hello??? DNS???) and he has $1000 worth of newspaper, magazine, radio advertising coming out that day.

I have even had people use this complaint on NEW domains.

Who would think it's a good idea to commit to advertisement BEFORE you even have your domain name or hosting account ready?!?!?

--Tina

Originally posted by Deb
Well...while we're at it....

How many of your customers can only "afford" your lowest cost package but if something "goes wrong" with their account they are suddenly loosing literally thousands of dollars per minute it's "down or broken or whatever the problem is"?

"FIX IT NOW!! I'M LOOSING THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS HERE!!"

Haha! That's soo true! And it usually the customer that caused his or her site to be unavailble too.

"Well the FTP logs show that you've deleted your htdocs directory, would you like us to restore that for you from backup?"

Then the customer cancels their account the next week to move to a different provider, as if it could have been handled better.

We had a customer once, that we'd had for over six months, email us to ask what their domain name was.

people are silly

We had one of our resellers threaten to cancel all of his accounts if we didn't get "example.com" back online....as his customer was very upset and we were making him look bad.

I looked through our records and could find NOTHING on that domain. So, I did a quick WHOIS (should have done that first) and found out we weren't even hosting that domain.

Apparently, the guy has reseller accounts at 3 different companies and thought we were hosting that domain.

--Tina

Hmmm I seem to have gone through all at least 80% of those experiences as well. And you know everytime theirs a server problem that client JUST sent advertisements and promos all over the globe. We should make customer bingo.

So far the squares are:
- losing thousands on lowest plan.
- just put out advertising compaign.
- just changed dns but the other companies have magic instant domain access.
- deleted file or added one which made domain inaccessable.

Do we have a bingo yet?

How about the ones that:
- make their password the easiest password in the world to guess.
- give their password out to just about anyone that asks for it.
- blame you for files being lost or added due to the above.

Let's not forget:

"I gave away email addresses to all my friends - it wasn't ME that spammed, it was my friend. Please don't cancel my account!"

or

"The guy I bought the list of email addresses from told me it was Opt-In!"

or

Customer: "My site is down"
Me: "It was deleted three months ago for non-payment"
(or)
Me: "Your domain name expired six months ago."

--Tina

That is so funny. We really need to start a website on this.

That is a good idea. :)

Just to add one of our many stories.

We have one lady we call the "The Eater". She calls tech support always at lunch to tell us she can't connect to the Internet (We provide IA too). She is a lady that is constantally getting viruses and upadating her system so she loses her connection info. The worst part - she EATS while talking! You hear her chewing on carrots, drinking, swallowing, everything. It is so annoying it is painfull. She does this everytime too. At least 10 times so far in 2 years.

How about this one: we have a customer who calls up about twice a month with "I can't connect to my web site, can you check it?". So, we check it and everything is fine. So I ask them to try to get to our web site, they can't do that either. So I ask them to do a traceroute to see if there's a network problem - and the traceroute won't go (DNS error). Finally, after about 15 minutes on the phone trying everything I can think of, they say "oh, do I have to be connected to the Internet to do this traceroute thing? Hold on, let me dial in."

ARGH!

Or, worse, the ones that when they call and say "Is our web site down?" and you say "no, everything is fine." and they reply "OK, I wanted to make sure because my ISP has been down all morning and I couldn't connect to make sure our web site is up."

ARGH!!

But, I have to say, the absolute worst ones (in my experience) are the ones who call up insisting, absolutely insisting, that their password is incorrect and that we must have screwed something up on our end that made their password not work anymore, and then after 10 minutes re-setting passwords on the server it turns out the client had their caps lock key on.

ARGH!!!

Ah, the joys of customer service!

Originally posted by JustinK
Hmmm I seem to have gone through all at least 80% of those experiences as well. And you know everytime theirs a server problem that client JUST sent advertisements and promos all over the globe. We should make customer bingo.

So far the squares are:

- just put out advertising compaign.


That is me above. I spent 6K on a buy for a client and their shared server went right down the tubes 2 hours before the first ad was on the air. I had to admit, this was the first time I saw Murphys Law in action. Just think Keystone Cops running in an office yelling at their host ( of 1 year ) yelling at each other and me just trying to be very calm about the entire thing. Then 2 explosions, then power outage then, 1 car getting hit by the man hole cover that blew-up ( big transformer blew up outside (I think) and the manhole covers flew like the wind ). The car belonged to my client.

happened this summer right in Newark right in front of my client's office.

-Sqposter / Michael

Originally posted by sqposter


That is me above. I spent 6K on a buy for a client and their shared server went right down the tubes 2 hours before the first ad was on the air. I had to admit, this was the first time I saw Murphys Law in action. Just think Keystone Cops running in an office yelling at their host ( of 1 year ) yelling at each other and me just trying to be very calm about the entire thing. Then 2 explosions, then power outage then, 1 car getting hit by the man hole cover that blew-up ( big transformer blew up outside (I think) and the manhole covers flew like the wind ). The car belonged to my client.

happened this summer right in Newark right in front of my client's office.

-Sqposter / Michael


Whoa! You have to admit though, that's a bit different than a client ordering $1000 worth of advertising...set to run 2 days from the day he purchased the ads.....and THEN orders hosting and a new domain name. Believe it or not, I've seen this happen many, many times.

--Tina

Originally posted by AffordableHost
we weren't even hosting that domain.

:D you made my day :D
That's by far the funniest story I heard so far.

Originally posted by AffordableHost
Customer: "My site is down"
Me: "It was deleted three months ago for non-payment"


Oh yeah. That happens here too. Like they check their email every few months, ignore the emails about their account, and never ever update their web site? I don't get it!

And like Jason almost hit on.

Customer: Why can't I get to my web site?
Me: Can you get to any other web sites on the Internet?
Customer: I don't know, let me try... Nope. So what's wrong?

Excuse me dear web hosts - I know there are a lot of people complain without a reason or do so because they do not understand a problem. Part of your job is to explain them properly (at least once in detail, why it is not your fault and how it is supposed to work) so they understand the issue. I have seen a lot of hosts and I think most tech guys have such high esteem and think that everyone else is a fool. 8 out of 10 tech support answers end up in a "one line" answer, that most of your customers don't understand. That is the problem. After looking at this long thread I don't have to wonder why because your attitude is reflected very well.

It's your customer who is paying you and if you can not take time to make them feel comfortable you should be selling donuts. Web hosting as such or any business that is technical in nature is different when it comes to dealing with customers and you can't expect them to know the things you know. You chose to do this - the customers are paying, be nice and thank your stars if you still have customers and until they are paying you support them. If you can not handle them tell them politely what you can do and what you can't do. You think that is fair?

Don't get mad at me (or do) - I am sharing my personal experiences and though I don't know all, I think I know enough.

Originally posted by Gurudev
Excuse me dear web hosts - I know there are a lot of people complain without a reason or do so because they do not understand a problem. Part of your job is to explain them properly (at least once in detail, why it is not your fault and how it is supposed to work) so they understand the issue. I have seen a lot of hosts and I think most tech guys have such high esteem and think that everyone else is a fool. 8 out of 10 tech support answers end up in a "one line" answer, that most of your customers don't understand. That is the problem.

It's your customer who is paying you and if you can not take time to make them feel comfortable you should be selling donuts. Web hosting as such or any business that is technical in nature is different when it comes to dealing with customers and you can't expect them to know the things you know. You chose to do this - the customers are paying, be nice and thank your stars if you still have customers and until they are paying you support them. If you can not handle them tell them politely what you can do and what you can't do. You think that is fair?



I don't think anyone here ever said we didn't try to help the customer - or were rude or gave one line answers. Quite the contrary.

There are ALWAYS going to be people that 'just don't get it' - be it on the support side or the customer side. We are merely sharing a common thread of the few 'support callers from hell'. We all have them - it's a fact of providing support. We have to deal with them, be polite and help them the best we can. However, it doesn't mean that we can't, or shouldn't, vent our frustrations and find some support from others dealing with the same thing.

There are idiot tech support people and there are idiot customers. Overall, the majority of the customers we deal with are great. I, personally, have become good friends with many of my customers. It's the one out of 500 that can drive a person insane sometimes. We're merely letting off a little steam.

--Tina

At no time did anyone here say that they don't support their customers. We all do it's but some of them just need to get it explained a million times. It's like this; why will you buy a car if you don't know how to drive? You can't ask the sales man to teach you. You can ask them if you have a little problem or ask for their opinion on something. So why will you signup for hosting if you can't even dial into the internet? Why if you don't know how to get a site up would you go buy the most expensive plan pay for a year and then call the host and say "How do I design a web site?" We go and help them out and try to be as nice as we can after we are asked how to setup an email account a million times and all you need to do is press on "Auto Setup on Outlook" on the control panel. If you need help fine but at least learn the basic of it before you waist your time and money on getting something you don't know how to use.

I was waiting for that post... it always happens. I'm sure most if not everyone that posted here replied and helped the person out asking the questions or annoying the heck out of them. For some in the hosting business it's just nice to know they aren't the only ones with the customers that do these things (like order a $5 plan for a business that relies on the site to supposedly make thousands of dollars).

Whois Results for supportstories.com
Registrant:
EIN (SUPPORTSTORIES-DOM)
PO Box 825
Boise, ID 83701
US


Record last updated on 10-Nov-1999.
Record expires on 10-Nov-2001.
Record created on 10-Nov-1999.
Database last updated on 14-Dec-2001 02:58:00 EST.




I really hate Netsol, its the perfect domain, and they aren't letting it go... Damn them..

Umm, ProHacker...isn't that a little bit off-topic?? :rolleyes:

hmm not really.... the domain he wants is supportstories.com which would be great for posting these types of stories..

:o ahhhh, ok that'd make more sense! :o

I registered one ahwhile go (supportbytes.com) for this purpose, but haven't gotten around to doing anything with it, because I don't want to take any heat for making people look like fools. Not that I would do that to any bitServe customers.

But in the past, I worked as a developer and tech support manager for several software companies, and have some great emails, conversations, and voice mail messages saved up.

Anyway, gurudev, I don't think that any of the things we have posted have been covered under any of our support policies. It really isn't our job to explain these things to the customer, but we do it anyway. And we never said we didn't do it in a nice way. And I like one_web's analogy. We're no more obligated to teach a person how to use their web hosting than a car sales person is for teaching a car buyer to drive.

Of course we can usually do it for a fee.

Hey, er...I have a question, like, not totally off-topic.

It never happened before: we had a customer sign-up for our $19/mo plan 2 weeks ago.
What we usually do is contact them to gather some more information for setting up their site.
Well, this one never replied to ANY of our messages;
it's like they're dead!

I know some may consider this to be the perfect client, however, if it goes on like this, we'll end up cashing a second month of hosting, then a first, etc. I'm not comfortable with that.

Ever had such an issue?
-

Originally posted by cyansmoker
Hey, er...I have a question, like, not totally off-topic.

It never happened before: we had a customer sign-up for our $19/mo plan 2 weeks ago.
What we usually do is contact them to gather some more information for setting up their site.
Well, this one never replied to ANY of our messages;
it's like they're dead!

I know some may consider this to be the perfect client, however, if it goes on like this, we'll end up cashing a second month of hosting, then a first, etc. I'm not comfortable with that.

Ever had such an issue?
-

be real careful, this might be a stolen CC. did you get a phone # ?
better that you spend .50 more and get everything cleared up otherwise you might get 2 charge backs

- Sqposter / Michael

Originally posted by Gurudev
Excuse me dear web hosts - I know there are a lot of people complain without a reason or do so because they do not understand a problem
Don't get mad at me (or do) - I am sharing my personal experiences and though I don't know all, I think I know enough.

Hi Gurudev,

It's not the complaining. It's also not that we feel all high and mighty. I spend a great deal writing long and helpful email answers, even anticipating what questions might be raised by my answer and answering them in that very same email.

Unless you have ever worked at a helpdesk or were in any way related to customer service I'm not sure if I can make you really understand what kind of people are out there, but I'll try.

This thread is not about people like you. From your post I can see I can reason with you. Teach you. Help you get your site online. Fix the problems.

With some people, that is just plain impossible. From the moment they sign on they scream, shout, curse and threaten you. They act like you are the devil come to make their lives miserable. THEY know what they are doing and you don't.

And no matter how polite you are, no matter how well you explain everything to them, no matter how much you help them out it just is no good, because we are EVIL, full of **** and out to scam them.

I am not a native English speaker, and I can tell you that since I went into the hosting business I have learned a LOT of new swear words, most of them cannot be repeated here and some of them I am not even sure of what they mean...

A real example (edited a little because minors visit this board ;)

What kind of scam company you running? Signed up hosting 2 hours ago and searched your site vor a place to login. THERE IS NO ****INGLOGIN. DO YUO ENJOY ANOYING YOUR CUSOMTERS?WHAT KIND OF SCAM IS THIS. IVE WAISTED ENOUGH TIME ON YR SITE GOING TO REAL HOSTING COMPANY NOW. LEMMME KNOW IF YOU PRICKS NEED HELP PUTTING LINK ON YOUR SITE TO LOGINTO SERVER!

After our email explaining him that he would either need an FTP program to login to his site, or upload it with Frontpage (he choose FP extension) he emailed:

SCREW YOU. ULOADED SITE NOT WORKING. YUOUR COMPANY IS THE BIGGEST SCAM ON THE INTERNET. IM REPORTING YOU TO THE BETTER BUSINES BUREAU

After carefully explaining him that he uploaded his files in the wrong directory and putting them in the right directory for him as well as point him to the info in the setup email where it told him in what directory to put the files he mailed me:

IM GETTING SICK OF THIS YOUR CGI NOT WORKING WHY MY CGI NOT WORKING I AM PAYING FOR CGI FIX IT

After checking his site, I discovered he had uploaded a bulletinboard script Was something like YBB.? Anyway, although I am not familiar with that I noticed he had not edited a single line in the config.pl file. So I did that for him. Still didn't work. Seemed he also did not set permissions right and didn't upload all the files that were needed to make it run. His reply:

I READ INSTRUCITONS DON'T NEED TO CHANGE ANYTHING. THIS BB WORKS ON MY OTHER SITE WHY NOT YOURS? YOU SUCK GIV ME CGI

The next day I received a report from spamcop about his site sending out spam emails. I politely told him that was in violation of article 12 of the TOS and asked him not to do it again as we would have to suspend his site the next time we got a complaint.

The following email was so full of swear words, that if I take the swear words out, there would be no msg left.
Suffice it to say that he told us he was going to a more "e-commere friendly" host, that we were the biggest scam on the internet, that he was going to sue us for everything we owned and that he was reporting us to the BBB and do a chargeback on his creditcard immediatly. Our services sucked, our servers were broken, his cgi didn't work and instead of giving support we did something "sexual" with eachother all day.

Now THAT is the kind of customer this thread is about.

On a related subject:

Because I know customers like that exist I also never reply in a thread in which a customer complains about hosting company "x".

I often see threads like that evolve into 60+ posts of bashing on the basis of that one customers story. Now I am not saying that the customer isn't right in his complaint, but just imagine the above customer taking the time to write a post about my company in the main forum. God help me!
One customer can ruin your name like that, sometimes totally without justified cause. Just remember that the next time you add to such a thread. The next thread might be about you....

The customer is always right!
This is true and the most important part in business.

Pilgirm,

This thread is not about people like you.
I know, but yet you won't believe the kind of answers and bull I have gotten from tech support. I always wonder if they are giving me replies like this how do they do with some others who do not know as much as I do (to get things working). That is why I was sharing my experience.

I am not saying that you guys don't support customers. However, most support problems result from the intial answers that are "one-liners" or do not make absolutely any sense to normal customers (and you know that most of them don't know what you know). I have had situations where the issue could have been resolved in 1-2 tickets that take 7-8. That's what I am talking about.

I also know there are a lot of customers who just do not get it or cause trouble and that is a part of any business and hosting in genral is tough. But you can always try at least once or twice making sense and explaing things properly, instead of answering questions just for the sake of it so you can close tickets and move on. Again, here when I say "you" I am talking in general sense as I have not hosted with you.

I often see threads like that evolve into 60+ posts of bashing on the basis of that one customers story
Well, it goes both ways. Why is it suddenly becomes a bashing if a customer reports problems? Because that is how the world works - people remember what bad you do to them, good gets less PR than bad, that is human nature.

One customer can ruin your name like that, sometimes totally without justified cause.
If you are doing well with a lot of your customers then there is no need to worry as you always have good customers for reference.

Finally, I do not agree that "customer is always right" and there are people who want more but mostly because customer can go somewhere else you (business owner) get to decide where to draw the line. You can let him go and you have lost a customer for your good or bad.

Originally posted by Gurudev
However, most support problems result from the intial answers that are "one-liners" or do not make absolutely any sense to normal customers (and you know that most of them don't know what you know). I have had situations where the issue could have been resolved in 1-2 tickets that take 7-8.

That's a very valid point, would be worth a new thread! This one-liners are so annoying, even to a customer who knows a bit about hosting! It takes anywhere from 2 hours (excellent) to 2 days (bad) for the hosting company to answer a support question - just think of how angry the customer gets if he has to wait for an answer, gets a one-liner and then has to resubmit the ticket or answer the email again!

explaing things properly, instead of answering questions just for the sake of it so you can close tickets and move on.

That's the difference between a good supporter and a bad one - he might know everything about the os and hosting, but simply said: that's not enough!

I agree Gurudev, it definatly goes both ways. :(

I also disagree with netsolutions. The customer is not always right. 99% Of the time I let them think they are right though. Telling people they are not right usually upsets them for some reason ;)

But on two separate occasions I have informed customers that we would be terminating their hosting at the end of the month and politely asked them to find another host as they (the customers) and us were not "compatible" and it would be in the best intrest of both if they moved on.

This was not because they asked questions, this was not because they didn't know how to upload websites, this was not because they complained. On the contrary, I like those customers. Help them out with simple tasks like learning them to upload a site or put a bulletin board on their site for them and they are customers for life.

No, they were rude, threatening, obnoxious, unreasonable beyond believe, swearing, cursing. In short: they had a few loose connections in their brain.

Those customers were definatly not right, and I have no problem with letting them know.

If a customer cusses and swears, reply back with "We will not honor support requests that contain swearing or personal insults".

Would the above work?

Originally posted by Skeptical
If a customer cusses and swears, reply back with "We will not honor support requests that contain swearing or personal insults".

Would the above work?

Nope, that would just piss them off even more, you have to learn how to handle customers who are mad, sometimes it can be for good reason, you learn to listen, which is the major part of dealing with them. Let them vent, and console them that you are doing the best that you can, if your calm, rational, and seem trustworthy, they will usually settle down, and be rational.


I've had many of my best sales, from the most irrate customers.....

Originally posted by Pilgrim


Hi Gurudev,

It's not the complaining. It's also not that we feel all high and mighty. I spend a great deal writing long and helpful email answers, even anticipating what questions might be raised by my answer and answering them in that very same email.

Unless you have ever worked at a helpdesk or were in any way related to customer service I'm not sure if I can make you really understand what kind of people are out there, but I'll try.

This thread is not about people like you. From your post I can see I can reason with you. Teach you. Help you get your site online. Fix the problems.

With some people, that is just plain impossible. From the moment they sign on they scream, shout, curse and threaten you. They act like you are the devil come to make their lives miserable. THEY know what they are doing and you don't.

And no matter how polite you are, no matter how well you explain everything to them, no matter how much you help them out it just is no good, because we are EVIL, full of **** and out to scam them.

I am not a native English speaker, and I can tell you that since I went into the hosting business I have learned a LOT of new swear words, most of them cannot be repeated here and some of them I am not even sure of what they mean...

A real example (edited a little because minors visit this board ;)

What kind of scam company you running? Signed up hosting 2 hours ago and searched your site vor a place to login. THERE IS NO ****INGLOGIN. DO YUO ENJOY ANOYING YOUR CUSOMTERS?WHAT KIND OF SCAM IS THIS. IVE WAISTED ENOUGH TIME ON YR SITE GOING TO REAL HOSTING COMPANY NOW. LEMMME KNOW IF YOU PRICKS NEED HELP PUTTING LINK ON YOUR SITE TO LOGINTO SERVER!

After our email explaining him that he would either need an FTP program to login to his site, or upload it with Frontpage (he choose FP extension) he emailed:

SCREW YOU. ULOADED SITE NOT WORKING. YUOUR COMPANY IS THE BIGGEST SCAM ON THE INTERNET. IM REPORTING YOU TO THE BETTER BUSINES BUREAU

After carefully explaining him that he uploaded his files in the wrong directory and putting them in the right directory for him as well as point him to the info in the setup email where it told him in what directory to put the files he mailed me:

IM GETTING SICK OF THIS YOUR CGI NOT WORKING WHY MY CGI NOT WORKING I AM PAYING FOR CGI FIX IT

After checking his site, I discovered he had uploaded a bulletinboard script Was something like YBB.? Anyway, although I am not familiar with that I noticed he had not edited a single line in the config.pl file. So I did that for him. Still didn't work. Seemed he also did not set permissions right and didn't upload all the files that were needed to make it run. His reply:

I READ INSTRUCITONS DON'T NEED TO CHANGE ANYTHING. THIS BB WORKS ON MY OTHER SITE WHY NOT YOURS? YOU SUCK GIV ME CGI

The next day I received a report from spamcop about his site sending out spam emails. I politely told him that was in violation of article 12 of the TOS and asked him not to do it again as we would have to suspend his site the next time we got a complaint.

The following email was so full of swear words, that if I take the swear words out, there would be no msg left.
Suffice it to say that he told us he was going to a more "e-commere friendly" host, that we were the biggest scam on the internet, that he was going to sue us for everything we owned and that he was reporting us to the BBB and do a chargeback on his creditcard immediatly. Our services sucked, our servers were broken, his cgi didn't work and instead of giving support we did something "sexual" with eachother all day.

Now THAT is the kind of customer this thread is about.


Hmm, :eek: that sounds familiar to me. :eek:
Wasn't his name J.G. ?

What i would like to see and would be a good idea is a completely independent website ANY host can forward a customer that doesnt know how to tie their shoes or send an email, a good intro on that site would be


"You have been forwarded here because your current hosting provider feels you need to learn about the different tehcnial aspects of hosting a website"

then break that into general issues like domains...dns...etc...

no advertisting or anything like that, completely independent that tells the customer they are dumber then they think they are :)

Originally posted by Pilgrim

No, they were rude, threatening, obnoxious, unreasonable beyond believe, swearing, cursing. In short: they had a few loose connections in their brain.

Those customers were definatly not right, and I have no problem with letting them know.

Those are the customers to drop. Their bad vibes infect others within the office, and causing those support staff that want to help much discomfort ( most great support people I've meet don't have very thick skin ).

I give you alot of credit. You value your staff over your pocket. that's a great sign that your firm, over the long term should be one of the survivors.

-Sqposter / Michael

I agree with the comment "the customer is not always right" and I have had my share of those "not-right" customers! :stickout

I think the key is to let them know gently, and offer options to them. I had one customer who was consistently late in paying, yet demanded 24-hour turnaround for modifications to his site (design client). After politely offering that he may be happier with a different designer, the guy has proven to be a very loyal client that now pays on time, and is very understanding of my position as a busy developer with more clients than just HIM.

Originally posted by AlaskanWolf
What i would like to see and would be a good idea is a completely independent website ANY host can forward a customer that doesnt know how to tie their shoes or send an email, a good intro on that site would be


"You have been forwarded here because your current hosting provider feels you need to learn about the different tehcnial aspects of hosting a website"

then break that into general issues like domains...dns...etc...

no advertisting or anything like that, completely independent that tells the customer they are dumber then they think they are :)

I agree that it's a good idea. I'd like somewhere to send our customers. Plus there doesn't really seem to be any sites that have all of this beginner information in one place.

Originally posted by Skeptical
If a customer cusses and swears, reply back with "We will not honor support requests that contain swearing or personal insults".

Would the above work?

Well, it generally makes them more angry, but sometimes it's the only thing you can possibly do.

What we do is that if a customer submits a written request (e-mail or trouble-ticket) that contains such things, we usually will just ignore the swearing and insults and just answer the message the way we would any other.

On the other hand, on the rare occasions when we have a customer call on the phone and talk to one of our staff that way, all of our staff who work on the phone have full authorization to hang up on the customer if they do that. In cases where that is necessary, we immediately send an e-mail to that customer saying:

"Dear <customer's name>,

We apologize for the fact that our telephone service representative found it necessary to disconnect your call. Our telephone representatives have authorization to disconnect any call if the customer becomes beligerent, rude, or personally insulting to our staff. I think you will agree that no person should have to take unreasonable abuse, and as such our policy on such calls is clear.

If you would like us to address the issues you are having with your account, we are happy to do so. But please be aware that we are a professional company with professional staff, and we expect our customers to behave in a similar professional behavior.

Thank you."

Usually this solves it. Sometimes it doesn't. But we have had situations where valued employees have quit their jobs because they wouldn't deal with a particularly uncouth customer - and as such, a policy such as ours is essential. I'd rather lose a bad customer than a good employee.

Jason

Originally posted by Jason Ellis

I'd rather lose a bad customer than a good employee.

Some great words of wisdom, Jason!! :) I like your approach regarding the email follow up and the wording of that message. Very professional, and impressive I think.

Originally posted by AlaskanWolf
"You have been forwarded here because your current hosting provider feels you need to learn about the different tehcnial aspects of hosting a website"

But.... how will you get him to read the site? :stickout
No matter how good your FAQ is, there are always some who don't read it.

Originally posted by Walter


But.... how will you get him to read the site? :stickout
No matter how good your FAQ is, there are always some who don't read it.

Well if he continues to send you the dumb questions and claims how you are costing him $3.9 million dollars every time his website goes down, I suggest kindly ask notify him that his account will be terminated and its best he find the "right" company that can understand his needs

1 guy tired to sue me for $100 (HAHAHAHA) until his lawyer told him it wasnt worth it because we told him he should find a new company to host with because we feel that he requires more time to deal with then other hosts

Right now, heres a client of mine that seems not have ANY CLUE and i have to giggle everytime i read


I sent him this: You can access your Shopping Cart by going to your online control panel (login information is in your confirmation email) and click on the Shopping cart logo (title the same) and you can install the Agora cart there.

(2nd email then told him its on the 6th row etc)


gary maybe your misunderstanding me with this shopping cart thing I said i do not understand in what control panel the control panel on my computer ???? where is the control panel and how do i get there ?????? SIXTH ROW OF WHERE ???? I GUESS I JUST DONT UNDERSTAND

Originally posted by AlaskanWolf
said i do not understand in what control panel the control panel on my computer ???? where is the control panel and how do i get there ??????

LOL! :D

...and yet these people always manage to figure out how the order form works. Go figure.

--Tina

On the flip side I remember a customer of mine that was a nun. Her org put up a simple website. She did really well at first but started to have some trouble and it was a pleasure to help her. I guess the difference with her was that she was patient and was actually trying to learn and understand.

Originally posted by Fred
I guess the difference with her was that she was patient and was actually trying to learn and understand.


Those are the ones I LOVE to help! :)

--Tina

Originally posted by The Prohacker
Nope, that would just piss them off even more, you have to learn how to handle customers who are mad, sometimes it can be for good reason, you learn to listen, which is the major part of dealing with them. Let them vent, and console them that you are doing the best that you can, if your calm, rational, and seem trustworthy, they will usually settle down, and be rational.


I've had many of my best sales, from the most irrate customers..... You are wise beyond your years. ;)

Originally posted by AffordableHost
...and yet these people always manage to figure out how the order form works. Go figure.

--Tina :D LMAO, no doubt!! :D

The most common complaint we receive is

"None of the images are loading on my site, please fix this!"

So it appears that the hosting company is to blame for the fact that the customer has either not uploaded any images or the image path is to a location on their hard drive!

We even had one customer insisting we rename the server to drive letter C: otherwise his images wont load??

After further explanation he still insisted it was our fault and any other host would just do as they asked!

Back to the addage "You do not buy a car then ask the salesman to teach you to drive" alternatively "Do you buy a driving lesson then say Where's my car?"

I just received an email from a new client complaining that her images weren't loading...a quick peek at the source code revealed that her pages were trying to call up images in her "My Documents" folder!! :rolleyes:

And she's getting mad at ME because it's not working!!!

The funniest aspect about this whole scenario is the fact that she just completed a semester-long course on Dreamweaver--taught by one of my local competitors!! :D

Man, I wish I could figure out a way to capitalize on THAT!

My current two favorite customers are:

#1: knows a lot about IRC, nukes and exploits. Knows nothing about hosting, doesn't even know if his DSL connection is on a static IP, refuses to read ANY of the online manuals we provide, so basically we have to copy/paste the manuals each time he asks something

#2: moved from a different host, got a new domain name in the process, but all his links are hard-coded with the old domain name, so he keeps accessing his old host; we told him many times that he should update his links; complains that our speed is plain as crappy as his previous host

It's ok, it's ok.

My most recent favorite was an angry customer who claimed to have 5 bazzilion years of programming experience...was on the internet BEFORE the world wide web...knows unix systems inside and out...knows how all of this stuff is SUPPOSED to work...if we can't get our act together he would be happy to show US how to operate a hosting business...SO WE BETTER FIX HIS ACCOUNT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!! After some brief investigation, on my part:

I said "What are you using for the 'servername'

He says "My domain name!!!!!!"

I said "Hmmm. WHOIS shows it pointing to (insert former host name here)"

He says "Wow. I must really look like an idiot, huh?"

:D

--Tina

Originally posted by hurtdidit
Tina--the day one of us finds a surefire method to deal with such problem clients without pissing them off or annoying us to death, I think we should file a patent and go into business as consultants! :D

Wow, where can we file such a patent....
Just kidding... ;)

I guess the most import thing to do with such customes is to setup a temporary subdomain for them e.g. theirname.yourhostingcompany.com till the time the domain is activiated. And then tell them all they can do with their shining new website... like put up their photo.... They usually appriciate it and thankyou for all the great help.....

I guess we too must understand them a bit...

Have a great day :)

regards amar

Originally posted by AGUK

After further explanation he still insisted it was our fault and any other host would just do as they asked!


Yup, it's weird but they always refer to other hosts who can do what you can't. Other hosts seem all to be able to pull off impossible stunts like making sure the DNS propagates within minutes or running bulletin board cgi scripts without having to set the correct settings in the settings file.

Tell me, oh other hosts... How doest thou do this ? :D

WOW and I thought I had a few insane clients. Thank goodness that out of a few hundred we only have around 5 'unreal' clients.

A few of my stories ;)

1. This guy signs up for a $5 plan.
A few minutes later (like 15 minutes) this guy emails our billing dept. and says "Please cancel 'me' account, yous people are very slow in settings up my account". Then we do just that. Approximately 45 minutes later he signs up again and cancels his account AGAIN! My billing deparment is like, 'make up your friggin mind buddy!'. Around 3 days later he finally decides to signup again. Since then we get a support ticket from him EVERYDAY, he complains that his HTML pages dont render properly and that its OUR FAULT! :eek:

2. Another person signs up for a Linux account. Now we dont offer Microsoft SQL 2000 on that platform. That is clearly stated on our shared plans page. Once his account is working he demands why MSSQL isnt working? We told him that we dont offer it on Linux as it's clearly stated on our plans page and that if he needs MSSQL he should shift to Windows. He REFUSES to do that (we said it would cost him NOTHING) and then he says that "You changed your plan offering, the time I signed up it WAS offered!" Then he threatens to sue us and report us to the BBB for changing our offering. After receiving around 15 emails full of trashy words my support team finally got tired and refunded + cancelled his account without waiting for him to contact us. We then mailed him and told him his account had been cancelled.

3. Another person who apparantely runs a HUGE business on a $6 plan got upset because the server was rebooting (approx. 30-50 seconds of downtime). He said he'd lost atleast 50 or more sales!! And that we cost him thousands of dollars!! :eek: He said that in future you must email me every time a server reboots otherwise he'd sue us (yeah heard that before). :)

4. This one is a bit offtopic but nonetheless interesting :) This person has been considering our service for about 2 months now. Every day he mails us and asks us exactly ONE question ! :) We usually respond within 15 minutes of an email (everytime), and each time after the response he says your support is very slow and then he sends a URL for the most trashiest designed website which looks like its run by a chimpanzee (and designed by one) and says, "They can respond within 5 minutes!".

I've got tons of other stories which I'll throw in later if I have some time ;)

Regards,
Asher.

we are happy to give support within reason but immediatly cut the cord on the pain in the behinds that dont read our setup directions which are verbose. most support is by email that saves lots of time..

regarding credit card mischief, when a client is rebilled and the credit card is declined we usually suspend immediately and ask questions later. this is business! go to burger king and get a whopper without first paying- no mercy there either.

our recent big laugh was an account that was asked kindly to leave after the third credit card was declined upon renewl billing. he flammed us in an email and stated he went to another host as we suggested. two days later he asked us to modify his dns, but he didnt purchse the domain through us. our reply was kind, as an after thought i wanted to use every explicative in our reply.

wasnt worth the time, water off a ducks back

gretta

I've got some wacky customers. So wacky that none of them, technically, are customers. Just website visitors. But they don't sign up! None of them! Zero signups! Talk about customers from the other side of realiy. :rolleyes:

Originally posted by appletreats
I've got some wacky customers. So wacky that none of them, technically, are customers. Just website visitors. But they don't sign up! None of them! Zero signups! Talk about customers from the other side of realiy. :rolleyes: :eek:Whoa . . . . Customers so far on the other side of reality they're not even customers. :rolleyes:



:D