To Phone or not to Phone

[XFS_Duke]

Vitelity is one of them...

 

[HostGuard]

Every time you make a call, you should be logging that in the relative ticket.

Likewise, when you send an email, follow it up with a call. Communication is key in any business.

Obviously though, you use common sense when either is more appropriate.

 

[javaj]

Umm, where are these $7 plans? I haven't seen any. Been browsing recently.

I cant vouge for any of these since I have never used them and prices may have changed since I last looked, somewhere around last july. But here is what I found looking now...

CallCentric:  500 minutes to USA, Canada, Puerto Rico. $6.95 per month.

Voip.ms:  $0.01 per minute US

FreePhoneLine.ca:  "As low as $0.02 per minute Canada and the US"

Depends upon how much you call really, but those are some pretty reasonable rates. Considering this is just my home phone I would probably only spend a few bucks a month.

 

[XFS_Duke]

I actually just signed up with Vitelity and they're pretty good... Testing them out now.

 

[javaj]

Vitelity is probably one of the earlier ones I looked at, but I'm holding out until gv's last dying breadth... its probably who I am going to go with too. Let us know how it works out.

 

[maounique]

I never called any provider. Not because of the fees, but I want all the things logged in a ticket. I also do not want to be recorded and the record placed some place risky.

Besides, unless you are renting servers, it is not worth the hassle, my 1 $ a month VPS is down ? Tough luck, move elsewhere, it is not wortht he hassle to open a ticket, usualy. All the data there is irrelevant I do not host anything important on such a VPS.

 

[ThePrimeHost]

Yea, good idea. What I tell my staff is to open the customers account and notate things. If they see it's going to be an issue then open a ticket for the customer with a description of the issue and if they have anything to add they can add it themselves... Normally people go Oh, ok, i'm good then... lol

Yes you want to document every interaction. It sounds like a pain but it's a good policy to follow.

Just an opinion based on experience,


I used to work as Linux sysadmin(the company have this policy where every staff is also customer service; so they publish everybody name, title and phone number extension) with some local web hosting that offer full range service from domain & shared hosting to dedicated & colocation.


My advise would be to either don't provide tech support through phone at all, or limit it to certain client(business/corporate). I can't recall how many times I spend half an hour to explain difference between hosting & domain, or IMAP & POP3, to shared hosting client who believe their hosting account is having problem due to their incompetence.


The worst part is shared hosting(not VPS nor dedi) client usually is the one who complaint and curse a lot. Why? because most of them don't understand enough and want it to just works(I blame Apple for this).


This is also one of the reason I quit, despite working with great team with great perks. The thickness of some is beyond me.


So I vote no for tech phone support. Maybe save it for sales & billing. Have some pity for your support staff, may god have mercy on their soul.


/rant

This is true. Some users just know enough to be dangerous and when they break things they take it out on techncial support.

We do the majority of our support via live chat / helpdesk. We do offer a toll free line for level 1 and general issues, however for the more serious issues we create a ticket for the caller and respond to them via that method. Trying to communicate long URL's over a phone is really not a efficient method of support at all.

 

[nunim]

... This is true. Some users just know enough to be dangerous and when they break things they take it out on techncial support. ...

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, generally any time someone tells me they're in the IT industry I cringe inside because I know it's going to be a long call. 

I hate IntoDNS, I've wasted too much time trying to explain to someone on the phone that it doesn't matter if your IPs are in the same subnet if you only have one VPS hosting your nameserver. 

 

[GoodHosting]

We've got a local-CA and a local-US number, and I publish my mobile for clients that need it.  We don't get many calls here, as none of the children/fraud/abusive clients have the balls to pick up a phone (no harshness intended, just pretty ironic.)  Our larger customers and business relations are all through Skype anyways.

Our local-US number and our toll free (not yet finalized) are through Skype Corporate.