I hate how customer support is handled these days..

Pola0502ds · Mar 22, 2017

What happened to the days of being able to call in to have a question answered? Everything is "Submit a ticket and we will get to you when we can" even if its an emergency. Most companies you can't even find a listed telephone number for support and probably 80% of questions can be answered within 5 minutes or less. And what really stinks is getting an email that says "do this, and this, and this, try that, and report back to us with your finding, we will advise on how to proceed" and your on the east coast and your support is on the west coast. I get it, the online support system sure does have its benefits. I love being able to reach out to these conpanies on this forum, facebook, email, etc.. But it has its downside too. My situation for example. My Neptune 1Link crapped the bed Sunday night which meant my wavs were dead and i have a reef tank. We all know how important flow is. I contact Neptune the following morning and describe the situation by email, they get back to me a few hours later with instructions on how to diagnose the problem. I respond and request a phone number so that I can call them back with my findings instead of responding by email and waiting for a response with another set of instructions. I am told that the next time they would be available to speak on the phone is Wednesday - Friday this week (Keep in mind i was told this on Monday with no flow in my tank). I responded telling them i have a reef tank and its an emergency and all i got was basically a response that stated other people have emergencies too and that i would still have to wait. After i got that i just went out and purchased a new Powerhead. In the meantime we schedule a phone support session for today at 6:20. I tried rushing home from picking up my kids and get a speeding ticket! Ugh! Im just ranting right now because im upset with the situation. I understand Neptune has a process for support and im not upset with them. I love the conpany, will buy from them again, and would recommend to anyone. Neptune is right, they had plenty of other people ahead of me that had emergencies. Ive always had great CS from them but I just don't like how support is handled these days, from most conpanies. After our support session it was fixed and i think it may have took 5-10 minutes max. Meanwhile, I purchased a new powerhead and have a speeding ticket for a 51 in a 30 which won't be cheap.

DLHDesign · Mar 22, 2017

I'm sorry for your troubles; they are for sure frustrating to go through.

At least now you have a backup to your powerheads for when (not if) they fail again. Always good to have backups for critical equipment!

reefwiser · Mar 22, 2017

There are only so many support staff for any company and 24/7 support is not easy to provide. Perhaps companies need to charge extra for 24/7 support for users. Many Computer companies do that. You pay extra for support and easy replacement of broken equipment.

Pola0502ds · Mar 23, 2017

reefwiser said:
There are only so many support staff for any company and 24/7 support is not easy to provide. Perhaps companies need to charge extra for 24/7 support for users. Many Computer companies do that. You pay extra for support and easy replacement of broken equipment.

Thats a good idea, paying extra for 24/7 support. Conpanies can have someone on call and since everything is done over a computer they could work from home

And shame on me for not having a extra powerhead ready so it wouldnt of been such a urgent issue.

DLHDesign · Mar 23, 2017

Pola0502ds said:
Thats a good idea, paying extra for 24/7 support. Conpanies can have someone on call and since everything is done over a computer they could work from home

Unfortunately, if you need someone on-call 24/7 (or usually just outside normal business hours), you still have to pay them a full-time wage (usually more). Which means that the company ends up paying someone to sit there for most of the time. In general, the gains don't justify the costs - not unless the company were to charge so much for the service that people would not end up paying for it. It's not a matter of getting more people on the service either - as you sell more support contracts, you have to hire more people to sit around for more time than they actually work. On top of that, you have the challenges of training and managing people that are working outside of business hours.

Pola0502ds said:
And shame on me for not having a extra powerhead ready so it wouldnt of been such a urgent issue.

I'm sorry if I implied this at all - it was not my intent. I was just trying to capture the "silver lining" of the situation...

Pola0502ds · Mar 23, 2017

DLHDesign said:
Unfortunately, if you need someone on-call 24/7 (or usually just outside normal business hours), you still have to pay them a full-time wage (usually more). Which means that the company ends up paying someone to sit there for most of the time. In general, the gains don't justify the costs - not unless the company were to charge so much for the service that people would not end up paying for it. It's not a matter of getting more people on the service either - as you sell more support contracts, you have to hire more people to sit around for more time than they actually work. On top of that, you have the challenges of training and managing people that are working outside of business hours.

I'm sorry if I implied this at all - it was not my intent. I was just trying to capture the "silver lining" of the situation...

No you didn't, it's true though. Our job as reefers are to make sure we keep the tank in a condition that will maintain life no matter what the situation is and that includes having backup equipment. I just don't have a ton of money to have one of everything extra on hand.