How to NOT make a customer for life

Brian Ambrozy 27 Dec, 2008 at 1:36pm ET Article published in Tech

Tech guy has a basically horrible experience with Microsoft. Attn customer service people: Here’s what NOT to do.

Comments

27 Dec 2008 ~ 3:20pm Thrax I cannot even begin to explain how difficult it was to acquire replacement media for customers when I worked at Best Buy. The number was always buried or changing, or the rules regarding replacements seemed to vary based on who we called.

It was a nightmare. So many customers could have been so happy with Best Buy, their OEM, and Microsoft if MS had been willing to ship a 16 cent CD.
27 Dec 2008 ~ 3:22pm Snarkasm To be honest... I fail to see how customer service people had ANYTHING to do with that guy's experience. He never called them, he said so himself. He looked on MS and his manufacturer's web site for a replacement CD, he tried a friend's with his code, and then he just went straight to Linux without even trying to call MS and get his code reset or have them send him another disc.

I'm not saying they're doing it right, but you can't call out "customer service people" when he didn't interact with any.
27 Dec 2008 ~ 3:43pm magicmedicine Yeah this is more an issue of customer satisfaction than customer service.
28 Dec 2008 ~ 12:15am primesuspect I mean in the sense of, if you're in charge of customer service for your organization, pay attention. You guys are so semantic.....
28 Dec 2008 ~ 12:42am Snarkasm /me may, in fact, be a bit of a pedant.
28 Dec 2008 ~ 2:04am Thrax orly?
28 Dec 2008 ~ 3:25am DrLiam Taking care of your O/S CD is your responsibility. If you lose it, damage it, or anything else, then expect to break your regular routine to fix your mistake. Take responsibility.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/326246

(Took 5 seconds to find that.)

That's how I look at it. :/
5 Jan 2009 ~ 6:22pm krharrison I happen to be 'the guy' who lost his CD. I think the thing that pushed me over the edge is that the product key that Toshiba attached to the bottom of my laptop had been compromised.

I borrowed an XP cd from a friend, used the key that came with my system and was told it was invalid. DRM software working at it's best; stopping someone who legally purchased your software without really stopping anything else. It ended up being a pain for me (yes, I understand it was partially brought on by me losing the CD), but it probably would've been easier to just find it on bittorrent.

Either way, I've been using Ubuntu for 2 or 3 months now on my laptop, using it as pretty much a netbook (email, internet, twitter). It's opened up my knowledge base and I'm glad I went through the experience.

krharrison
http://krharrison.blogspot.com
5 Jan 2009 ~ 6:23pm Thrax Was his a copy of Windows XP retail? If so, the key on the bottom of your laptop is XP OEM, and it's incompatible.

Also, hello sir! @Thracks here.
5 Jan 2009 ~ 6:39pm Snarkasm Glad you found Ubuntu through the ordeal. Welcome to the community, both Linux and Icrontic.
5 Jan 2009 ~ 8:27pm krharrison

Thrax wrote:

Was his a copy of Windows XP retail? If so, the key on the bottom of your laptop is XP OEM, and it's incompatible.

Also, hello sir! @Thracks here.

More than likely it wasn't a compatible version, so I was relegated to the 'uninformed' bin.

And, back at ya @Thracks. Another reason Twitter is so cool, connecting with great people.
5 Jan 2009 ~ 10:02pm QCH Great people and a great place... that's Icrontic. Oh, and welcome krharrison.