Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!microsoft!davevi
From: davevi@microsoft.UUCP (Dave Vineberg)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Microsoft OnLine
Keywords: OnLine
Message-ID: <5743@microsoft.UUCP>
Date: 18 May 89 15:49:30 GMT
References: <1247@netxcom.UUCP>
Reply-To: davevi@microsoft.UUCP (Dave Vineberg)
Organization: Microsoft Corp., Redmond WA
Lines: 72

To: uunet!seismo!sundc!netxcom!dlarsen
Subject: Re: Microsoft OnLine
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
In-Reply-To: <1247@netxcom.UUCP>
Organization: Microsoft Corp., Redmond WA
Cc: 
Bcc: 


I am a support manager for Windows. I am interested in the comments here.
We have done alot of work to improve the quality of the service that we
provide. We have made major investments in software and hardware to insure
that the quality of support that we provide is in line with the quality
of our other products.
 
There is a major difference between the type of support that you purchase
via Online and the type of support that you get here or on the other forums.
That difference is accountability.
Now on Online you are asked to comment on the quality of the service that
you recieve. If you respond that the service did not meet your standards
then a support manager will be giving you a call to find out what happened.
As a line manager I must provide reports on the outcome of these calls to
my management. The visibility of your satisfaction has been really increased.

Yes with Dial there were both system and attitude problems. On a number
of occasions responses were delayed because of software failures.
Since we knew that support would be an essential component of the
success of the OS/2 and Windows SDK we made these major investments
and we really have improved.

To clarify one point I manage support for Windows (the retail product)
and Excel rather than the SDK. However I will forward mail concerning
support issues to the appropriate manager.

My participation in this forum is my own initiative and not an official
visit. I do want you all to know that we really do care about the quality
of the support that we provide and we are doing things to improve it.

Sure it would be nice to give support away for free and in fact we provide
an extraordinary amount of free support. We have 50 technicians in the
Windows and Excel support teams alone. However at a certian point you have
to draw the line. All together we have over 230 people working in our
product support services departments. If we were to provide free support
on all of the issues that came up we would really start affecting our
companies bottom line. The worst support is no support and if there was
no Microsoft we all would be in a pretty bad spot.

At what point do you draw the line?
We made the decision that we would not provide coding assistance other
than syntax explanations for free. In other words if we can explain the
situation over the telephone we will and all it costs you is the price
of a telephone call. In fact we will answer letters concerning coding
issues however out paying customers come first when we assign priorities.

From the outside it is easy to imagine that we have unlimited resources
here however we don't. Developing the complex systems that we are working
on now is not cheap and investment in future products always looks better
to investors than increasing the cost of goods sold by adding additional
expenses to our current products. The technicians here work hard to
provide fast response to the complex issues that our customers bring us.
We do care how successful you are and we are working to insure that success.
From the top on down we have a reall commitment to providing the best support
in the world...While at the same time not breaking the bank..

I know that there are those of you out there ready to flame but please
try and be realistic in your requests.
Rather than going on longer than I already have I'll follow up later.
Thanks for bearing with this overly long message but I felt that I just
had to respond. Remember these are just my opinions and not official
Microsoft statements.
Thanks
David Vineberg