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From: atreides@caladan.UUCP (System Administrator)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Apple Product-Customer Service (was: Re: Apple OS 7.0 - Cost?)
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Date: 3 Jan 90 03:20:37 GMT
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Organization: Caladan (Homeworld of House Atreides), Seattle. WA.
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In a recent article omh@cs.brown.edu (Owen M. Hartnett) writes, in reply
to an article from rewing@Apple.COM (Richard Ewing) re Apple support, or
lack thereof:
  | Frankly, speaking, there is no way that the current setup could
  | ever "maximize service to the customer."

I agree, and have always felt that Apple have tried to fob off the burden
of support, and lacked the intestinal fortitude to put money (the real key
here) behind a good product support service!

  | Guy Kawasaki used a running joke in his talks:  You want customer
  | support? Call 996-1010 (or whatever the main Apple number is)

[Many appropriate comments about Apples 'visionary' (1/2 :-) dealer
support network, deleted for brevity]

Apples dealer network has NEVER been support oriented.. that's why they
are dealers.. they sell computers.  Support sucks money from a dealer just
as easily as it would from Apple.  The only difference is that the dealer
network is not Apple, and could not possibly have the techinical knowledge
that could and should be grown at Apple.

  | Answer the user's calls.  Expedite the channel of support
  | instead of inhibiting it. If a customer has a problem, follow it up.
  | Think of the PR benefits, they'll pay for those 50 people fast! Sure,
  | you'll get a lot of calls like "What is the Finder?" but, once you've
  | answered them, you'll get a satisfied user who'll tell other ones.

I agree, but unfortunately I think you have seriously underestimated the
commitment that Apple would have to make if they were to undertake direct
support.

Support is a money pit, it always has been, and unless you sell your
support to your clients it will continue to be a money pit.  Apple
realised this many years ago and much to their clients chagrin, have been
staunchly defending thier continual bald faced ignorance of what thier
customers want for years!

Although Microsoft may not be the "ideal" example of product support (and
I shall not use it as such), they have a staff of over 300 product support
people to answer calls and mail!

Apple would need at LEAST this level of commitment to support it's
customers well.  I wonder how many they have in dealer support now?

It takes years to build a good product support network and Apple are years
behind in this field.

The bottom line is that no single person at Apple has the balls it would
take to commit Apple to a profit loss centre of this kind.  If there was,
it would be done!

  | >believe it or not, Apple's support organization does exist, and has
  | >a specific way to access it.  Make sure your dealer remembers
  | >how and when to use it.  I've even had to remeind certain dealers
  | >of its existence.  They can forget!

  | The above statements typify the quality of the support channel.

Total agreement!.  What a statement.. "They can forget!".. sheesh.. well I
guess Apple just leads by example!

  | Owen Hartnett

--
Stuart Burden
root@caladan.uucp
root@caladan.wa.com