I’m
considering upgrading to Microsoft’s new Office 365, but as the way it works is
so different from its predecessors, I did some research and found an issue I
needed clearing up before I could download the trial. Slightly technical, but I would expect sales
staff to know the answer, just as I would expect a car dealer to know whether a
car used diesel, petrol or LPG, or an estate agent to know how the central
heating in a house works. I would have asked it in the forum, but inexplicably
Microsoft won’t allow you to post without registering the software first.
So I browse
the Office 365 website and find the link for live chat. Below is a paraphrased account of the
exchange, with names changed to protect the guilty.
WELCOME TO MICROSOFT
HELP. ALL OUR OPERATORS ARE BUSY. YOU ARE NUMBER ‘1’ IN THE QUEUE.
WELCOME TO MICROSOFT
HELP. ALL OUR OPERATORS ARE BUSY. YOU ARE NUMBER ‘1’ IN THE QUEUE.
WELCOME TO MICROSOFT
HELP. ALL OUR OPERATORS ARE BUSY. YOU ARE NUMBER ‘1’ IN THE QUEUE.
15 minutes
later I’m pretty sure that the help desk is manned by a solitary chap in
Pondicherry who’s popped out for a cup of tea.
Eventually:
Fred: Hi, I’m
Fred. Do you mind if I take a moment to review
your problem?
Me: Please
do! There’s little I hate more than
having to type in my question twice during live chats. Knock yourself out. I’ll carry on with my knitting.
Some
minutes pass. Fred, it seems, is a slow reader.
Fred: I
understand you’re having technical problems with your Office 365 web space
setup.
Blimey, is
it my English that’s dodgy, or is his?
My question is about Outlook.
Me: No, I
don’t own the product yet. I’m considering
updating and need to understand if Outlook 2013 can be configured to collect
mail in the same way that Outlook 2007 did, without going through Microsoft
servers.
Fred sends
a link to the German technical support page.
Me: This is
a pre-sales question and I don’t need German technical support. I don’t speak German.
Fred sends
a link to the Office 365 web site. The
same site I researched thoroughly and which contains the link to the live chat
I’m using now. Patronising? Insulting my
intelligence? Taking the piss?
Fred: Is
there anything else I can help you with today?
Me: Well,
you could answer the question.
Fred:
Me: Is
there anybody else there who might be able to help? It’s not really a technical
issue.
Fred:
Me: Are you
ill? If you can get to your keyboard, let me know where you are and I’ll try to
get an ambulance to you.
Fred
realises I’m not going to give up.
Fred: There’s
nobody else here who can help you, and I can’t help you because you’re in
Germany.
What? Microsoft
provides a link for live chat on a globally accessible site, without any
reference to restrictions, but they can’t help you if you’re in Germany? I think this might be more a case of won’t
because I have a feeling Fred can’t (won’t?) admit that he just doesn’t know
the answer.
Fred: The
German technical support team all speak fluent English.
Ah, now I
know Fred isn’t in Pondicherry because he’s clearly not on this planet if he thinks
German help desks all use fluent English speakers. Anyway, the German technical support site is in
German, so I’d have to find the right page and link before being able to
contact them.
Fred: Is
there anything else I can help you with today?
Me:
[censored]
In the
spirit of research, I find the right page on the German site and send an
e-mail. They respond in fluent English
with a toll-free telephone number. Which
doesn’t work. A little more research tells
me that that toll-free number is in the United States. Would they answer my questions? After all, I am in Germany.
On the
German technical pages there’s information (in German!) about an English-language
support number. I call it, press 2 for
English, get a whole raft of German information and requests for choices, and
then a German operator. To her credit
she puts me through to a nice Irish lady who can’t answer my question but does
give me toll free numbers for Denmark, the UK and Ireland in the hope of finding
somebody who speaks English and knows how Outlook 2013 works.
The result
is that I’m none the wiser and Microsoft are not likely to get my custom at the
moment. Don’t get me wrong, I rarely
have reason to need Microsoft technical support because their products mostly
just work, and when I have needed it, most of the time it’s been fine. But in a global world, without borders
(especially online), you can’t corral your customers into pens labeled “Germany”
or anywhere else, and refuse service or restrict services in one language to
users in one region.
Maybe I’ll
give Denmark a call. You never know …
