Time for a rant.

 

Lets say you buy a car. You get home and then you go out the next day to start your car and it does not start. You contact the dealer and they say, ya we can fix that for you but we will need to charge you to fix it. You would probably have the car towed to the dealer and get your money back right?

 

If that is the case then why do so many people accept poor software support as the norm.

 

Example. You purchase the latest version of an operating system from Microsoft install it and it does not work correctly. You then call Microsoft and they tell you, ya we can fix that for you but we will need to charge you for it. Then you pull out your credit card without even thinking twice about it.

 

I recently went through a scenario like this one with a product called Microsoft Visual Studio 2005. I installed it and it seemed to work but then it started to hang up at random times. Thus causing me to kill- the process and start over. At first this was just a little frustrating but I lived with it.

 

Then it started happening more and more.

Now I needed a fix. I contacted Microsoft and they told me I needed to open a new case for $275 to fix their product.

 

Now, before I continue here let me say this. The computer I am working on has nothing on it but Windows Vista and Microsoft's One Care Internet Firewall/AntiVirus.

 

It also has Microsoft's SQL tools as well. So this is a clean machine. With only Microsoft products installed. I'll say that again. It only has Microsoft's products installed.

 

It is also a brand new HP computer that came with Windows Vista installed. 

It has all patches installed. All 40+ operating system patches + other patches for Visual Studio etc.

 

In other words, it is setup according to Microsoft's own recommendations completely.

 

Now I open a case and pay them the outrageous support fee that cost almost as much as I paid for the product to begin with and now we start the troubleshooting phase of this endeavor.

 

I was called back from a person in India and he used a diagnostic tool that allowed him to view my computer in real time. He was actually able to see the application lockup and he did a dump- of all the processes running on the computer.

 

Then I needed to upload- these dumps to a website provided by him. It took about 2 hours to complete the upload- on a fast connection.

 

About 2  GB of information. Now the waiting begins.

 

24 hours later I get an email saying.

 

"Our CPR is analyzing the dumps and they haven’t found anything yet".

 

I replied with.

"Do you have any idea when or if you will find the problem?"

 

To which he replied with

"I have my CPR involved in this case and they have not found anything much informative."

 

Ok so what do I do now. He could not find anything. Does that mean I should just put up with the problem and take the $275 hit on my credit card and chalk it up to being stupid enough to pay someone to fix their own problems?

 

If you think for a minute that this is an isolated support problem, think again.

 

I had a similar issue with another product I was looking to use from a company called CuteSoft. They had an instant messenger program that you could use to embed into an interactive website.

 

I also owned a license to another product of theirs called CuteChat that I purchased three months back.

I downloaded the latest version of the Instant Messenger product for evaluation.

 

I attempted to get it working but there was a problem with it working with the version of CuteChat I was using.

I contact support via email because that was the only support option they offered.

 

I get an email back saying I need to upgrade my CuteChat to Version 4.0 to allow messenger to work.

 

I should say it took several weeks before this was divulged to me.

 

Anyway, I decided to bite the bullet and upgrade a working product to the latest version just so I could get another product working so I break out my credit card and upgrade CuteChat to version 4.0 for $149.

 

Now this is a complete re-write of the application so I need to change my application to work correctly with this new version. It takes this company 48 hours at minimum to answer any support emails.

 

So it took me about 2 1/2 weeks before I got the new version of CuteChat working. Now onto the reason I upgraded to begin with. I now needed to get the instant messenger working.

 

I was having some problems even getting out of the gate. The product just did not work period. Now I had a new problem. The trial license expired.

 

So I did not get it working yet and it has been over 30 days. I contact their support and I was told I needed to purchase the Instant Messenger because they could not issue another trial license.

 

I said ok and plunked down another $249 to get a product working that did not work. Now after numerous emails back and forth I determined that the product was really in fact vaporware and it was never going to work.  

 

Their support was so bad that I can not begin to tell you just how bad it was.

 

I will give you an example of one of the conversations and you can decide for yourself.

 

The name of the support guy is Adam and my name is Paul

 

Adam, I have sent you a copy of my configuration of the product. Is it correct? Do I need to load- any other kind of script to make this work?

 

I am having trouble getting it to work. When I try to send an instant message to another user that is on-line. It tells me the other user is off-line and it never popsup a window on the other computer. In other words it is just plain not working at all.

 

48 hours later he replied with:

Paul, If the other user is off-line. It will send an off-line message.

 

I replied with: 

I said the user is ONLINE. It is not working correctly. What am I missing here?

 

48 hours later he replied with:

Did you check the configuration?

 

I replied with:

Yes I did and I attached it to the first email I sent to you.

I will attach it to this email so you can verify it for me.

 

48 hours later I get this from him:

It looks ok.

 

I replied with:

Ok so what do you think the problem is?

 

48 hours later he replied with:

Have you checked your configuration?

 

I replied with:

 I give up please credit me for the purchase price of the product and I will go on my way.

 

48 hours later he replied with:

We can not offer a refund after a license file is generated.

 

I replied with:

No problem.

 

So 240 hours later which is about 10 days. I then called my credit card company and charged back every product I purchased from this company.

 

I decided to just write my own messenger instead.

 

So what do you do when the company that writes the software wants to charge you to fix their own product or offers support so bad you can not get it working in the first place?

 

I will tell you what you should do. Find a company that will support their products at their cost not yours.

 

I have always been a supporter of Microsoft's products because I use them all the time. But as of late, I am beginning to rethink my support of these products.

 

I now believe big companies like Microsoft have their days numbered. Maybe not today but in the long run.

 

I see a day when Open Source will rule the planet instead of Microsoft.

 

Why? Because the software is created by people. Not companies. All of these people are working to a common goal. To create- the best software they can. It is not about profits. It is about getting it right.

 

 

I used to think Open Source was a joke. But in retrospect I do see the light at the end of the tunnel.

 

I, for one, will be one of the first adopters of these new products from now on.

 

I will say that not all companies offer bad support. There are some companies that offer outstanding support and it is a welcome effort.

 

I need to give a big kudos to a company called Telerik that sells Radcontrols for ASP.NET.

 

They have a great product line with outstanding support and documentation.

 

If all companies that wrote software did it just half as good as them, it would be a much better world.

 

Companies like CuteSoft and Microsoft should take lessons from companies like Telerik.

 

Rant Complete! 

 

- Paul