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Discuss The Industry
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41

Thanks. Have I missed any communication on that? :slight_smile:

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42

I dont think so, I think it was not communicated in any public topic.

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43

Support is handled by a (big) subcontractor (ZenDesk), so I’m afraid you can nudge here as much as you want, it probably won’t help much–in this specific case.

The “you can also call us” thing is because phones can be absolutely vital for some people (it could be your only contact with the outside world), and in this case going through the usual slow procedure won’t do. In this case you are supposed to be able to call, in the quite unlikely case your issue can be solved by phone, and at least it eliminates the week of waiting for the first answer after the automated reply.

44

Support team still is from Fairphone, and they should be able to influence what is send on their behalf by a contractor platform.

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45

Ain’t ZenDesk not just the software they use to handle support cases?

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46

That’s true, Zendesk is a software.

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47

Hey! Thank you for flagging this. It seems we had one errant email going out from us that still mentioned the option to reach us by phone. As mentioned in the post above, all requests will now happen through our virtual customer support desk, where you can live chat with someone from Fairphone. We hope this helps. Have a great day!

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48

Guys, just a thought.

I have seen on this forum voices against AI, and in favour of AI, for all good and understandable reasons and in the beginning I was really in favour of FP running the support operated by human agents.

But recently I have had a really good experience with AI assisted support which led me to reconsider.

Still, I would not have mentioned that if not for a very bad situation with FP support at the moment. Chat availability severely limited, unbelievably long waiting time for the reply to the request (weeks instead of days), feelings of frustration and venting shared over the forum.

Now, I have had a very good and stable experience with the support but I can’t help but notice the vibe. Plus I am not sure how temporary this situation is.

So, just a thought, would it not make sense to use chat bots as a supplementary, 24 hours service? Guiding customers through the website, clarifying terms and conditions, asking for additional information and potentially helping with running the tests?

I have no experience in running such a service and estimating the implementation costs. Perhaps this is the huge operation and the risks outweigh the gains. Would love to hear your thoughts then.

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49

i will like to see a Fairphone chatbot how can handle the regular questions that are easy to answer like the thing how are already explained on the Fairphone suport page.

but please don’t go for a IA chatbot. just the traditional one how is around for years and is working well for most companies.
one that just follow a programmed script (wat can be published by Fairphone “transparency”).

and will be important that it is easy to bypass if the customer don’t like to talk to a bot.

At the same time i think that investment will not make that much of a difference, now Fairphone have made the link to this form more visible than the seport link. users here can answer much more complex questions.

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50

Unfortunately this is survival bias: One good experience doesn’t mean AI will solve Fairphone’s support issues, especially in those cases we see people complaining about in this forum.

The problem is that a customer with a problem is expecting some action (help, repairs) from support, action which a chatbot can’t initiate, because it neither knows anything (about anything actually), nor can it initiate a physical repair/warranty procedure.
It can only talk, which isn’t very helpful when you want your phone fixed. :frowning_face:

A chatbot, AI-driven or not, usually only serves to annoy the victim long enough till (s)he gives up. It’s indeed a way to reduce support load, but not really the best one. IMHO.

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51

Thanks.
That was one of my concerns, perhaps should have mentioned it.
In many cases the bot needs to refer a customer to a human and it does not help if a human is so overwhelmed with work that they would answer next month.

But there was a case on a forum, someone could not get the spare part within a warranty. It’s not such a big matter for a company, you could have automated such a process (still, in a humble opinion of a laywoman :slightly_smiling_face: )

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52

There are indeed always possible solutions when you have the will to look for one.
The problem here is the apparent lack of will though, and there is no technical cure for that. :frowning_face:

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53

Thanks.

I do not share your general overview of the company (prefer to keep my rosy glasses on) though of course I understand where you’re coming from.

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54

I envy you. :grinning:

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55

Hi,
I been on the live chat for 2.5 hrs now with no response. This is my third attempt at contacting Customer Service since the 17th March by both email and chat. Please either reintroduce phones or get a system that works.

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56

They first have to hire some employees. It seems that there is hardly anybody left.

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