[Hidden-tech] quickbooks technician needed

[Ira Bryck]

Thanks- interesting and makes sense 

Of course, excellent tech support also supports the revenue stream of a company, and is a cost of sales that should not be skimped on. Case in point, I’m considering alternative software, because the tech people can’t solve my problem without selling a $365 support subscription to solve a problem in a $180 software purchase.

Ira
 


    Actually, the "Tech Support" staff are the people who are not good enough to
    be actuall developers (real programmers). :-( That is, they are "cheap". Tech
    Support is a money *losing* part of a software company -- unless the company
    is only offering *paid* tech support (eg a service contract like RedHat
    offers), Tech Support is an expense without a revenue stream, so software
    companies try to minimize the costs -- eg with low-paid staff that primarily
    deal with FAQ type issues with formula responses. Anything outside of that box
    gets you refered to paid support (in house or third party).
    
    One common feature of *open source* projects is that there is often a mailing 
    list (or forum) that connects you with the actual developers (the software 
    people who actually wrote the code and understand it extreemly well).  (Yes, 
    the techies might not write the best documentation and sometimes have a hard 
    time explaining what the code does, in *layman's* terms, but if there is a 
    problem, it will likely get quick attention and not be sat on for 6 months by 
    the marketing people and the developers won't be busy implementing some cute 
    and useless UI feature dreamed up by the marketing people.)
    
    > 
    > 
 
 

On 2/23/17, 2:23 PM, "Robert Heller" <heller at deepsoft.com> wrote:

    At Thu, 23 Feb 2017 18:11:59 +0000 Ira Bryck <ira at fambizpv.com> wrote:
    
    > 
    > Content-Language: en-US
    > 
    > 
    > The "they" is quickbooks technical support, supposedly a level higher than
    > the first people you speak to (who couldn't solve it)
    > 
    > It backs up every time I quit, and they're saying it's not corrupted, but is
    > damaged, most likely from a power or connectivity interruption. You'd
    > think a huge software company would expect such things, and also, they're
    > saying they've rarely seen this.
    > 
    > The cynical side of me agrees that they are salespeople in techies'
    > clothing.
    
    Actually, the "Tech Support" staff are the people who are not good enough to
    be actuall developers (real programmers). :-( That is, they are "cheap". Tech
    Support is a money *losing* part of a software company -- unless the company
    is only offering *paid* tech support (eg a service contract like RedHat
    offers), Tech Support is an expense without a revenue stream, so software
    companies try to minimize the costs -- eg with low-paid staff that primarily
    deal with FAQ type issues with formula responses. Anything outside of that box
    gets you refered to paid support (in house or third party).
    
    One common feature of *open source* projects is that there is often a mailing 
    list (or forum) that connects you with the actual developers (the software 
    people who actually wrote the code and understand it extreemly well).  (Yes, 
    the techies might not write the best documentation and sometimes have a hard 
    time explaining what the code does, in *layman's* terms, but if there is a 
    problem, it will likely get quick attention and not be sat on for 6 months by 
    the marketing people and the developers won't be busy implementing some cute 
    and useless UI feature dreamed up by the marketing people.)
    
    > 
    > 
    > Ira Bryck
    > Family Business Center of Pioneer Valley
    > 447 West Street, Amherst, MA 01002
    > www.fambizpv.com<http://www.fambizpv.com/>   413-835-0810
    > 
    > 
    > From: <hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net> on behalf of Ed Bride <Ed at edbride-pr.com>
    > Date: Thursday, February 23, 2017 at 11:16 AM
    > To: "Hidden tech Rich Roth, moderator" <hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net>
    > Subject: Re: [Hidden-tech] quickbooks technician needed
    > 
    > Just curious: who is the “they” that are offering tech support? Is it Quicken, or a third party?
    > 
    > Related: do you backup your files every time you use QB? If so, were both your primary and backup files damaged?
    > 
    > Ed
    > 
    > From: hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net [mailto:hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net] On Behalf Of Kiernan Gulick-Sherrill
    > Sent: Thursday, February 23, 2017 9:31 AM
    > To: Ira Bryck
    > Cc: Hidden-Tech Tech
    > Subject: Re: [Hidden-tech] quickbooks technician needed
    > 
    > Ira,
    > 
    > I would personally be skeptical of who you are speaking to at that point. There are a lot of semi legit or not legit at all companies out there pretending to be tech support for companies that are just trying to sign people up. What you describe sounds kind of like one of those.
    > 
    > We absolutely work on QuickBooks issues for Mac if you want to bring it in for us to diagnose and repair. Our rates are way less than that as we charge by the hour and can't imagine it taking anywhere near long enough to rack up that kinda bill.
    > 
    > Thanks,
    > Kiernan Gulick-Sherrill
    > Green Earth Computers - Computer & Smartphone Repair
    > 20a Crafts Ave
    > Northampton, MA 01060
    > www.greenearthpc.us<http://www.greenearthpc.us>
    > 413-282-8324
    > -----------------------
    > 
    > See what people are saying -- Check us out on Yelp: http://bit.ly/GEPCYELP
    > 
    > On Feb 23, 2017 7:44 AM, "Ira Bryck" <ira at fambizpv.com<mailto:ira at fambizpv.com>> wrote:
    > Hello- my quickbooks 2011 for Mac kept quitting; followed their recommendation to upgrade to 2016, same problem; now they say upgrade to 2017, or pay $364 for one year of tech support, so they can use 3rd party tools to fix damage to files (as they diagnose- not corrupted, but damaged- from power interruption?) – they are really pushing the tech support, and wondering if there’s any local, less expensive, less vested interests person in the area?
    > 
    > 
    > Ira Bryck
    > Family Business Center of Pioneer Valley
    > 447 West Street, Amherst, MA 01002
    > www.fambizpv.com<http://www.fambizpv.com/>   413-835-0810
    > 
    > 
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