Worst tech support/customer service helpline?

TestTransmission

Who do ye find to be the best and worst?
I find the revenue completely useless,saying that i regularly contact IBM and HP in the states and they are a shambles.
ESB are pretty good,always polite and sort out any issues fairly quickly.

Davidius

I don't like any of them. They never understand a word I'm saying.

Also NTL are terrible but I get the feeling that orestes will overlook this post.

Mr. CooL ICE

Eircoms automated service drives me nuts. I have gotten many an odd stare while I repeatedly shout "3" into the phone



Well, I hope it was automated...

Lockstep

I despise eircom.
My internet is atrocious and I've spent so long trying to get help from them but they don't give a damn.

The amount of times I've spent stuck on the phone waiting for some chap named Anto to gabble instructions at me at 100 miles an hour in a thick Dublin accent. They should just change the eircom helpline to a prerecorded message saying

"turn it off and then back on again. If that doesn't work, unplug it for the night"

Three has, by far, the worst tech support/customer service helpline ever. Meteor, however, have the best by far.

JavaBear

Ntl.

orestes

JavaBear wrote: »

Ntl.

How did it take until post 6 for them to be mentioned? Complete fukking disaster they are

Lockstep

agreed. I'm no fan of NTL

Davidius

orestes wrote: »

How did it take until post 2 for them to be mentioned? Complete fukking disaster they are

Fixed.

Lil' Smiler

I've heard a fair few people complaining about the O2 line for setting up their Blackberrys


I hate when you get a really crappy phone service and then they put you on hold to some terrible terrible music!!

james123

Sky is by far the worst ive ever had the misfortune to ring i was on hold for nearly an hour one time

Karoma

I'd say NTL, but I'm not too sure - I rarely get to speak to the twunts - it's usually a 5 minute wait before being diverted to voicemail that tells you that the line is open, but they're just not taking your call (And in fairness, most of the call centre agents were polite and semi-helpful; they're just let down by the rest of the service)

ED: Pre-empting the whiners: Yes, this has been done to death. Yes, it is usually in Consumer Issues and yes, it probably belongs there, but No, I won't move it. It's generic and boring enough.

orestes

Davidius wrote: »

I don't like any of them. They never understand a word I'm saying.

Also NTL are terrible but I get the feeling that orestes will overlook this post.

Ah foolish me, how could I possibly have missed that?

I reckon it might be cos I'm using ntl broadband and the page didn't load properly, think I'll give them a call and see what the problem is. Anyone know if their customer service is any good?

Lockstep

orestes wrote: »

Ah foolish me, how could I possibly have missed that?

I reckon it might be cos I'm using ntl broadband and the page didn't load properly, think I'll give them a call and see what the problem is. Anyone know if their customer service is any good?

You guys crack me up

0ubliette

kickoutthejams wrote: »

They should just change the eircom helpline to a prerecorded message saying

"turn it off and then back on again. If that doesn't work, unplug it for the night"

Ironically enough, that would probably fix about 80% of calls to the eircom helpdesk.

Dord

Deleted User wrote: »

Three has, by far, the worst tech support/customer service helpline ever. Meteor, however, have the best by far.

I noticed that, actually it was one of the reasons why I went back to Meteor from Three. I didn't stay with them long, useless fookers!

One of my friends got a job with Three a while back, he keeps trying to pimp their phones to me. Not a chance buddy! :pac:

keen

Ntl.

Overheal

I dunno. I think the lady at the AIB Customer Service desk gets to be king of my mountain:

Whats paypal? I've never heard of that before.

nkay1985

NTL, NTL, NTL, NTL, NTL!

They're Sh!te.

I was waiting for my call to be taken for 20 minutes. When I did get through I was told she'd have to put me through to another department. After another 5 minutes on hold she tells me that they're too busy over there and that she'll arrange for someone to call me back. I grilled her about who was calling me back, double checked my phone number etc etc. No phone call.

Next time I got through, after another 15 minute wait, I refused to accept a call back. Eentually go tto the person I needed who, in fairness to her, was nice. The previous two I talked to were awful though.

c - 13

Best -
I have to say Vodafone and Bank of Ireland 365 service, i've never come across anyone on their helplines whom I couldnt understand and about 99% of the time they've gone out of their way to help me.

Worst -
Definately Sky and NTL, huge hold times, repetitive questioning, being passed around departents before being hung up on. Its ridiculous.

zod

BT .. if u can fathom their billing system, then please explain it somebody in there, if you can get through

kelle

Don't get me started on Eircom:mad:, I'll be here till tomorrow!

Dinkie

Talktalk.... utterly incompetant. I would warn every one off dealing with them.

Doctor DooM

Ever used apple?

Not the worst, but certainly the most schizophrenic(sp?).

One day you will ring up and get the most helpful person in the world: Next a rule monkey.

I've actually rang someone, not gotten anywhere, hung up, and rung again and got what I wanted.

And I've worked for O2 so I know how to work support lines

b0bsquish

Three, by a country mile.

Lockstep

Methinks AIB have the best customer service helpline.



ALthough helplines are fundamentally flawed these days, you find them on packaging for everything from toothpaste to dental floss.

Seriously, if you dunno how to use toothpaste, your not ready for that level of oral hygiene.

chopperbyrne

NTL or Bord Gáis are the worst.

Permanent TSB and Meteor have always been very helpful and given callbacks promptly when promised.

I used to do tech support for eircom net and can honestly say that a good 90% of the staff were either incompetent or fob off merchants.

If you ever got through to me though, you got impeccable service. Piss easy job that.

Sherifu

NTL wins this round.

Eric Cartman

in order of shítness , 1 being the shíttest:

1. Dell
2. Eircom
3. Meteor
4. Three(3)
5. Smart Telecom
6. CD-Soft
7. IT Force
8. NTL
9. Sky
10. Ryanair

but on the upside heres 3 decent enough support lines, 1 being the best :

1. Apple
2. O2
3. BT

Dord

Dinkie wrote: »

Talktalk.... utterly incompetant. I would warn every one off dealing with them.

I agree, but from my own experience the issue is not with the people in the call center. I won't say any more as I don't want to get Boards into trouble.

kickoutthejams

kickoutthejams wrote: »

I despise eircom.
My internet is atrocious and I've spent so long trying to get help from them but they don't give a damn.

The amount of times I've spent stuck on the phone waiting for some chap named Anto to gabble instructions at me at 100 miles an hour in a thick Dublin accent. They should just change the eircom helpline to a prerecorded message saying

"turn it off and then back on again. If that doesn't work, unplug it for the night"

I work in Eircom, we are the best.

Lockstep

Please move to Galway then.

_feedback_

Eric Cartman wrote: »

in order of shítness , 1 being the shíttest:

1. Dell
2. Eircom
3. Meteor
4. Three(3)
5. Smart Telecom
6. CD-Soft
7. IT Force
8. NTL
9. Sky
10. Ryanair

but on the upside heres 3 decent enough support lines, 1 being the best :

1. Apple
2. O2
3. BT

You must have a lot of bills, if you've dealt with all of those ^^ recently.

Doctor DooM

Eric Cartman wrote: »

in order of shítness , 1 being the shíttest:

1. Dell
2. Eircom
3. Meteor
4. Three(3)
5. Smart Telecom
6. CD-Soft
7. IT Force
8. NTL
9. Sky
10. Ryanair

but on the upside heres 3 decent enough support lines, 1 being the best :

1. Apple
2. O2
3. BT

No way would I ever say Meteor are worse than three. Even people who work for three hate three's CC line.

Ryaller

NTL beyond a shadow of a doubt. It's like pulling your own teeth out dealing with that shower.
I didn't know before last week, but apparently, if you don't hang up on them, they can't connect to their next call. I'd say I eked an extra 5 minutes of confused heavy breathing from the useless muppet I got last week. I kept waiting for him to say "thank you" or "sorry for not being able to help", but he was just plain ignorant, so I left him hanging. He didn't have a clue what to do. Kept on going "uhhh, is there anything else?" Classic.

chopperbyrne

David Lynch wrote: »

I work in Eircom, we are the best.

Eircom or Eircom Net?

Eircom Net went downhill quite rapidly when Stream took over as the majority of good staff left.

Dord

Ryaller wrote: »

NTL beyond a shadow of a doubt. It's like pulling your own teeth out dealing with that shower.
I didn't know before last week, but apparently, if you don't hang up on them, they can't connect to their next call. I'd say I eked an extra 5 minutes of confused heavy breathing from the useless muppet I got last week. I kept waiting for him to say "thank you" or "sorry for not being able to help", but he was just plain ignorant, so I left him hanging. He didn't have a clue what to do. Kept on going "uhhh, is there anything else?" Classic.

Well he should be able to hang up, but it wouldn't look good on his stats. So thats probably why he didn't do it.

punchdrunk

Three...

definitely highly trained Bollock Ninja's working there :mad:

Miguel_Sanchez

Eircom and Vodafone.

Last year eircom cut off my phoneline even though I didn't owe them any money. When I asked for a refund for the line rental I had paid for in advance I was told 'oh you won't be getting a refund' and that 'you mustn't have paid the bill if you got cut off' even though the screen in front of her clearly showed that there was nothing owing on the account. Idiots. Took me weeks to get them to finally admit they owed me money and to send it out.

Vodafone. Violated my data protection rights and then called me a liar when I pulled them up on it. Weeks of promised return calls that never happened. Unbelievably ****, rude, unhelpful and lying staff in their customer 'support'. They also went back into their logs and deleted the text message that was pertinent to the whole thing so they could claim that it was never sent.

kickoutthejams

kickoutthejams wrote: »

Please move to Galway then.

Will do. And I like your avatar.

PurplePrincess

David Lynch wrote: »

I work in Eircom, we are the best.

You should probably see someone about them delusions.


It took me 3 weeks to convince Eircom that despite their system showing my house wasn't set up with a phoneline the fact I was ringing them from a phone plugged into the wall socket proved it was.
Eventually I got someone who believed me and 5mins later I had a phone number (and a few more grey hairs)

cornbb

Best: Special praise goes to Bank of Ireland 365 Online, they are extraordinarily knowledgeable, pleasant and helpful.
Honourable mentions: ESB, Revenue Commissioners, Meteor.

Worst: NTL, NTL, NTL. It usually takes over an hour to get through to a customer service person even though they manage to set aside a guy to ring me at least twice a month to offer me what is also a doubtlessly shítty phone service. Once you do get through to a customer service person they can't wait to get rid of you.
Honourable Mentions: Motor taxation department (whatever they call themselves), NTL's mom, NTL's dog, NTL's bastard inbred cousins.

elmolesto

Eircom and vodafone are definitely the worse I have come across

shinzon

I had the misfortune of being a multitude of people with the invalid credit card details on the playstation store about 2 weeks ago and had the absolute misfortune of dealing with the playstation store careline, for a company like sony not to let the customer care people have any access to the systems to see what the actual problem is is unforgiveable, twice i rang them twice had to give them all my details and twice i was told they had to send my details off to head office and that theyd ring me back, no resolution no attempt at any troubleshoot, just call centre speak for fook off and die

I happened to receive a customer satisfaction survey from them and basically launched a scathing attack on there helpline, and funnily enough about an hour later my problem was fixed

Whether the survey had anything to do with i dont know but seems a coincidence in my opinion at least :cool:

Shin

Duggy747

Has to be HP for me, I work in a repair shop and most times I have to ring up over HP products, which is ALWAYS hell!

Classic example last week, rang them at 1890 923 902 over a machine and was chatting to somebody down in India. Told him what machine it was 3 times and then he proceeded taking information for the next 15 minutes. He asked me again what machine it was, I told him to which he replied: "Oh no, that's a business machine. I don't deal with that, you'll have to ring 1890 923 902"

GRRR.

So I rang the number again later and got onto a different person. After learning my lesson I told another Indian that he was dealing with a business machine. He tells me to hold on while he directs me onto someone, I wait.......singing along to Boston. Eventually I get onto another person, tell them my problem but, lo and behold, they tell me to ring 1890 923 902. I lose the plot, cue alot of screaming down the phone and I promptly hang up.

I nip out for a fag before my head explodes, come back in, ring the English HP number and within 5 minutes I have my problem sorted.

Bah! I hate ringing HP!!

Neil_Sedaka

NTL, the worst customer service and support since time began.
Heard a rumour once that their office was manned by a lone, rusty stapler! Wouldn't surprise me.
Not with them anymore, for several reasons.

megadodge

NTL and it's not even close.

At the very minimum you hold for 20 minutes (usually a lot more).
Then you deal with bad mannered people who haven't a clue what they're talking about.

Actually I'm gonna stop before I get too upset.
I haven't dealt with them for a few years now but still get pissed off at the mere mention of their name.

youcancallmeal

NTL are the perfect example of how not to run a support service.
Also I don't like the Revenue Commissioners because of that ridiculous automated system you have to "talk" to. I spent 10 minutes "talking" my way through the menu system including calling out my PPS number 3 times until the system could understand it. Then to top it all off when you finally get through to a human being the first thing they ask your for is your PPS number
After that though the staff are usually quite knowledgeable and helpful

jetsonx

Eircom Landline Support.

Lazy, incompetent, rude and a "don't give a dam, you can't fire me" attitude.

Badly need someone like O'Leary to do a root and branch reform.

Eircom Broadband Support is quite impressive.

Symantec

You might as well be speakng to a bunch of robots - infuriating.

kelle

David Lynch wrote: »

I work in Eircom, we are the best.

<sharpening my claws>

deisedevil

NTL are the worst there ever was and there ever will be. They have no idea about customer service. I have no intention in going into the big long list of problems their call centres have (mainly Clonmel) but i'll just say that I work in a call centre (one which wins awards every year, in the UK) and the difference between the two is so vast that I can't even begin to imagine how they are going to sort things out.
If you want tech support they will send mail after mail to a tech support agent who might call after a few weeks if your lucky. In most call centres I know you can call tech support straight away. Nuff said.