Has anyone ever experienced any rudeness from customer support/forums in any of the following companies: Level-D, iFly, PMDG, Captainsim, Wilco/Feelthere? (Or any other ones that I haven't mentioned)

 

I myself have experience not rude but very cold answers from iFly and Level-D. Level-D Are just horrible, especially when it comes to asking them what's next, and Where the hell is their promised 757? By the time they release it, nobody would even remember such plane existed. Or maybe I am asking too much from companies that I spent a lot of money on. (I am a loyal customer, I have not been downloading any of their stuff on Torrents) I pay for good quality aircraft.

Has anyone ever experienced any rudeness from customer support/forums in any of the following companies: Level-D, iFly, PMDG, Captainsim, Wilco/Feelthere? (Or any other ones that I haven't mentioned)

 

I myself have experience not rude but very cold answers from iFly and Level-D. Level-D Are just horrible, especially when it comes to asking them what's next, and Where the hell is their promised 757? By the time they release it, nobody would even remember such plane existed. Or maybe I am asking too much from companies that I spent a lot of money on. (I am a loyal customer, I have not been downloading any of their stuff on Torrents) I pay for good quality aircraft.

What does it have to do with customer support?

Has anyone ever experienced any rudeness from customer support/forums in any of the following companies: Level-D, iFly, PMDG, Captainsim, Wilco/Feelthere? (Or any other ones that I haven't mentioned)

 

I myself have experience not rude but very cold answers from iFly and Level-D. Level-D Are just horrible, especially when it comes to asking them what's next, and Where the hell is their promised 757? By the time they release it, nobody would even remember such plane existed. Or maybe I am asking too much from companies that I spent a lot of money on. (I am a loyal customer, I have not been downloading any of their stuff on Torrents) I pay for good quality aircraft.

 

I work in software development.  Not MSFS related, although I have released many freeware add-ons for the sim (Soft Horizons, Landclass Assistant, an Ultralight Trike).  The company I work for is highly successful.  They employ a lot of people and the place is busy all the time.  They have all the departments associated with a busy software company--HR, PR, Marketing, Development, Finance, Education. 

 

Most MSFS add-on developers are not "companies" that you would think of in the retail world.  They are small groups of people and they have to run pretty lean and mean in order to eke out a profit--if they eke out a profit at all.  Piracy and other factors come in to play.  These developers also have careers outside of the hobby.  They aren't full-time devoted to MSFS.  Maybe a handful, but certainly not all.

 

So the last thing they want to hear are questions pressing them for a timeline, for deliverables.  So much of their lives are outside of MSFS that any distraction will delay a product.  Also, many of these companies are run by the developers themselves.  As a developer, I've been removed from the public for years.  I would not know how to handle a customer and I'd probably take offense at the slightest remark.  And I used to work with the public, in the retail and hospitality sectors.  I was good at it.  These are skills that must be used in order to stay fluent.  I know how to communicate to other developers because they see the world through my eyes.

 

So when you ask a question (you haven't shared an example of your dialog with the developer you mention), remember that you're asking a question of a person who's probably worked a good ten hours at another job.  Word your questions carefully and please don't barrage them with questions like "when is .... product coming out".  Good things are worth the wait.

 

Regards,

 

John

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I asked this question on another forum long ago, though I didn't name any specific companies. I've often thought that the proportion of 3PD's who are very aggressively defensive of their products; to the point of appearing to respond with poor grace to anything but praise seems quite high in the Flight Simulation market.

 

It struck me immediately when I first returned to simulation and began visiting sites.

 

Initially I used to visit a lot more places, exploring the community, but eventually retreated (and also stopped buying) from sites where the owners and mods alternated between either ignoring their customers or being on apparent (and random) hair-triggers.

 

"Black sites" where plaintive customer cries for help go unanswered for weeks or months only to finally be answered by a crusty author demanding that people "stop whining" and be glad they even got what they have are a special no-no!

 

Several sites are on my "avoid with extreme prejudice" list because of that one, and I am very glad that I only lurked at many of those; observing how they treated their customers first before purchasing anything.

I asked this question on another forum long ago, though I didn't name any specific companies. I've often thought that the proportion of 3PD's who are very aggressively defensive of their products; to the point of appearing to respond with poor grace to anything but praise seems quite high in the Flight Simulation market.

 

It struck me immediately when I first returned to simulation and began visiting sites.

 

Initially I used to visit a lot more places, exploring the community, but eventually retreated (and also stopped buying) from sites where the owners and mods alternated between either ignoring their customers or being on apparent (and random) hair-triggers.

 

"Black sites" where plaintive customer cries for help go unanswered for weeks or months only to finally be answered by a crusty author demanding that people "stop whining" and be glad they even got what they have are a special no-no!

 

Several sites are on my "avoid with extreme prejudice" list because of that one, and I am very glad that I only lurked at many of those; observing how they treated their customers first before purchasing anything.

 

I often wonder about the payware vendors in our hobby that are good at answering questions.  Do they devote most of their time to their products (is their product(s) the main source of their livelihood?)?  Or have they simply gained good customer service skills because of their careers?  I know one payware developer is a police officer, another a priest, and both are good at customer service.

 

I've only purchased payware from sites known for good customer service, which comes from browsing the forums.  Fortunately, just about every great general aviation release comes from such a site.  I feel bad about the sites that don't practice good customer service skills--especially when hobbyists send well worded and benign messages seeking support.  When you accept money from someone I feel you should provide at least a basic level of customer service.  It doesn't mean one needs to answer an email in 30 minutes, but it does mean emails shouldn't go unanswered.  And when a product is purchased, but can't be activated, a vendor needs to have some means to respond in a reasonable time, even on weekends.  Especially on weekends, since that's when many purchases take place.

 

I answer all the inquiries I receive on freeware that I shelved years ago, usually within moments of reading an email.  If I can do it, if vendors like Eaglesoft can do it, Flight1, Justflight, etc.... then any vendor should be able to do it.  That's not to say that what I said above isn't true--the wording of correspondence to vendors makes a big difference.  But many members here who are very articulate and kind in their posts still get the cold shoulder from some vendors.  I hope those vendors are reading these threads and learn something.

 

John

What makes me wondering is:

 

Why would someone get a rude reply from support and/or forum moderators?

 

I'm suggesting a number of possible answers:

 

- The company has a policy of being rude to their customers: Highly improbable.

- The company employs support staff/forum mods who are constantly rude to their customers: Highly probable they won't be employed much longer.

- A mod or "deputy" has a bad day and is just happening to be rude on a couple of occasions: Yes, this will happen - occasionally.

- Language used in support requests and forum posts isn't native to the people involved. They can't see each other. They can't sense an atmosphere or a temper. They judge per the words written in a ticket or in a post: Misunderstandings of that kind simply can't be avoided.

 

But the most important question to me is:

 

What was the wording of your submission ...

and what happened between you and the company in question before you submitted your request?

 

I'm absolutely sure your own contribution has a huge influence on the company's reaction ...

What makes me wondering is:

 

Why would someone get a rude reply from support and/or forum moderators?

 

I'm suggesting a number of possible answers:

 

- The company has a policy of being rude to their customers: Highly improbable.

- The company employs support staff/forum mods who are constantly rude to their customers: Highly probable they won't be employed much longer.

- A mod or "deputy" has a bad day and is just happening to be rude on a couple of occasions: Yes, this will happen - occasionally.

- Language used in support requests and forum posts isn't native to the people involved. They can't see each other. They can't sense an atmosphere or a temper. They judge per the words written in a ticket or in a post: Misunderstandings of that kind simply can't be avoided.

 

But the most important question to me is:

 

What was the wording of your submission ...

and what happened between you and the company in question before you submitted your request?

 

I'm absolutely sure your own contribution has a huge influence on the company's reaction ...

 

Going back to what I said above, many of these vendors don't consist of many people.  The products are developed, supported and marketed by a small number of people.  And if those people are rude, or just culturally different from the "service with a smile" many of us who live in the States and Canada expect, they may still have a good product.  And people will buy their product in spite of the way they are.  Which is OK if support isn't needed.  I've never had a negative experience with support for our hobby, but in my profession I ran into one vendor with terrible support.  They would not allow me to purchase their latest product unless I renewed a service contract and payed retroactive fees back to the time we cancelled it.  I spoke to my boss about it and he allowed me to purchase similar software from another vendor.  That lapse in support cost the vendor tens of thousands of dollars.

 

But in our hobby, vendors aren't dealing with such losses if they lose a customer or two.  They may not care and/or may not even realize they've lost a customer.

 

You conclude your post with a good point (all your points were good, but this is my favorite: "I'm absolutely sure your own contribution has a huge influence on the company's reaction ...")

 

I always try to preface any support question with praise for what I like about the product.  It may seem gratuitous, but it works wonders in dropping barriers across all cultures.  It's the best bit of advice I think I can leave.

 

John

As Oliver has already said, language can be an important factor on both ends. Something that sounds pretty normal to the one who wites it with a cretain intention may sound rude to the recipient, because neither one faces the other one nor can he hear the tone, which is a vital part of comminicating, it can really influence how something can be received - and it can be very hard to find (and tell for that matter) the correct and intended tone in written language, especially for those who aren't native English speakers, I know that from my own experience.

And bear in mind that accusing and insulting the ones you seek support from (see, this could be a situation where only spoken language may make it clear that I do not want to accuse you of insulting the developer) will for sure react rude.

There also is the cultural factor: Without wanting to insult anyone from Austria, I can say that working as little as possible is the goal for quite many people here, and any request - which means work - will be will very likely be declined, noting that someone else is responsible for this particular matter, and not always in the most friendly of ways, whereas effort counts more in other cultures, so the "serve and smile" attitude will be expected.

Sometimes things get nasty simply because the dev has to deal with rude customers and it spills over on the occasion. I had one occasion where a guy emailed me asking me why my code in the Milviz F-86 modified his graphics settings in his FSX cfg. I made it plain to him that the only mods that could be made to his FSX cfg by the product were whether or not the gauges could be "trusted" and that it was FSX, not my code, that made those changes. He then turned nasty and accused me outright of lying and in general turned loose on me, promising that our dishonesty would be made public etc etc etc.....When the next guy came asking for help not long after I was still somewhat drained and i fear my reply was somewhat stiff and formal rather than the informal and eager to help attitude i try to assume for our customers. He was not the only one though....There are some pretty nasty punks around.

I try to use the following that my father gave me.  HE SAID, REMEMBER THAT WHAT EVER YOU GIVE AWAY YOU WILL ALWAYS GET BACK SOONER OR LATER BUT IT WILL COME BACK.......JOHN   But once in a while I regress lol.

Never mind. I'll steer clear of the topic. ^_^

At least in my case I do try to be courteous but honestly it can get very frustrating at times - you have to understand that people who do this job are basically dealing with complaints and upset people all day long. You'd probably be very surprised at the number of people who come in right off the bat with a horrible attitude - making assumptions that we won't be able to solve their issue, accusing us of things, using "colorful" language in their requests, even threatening lawsuits over whatever their issue is. After I get a few of those types of tickets I'm honestly ready to throw the monitor out the window. I try to confine my displeasure to those specific people, but I'd be lying if I said it doesn't occasionally rub off to some degree on how I deal with subsequent tickets. If you happened to get me in that situation, sorry!

Again this is just my personal case, but I'm defensive of our products when people complain simply because I was involved in the whole development of them - they're like children to me, I've seen them all since the time they were nothing but a couple displays floating in space without a cockpit or model around them. If I was "just a support guy" maybe it wouldn't be this way, but our company is lot more tight-knit than that and everyone's involved in most aspects of the products. It's also the fact that a very high percentage of the complaints I see are due to things that are out of our control - people not reading the manuals, people who've messed their computers up with malware, driver issues, tons of garbage running in the background, FSX or Windows issues, etc.

There are also vendors that go above and beyond. I remember after visiting several "black sites" where the program authors had apparently hightailed it for parts unknown, leaving behind helpful forum members to attempt to take up the slack in the interim, I came across the REX site (and a few others) and made sure to write them (forum post) and thank them for the way they treated their customers.

 

 

Level-D Are just horrible

Not in my experience. I have their products since inception and have never found them to anything but helpful. Nor for that matter, any other developer. Might have been a be a bit slow responding, but then then I'm not their one and only customer, so totally understandable.