Tag: customer service

Corporations, Soapbox, Software, technology

Google Play support agent suggests waiting a year for problem to go away. (audio)

| be3n

I have been struggling with a Google Play suspension.  For some reason, google policy is not to discuss suspensions. period.  Not even to resolve them.  I have been battling with email and phone support for days, but this last communique was just too good not to share.  In this recording, the Google Play support agent admits nothing can be done and suggests i wait a year for the problem to resolve itself. (edited to remove personal details and to shorten length)

Google Play Fail - Rejected reinstatement

 

Google Play Fail - Suspicious ActivityGoogle doesn’t think my account has been hacked or that I have lost control. They seem to genuinely believe that i am not authorized to pay with this “instrument” and that my intentions is fraud. This all started with a neglected Google Play account. So neglected that i never replaced the credit card on file and the one there had been reported lost in 2013. I logged into the account to buy a $4 app for some android cameras i was playing with. I purchased the app without error or incident 2 days ago. . .

Google Play Fail - Purchase

I use the app with the cameras problem free for 2 days.  In the end, one camera was a little glitchy, so i decided to restore it to factory settings and set it up new.  This is when it all went very bad.  When i logged into the store i couldn’t find the purchased app in my account and it wouldn’t let me buy it again. It was giving me strange errors about lack of internet or an error code: OR-IEH-01.  It was at this point that i noticed the email about payment information being needed.  I never received any emails about the purchase being canceled (apparently it was).  This is when i decided to call customer service.  The support agent interrupted me repeatedly, imparted the same explanation over and over, all the while asking me to submit a credit card statement from 2013. The incompetence was staggering.  I did some reading about reports of a massive Google outage today.  The agent insisted that i had added the lost card to the account the day of the purchase, the same day that i received the request for additional documents. This claim is ridiculous at every point, but not as ridiculous as google expecting me to have the same credit card number forever. Did the outage contribute to the problem?  i don’t know, but across Google’s ecosystem there has been failure today.  I even tried to create a new google play account with all new info.  It did not work, something is broken.  I jumped though the first set of rings and submitted my current credit card and state ID card.  The rejection came swift.  23 hours under their 24 hour ETA came this email. . .

Google Play Fail - Rejected reinstatement

I feel at this point i need to provide some context.  Was this a new account?  was it active?  I have used my google account almost daily since 2009.  In fact, i used their own google pay service for years until they changed their policy to require delivery of digital content thought their platform only. I charged clients weekly, and google deposited that into my bank account.  For years without a single charge back.  I used many of their experimental products. I even used Google+ and i still don’t know how i am going to replace fusion tables.

What now?  now i gather the remaining documents and try again?  what are our options with gatekeepers like these?  I’m still locked out of the play store and my google login is behaving erratically.  (gmail delays on both incoming and outgoing)

Corporations, Culture, Soapbox

Apparently the bots have the only real authority at eBay!

| be3n

pee on ebay

I have been an eBay hater for years.  Mostly to do with the way eBay and it’s sidekick Paypal treat sellers- with contempt.  As an occasional seller, I have run into some glaring faults in eBay’s consumer protection.  One case where a buyer refused delivery on the package and falsely claimed it was never delivered.  Despite the tracking clearly stating that the package was refused, eBay sided with the buyer and refunded the money.  I was now out my item and I had to pay shipping to get it back.  Fought and won, but a pain in my ass.  Mostly, I was selling my old iPhones.  The last i sold an iPhone It only sold after it was listed for the fifth time.  When the buyer actually paid for the item, before that, the buyer just blew me off.  Of course eBay now wants 5x completed auction fee.  More fighting with eBay.  It’s just not worth it.

Despite all this, I come back to my abuser to sell some routers.  I want to quickly list some items late afternoon Friday.  I got them listed, which took me some doing.  Apparently policy changes lead me needing to reword some of my boiler plate auction templates.  Money orders no longer accepted, certain search terms no longer in auction title, etc.  Even my auction software needed to be reauthorized.  All these steps completed without incident.  Finally my sonicwalls were listed.  I’m done.  I’ll list the rest later.

20 minutes later, i get an email from eBay that fraud was detected on my account and my auctions were canceled and and my account suspended pending password reset.  I was able to reset the password, so that is not a problem.  However, after nearly an hour on the phone with them (there is no chat or email support that i could find) no one could tell me (1) what triggered the fraud alert.  More surprisingly, (2) no one could re-list the items.  I got transferred from department to department and finally hung up and started drinking.

At this time should say that I have actually have the same IP as when i regularly sold on eBay.  As a buyer, i have never stopped for long (including Lupin III DVDs just last month).  I was using a relatively deduct selling software platform, but it still works, and I have been using with eBay for about a decade.

What would I like to see from eBay?  An explanation. If there was an error, I would like to see an effort to correct the problem and prevent other users from experiencing this frustration.  In general, I would like to see a greater effort to engage with both buyers and sellers to resolve issues. For example, why can’t I send a support email?  Why can a bot do something that actual customer service people cannot undo?

Corporations, hardware, iPhone, Soapbox, technology

Waisting my time at the Apple Store

| be3n

I’m at the Apple Store resolving an issue with my iPhone camera.  The same camera Jitter that is already an extended replacement with Apple for the iPhone 6 Plus.  No warranty left and no love for my 6s Plus. They wanted to charge me $80.  After begrudgingly agreeing and waiting an hour for the repair.  i returned to a phone with a completely non-functioning camera.  whoops.

Final iPhone Backup Before Apple Replacement

I hurriedly backed up my phone in preparation for Apple replacing it.  I have now been here for 3 hours.  I spent most of my time waiting for someone.  Now waiting for activation of the new phone.   Then waiting for restore.  In all, my customer service experience was much worse then expected.  After very helpful and accommodating internet support, I received absolutely terrible support from the Apple Store itself.  When i asked to complain to a manager, the “Leader” they brought out was condescending and robotic in his rhetoric.  The 2nd guy, was a lot more understanding, but Apple needs to take a hard look at their customer service.

Internet, technology, Web

Dreamhost you made a fool of me.

| be3n

Dreamhost Logo

I recommended Dreamhost highly for many years.  When Mac Enthusiasts asked me where they should host their email, I said Dreamhost without a pause.  We moved the MX record over the weekend from Media Temple to Dreamhost and waited as the DNS records propagated throughout the internet.  Monday morning I left everyone’s new credentials on a note so they could get to work.  Immediately, we noticed a problem.  The mail server was unresponsive.  By noon, I had a good understanding of the problem and I submitted a support request.  Dreamhost did not respond until after 9pm and this was all they said.

I’m terribly sorry for the issues with the mail service responding slowly today. It looks like there was an issue with our POP/IMAP machines causing the slowness with the accessing of your mailbox earlier today.  Our Admins were able to look into this matter and get the issue resolved.  This was a temporary issue with the mail load spiking, resulting in the slowness, but that’s all resolved now.

Oh good one might think.  Problem reported, problem solved.  Not so.  Of course now that buisness was done, I couldn’t verify their claim. Again I waited to see if their claim was true.  It was not.  It the light of Tuesday morning macenthusiasts.com email was completely unusable from the office.  So once again, I carefully composed my support request.  They quickly responded with additional questions, I immediately answered.  They wanted the IP of the office and a traceroute to their mail server.  No response from Dreamhost until 1am.  This is what they said:

This should be resolved with the load balancing issues resolved. I just checked multiple email addresses from your domain, and was able to connect to them on multiple ports. I also checked and found that your office IP address is not currently banned. I am sorry it took so long to get back to you, your tickets were placed in my queue when I was out of
the office. Please let us know if the issues are continuing in the office, so we can continue to look at the office, and troubleshoot there.

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