Outreaching foreign language speakers

[austinhuang]

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

[will13am]

@austinhuang, I haven't said this in a while and I don't recall whether I directed my now infamous comment at you.  Get this service for what it is, not what you wish it to be. 

Having a multi lingual community forum and having community members identifying to multi linguistics to help others is not enough.  We can only do so much to help customers.  What are we going to do when moderator team support is needed?  So now you are asking Public Mobile to provide moderator team members that can communicate with customers in English, French and what ever additional language you and other customers fancy.  I really don't think so.  If people cherish being able to communicate with their service provider in Chinese, then they can go to Chatr which as you say already have this capability.  There are many ways to enhance this service that doesn't involve hiring 3POs to be moderator team members.  Sorry moderator team members, there is no malice intended with this statement.

BTW, let me give you an alternate suggestion.  You can step up your game and look after those you know who find it challenging using this service without the aid of linguistics support.  In the early days when I joined this service and brought a lot of customers with me, I provided tech support to many of these people to the level that they didn't need to know that this forum or the self serve portal ever existed.  How is that for breaching the language barrier?

[RobertQc]

Seems like poor way to spend the little amount of resources public mobile has when we have as many current issues for the current english and french community for a chance to gain a customer who lives in an english+french speaking country that doesn't speak the official language. We are a loving country and will teach people for free to speak english or french. Our country has the resources and wants to help them.

I think a better question is, why do these people not learn the official languages of the county they are in? And why chinese? That might cause some hate. Someone comes here and says you do chinese but not german? Why not the other 6500 languages? How do you decide which ones public mobile will support?

The Official Languages Act (French: Loi sur les langues officielles) is a Canadian law that came into force on September 9, 1969,[1] which gives French and English equal status in the government of Canada.[2] This makes them "official" languages, having preferred status in law over all other languages. Although the Official Languages Act is not the only piece of federal language law, it is the legislative keystone of Canada's official bilingualism. It was substantially amended in 1988. Both languages are equal in Canada's government and in all the services it controls, such as the courts.

[srlawren]

Yeah I'm mostly with @ShawnC13 on this.  However, there are times--and I'm not saying this to be mean--but there are times when it can be very difficult to understand what a fairly-clearly non-native English speaker is trying to convey when they post here.  It would be nice if everyone could get help in their most comfortable language, but I think that it would be frustrating if they then had to switch to English or French to converse with the moderator team members.  If they're going to go multilingual instead of just bilingual, I think they need to expand the moderator team to include moderators that can help in any language the community is configured to allow.  

[ShawnC13]

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@austinhuang wrote:

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

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@austinhuang wrote:

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

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@austinhuang wrote:

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

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Personally i would like public mobile to take care of all current issues.  Teehee public mobile isn't for everyone and look at current wait times now if they were to start adding multiple languages of support over the two official languages just think off the potential increase in wait time to get the mood that specializes in that language.  We are on a third tier provider with the budget designed that way. I just see many more things resources could be used on to improve the service which is needed before you grow the service

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Chatr and Lucky doesn't have multi-lang support either. I said that community support should be multi-lang'ed. So it doesn't really involve the company itself: It's solely community-based.

Also, I think someone said marketing is independent from support?

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I don't think you could have community pages that are basically encouraging people to sign up in a foreign language and then not have a support system to care for that customer throughout their time with pm

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Okay I think you're misunderstanding what I meant. Multi-lang market campaigns aside... I think we should establish a pinned list of users with multi-lang capabilities with the language(s) they're fluent in. The list should be categorized by language with explanations in said language. That's all.

I think the English used in the forum system should be simple enough to understand.

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I understand what you are saying a couple of additional things about that

1. Community members are volunteers not employees and they come and go
2. When this person needs help from a mod and there may not be anyone fluent in that language what happens does support time go from 48 hours to 7days?

I like the  out off the box thinking but it does come down to being able to support the customers and pm is struggling to do that now in a timely manner as additional language barriers and that will increase time lines.  The focus should be on fixig with backlogs and issues that create the backlogs before any type of expansion marketing takes place.

Again i know you mean community members on a list but really what good is that for any account related issues.  On a side note i have seen people speak in other languages here helping people with what they can

[austinhuang]

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

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@austinhuang wrote:

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

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@austinhuang wrote:

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

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Personally i would like public mobile to take care of all current issues.  Teehee public mobile isn't for everyone and look at current wait times now if they were to start adding multiple languages of support over the two official languages just think off the potential increase in wait time to get the mood that specializes in that language.  We are on a third tier provider with the budget designed that way. I just see many more things resources could be used on to improve the service which is needed before you grow the service

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Chatr and Lucky doesn't have multi-lang support either. I said that community support should be multi-lang'ed. So it doesn't really involve the company itself: It's solely community-based.

Also, I think someone said marketing is independent from support?

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I don't think you could have community pages that are basically encouraging people to sign up in a foreign language and then not have a support system to care for that customer throughout their time with pm

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Okay I think you're misunderstanding what I meant. Multi-lang market campaigns aside... I think we should establish a pinned list of users with multi-lang capabilities with the language(s) they're fluent in. The list should be categorized by language with explanations in said language. That's all.

I think the English used in the forum system should be simple enough to understand.

[ShawnC13]

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@austinhuang wrote:

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

---

@austinhuang wrote:

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

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Personally i would like public mobile to take care of all current issues.  Teehee public mobile isn't for everyone and look at current wait times now if they were to start adding multiple languages of support over the two official languages just think off the potential increase in wait time to get the mood that specializes in that language.  We are on a third tier provider with the budget designed that way. I just see many more things resources could be used on to improve the service which is needed before you grow the service

---

Chatr and Lucky doesn't have multi-lang support either. I said that community support should be multi-lang'ed. So it doesn't really involve the company itself: It's solely community-based.

Also, I think someone said marketing is independent from support?

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I don't think you could have community pages that are basically encouraging people to sign up in a foreign language and then not have a support system to care for that customer throughout their time with pm

[austinhuang]

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@ShawnC13 wrote:

---

@austinhuang wrote:

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

---

Personally i would like public mobile to take care of all current issues.  Teehee public mobile isn't for everyone and look at current wait times now if they were to start adding multiple languages of support over the two official languages just think off the potential increase in wait time to get the mood that specializes in that language.  We are on a third tier provider with the budget designed that way. I just see many more things resources could be used on to improve the service which is needed before you grow the service

---

Chatr and Lucky doesn't have multi-lang support either. I said that community support should be multi-lang'ed. So it doesn't really involve the company itself: It's solely community-based.

Also, I think someone said marketing is independent from support?

[Gonzo]

Hmm, for a company with limited resources that already can have trouble helping its English and French speaking clientele within a short time frame, I wouldn’t think expanding in a multi-lingual direction would do much for PM. Of course if the person asking for help indicated they were more comfortable in a language other than English or French, and someone on the forums happened to be fluent and could help them comfortably, that’s super - but a nice bonus, not something that should be made a standard of service.

Also, as I have seen on these forums, online translators can be a great aid for people with language barriers.

[ShawnC13]

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@austinhuang wrote:

Looking at PM's counterparts...

• Lucky and Chatr both have Chinese pages. (Not sure about other languages, but Chinese do form a significant linguistic minority already.
• Chatr and Fido had ran commercials with multiple languages. Example.

In my opinion, PM is not quite suitable with people who do not fluently speak English. They'll be overwhelmed by the amount of English content on the support forum, which is their main source of help, thus they're discouraged from asking questions (There are questions in French yet only a miniscule amount comparing to English posts). So...

• Maybe PM should launch campaigns to reach foreign language speakers? (Online ads + some pages on the website would be enough, but if u have the budget to do physical/broadcasting ads then why not)
• In the community, should we organize/list people who can help in languages other than English/French?

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Personally i would like public mobile to take care of all current issues.  Remember public mobile isn't for everyone and look at current wait times now if they were to start adding multiple languages of support over the two official languages just think off the potential increase in wait time to get the mood that specializes in that language.  We are on a third tier provider with the budget designed that way. I just see many more things resources could be used on to improve the service which is needed before you grow the service