Changes to our Support structure

[Jeremy_M]

Hey Community,

In order to best assist you, we are making some customer support changes in the coming days.

Presently, we support customers through social media, web forms, and the Community. Having multiple support channels has given customers more flexibility but it has also led to longer response times, delays in our service, and confusion for our customers.

In order to continuously deliver the best possible customer experience, we are simplifying how you can reach out to one single place: our Community. It’s easy - plus, you’ll never have to wonder if you should Facebook message us and post on our Community. On our end, it will streamline all your questions and make it easier to get back to you.

Here’s how this breaks down:

Today	July 13th
Support Channels: Social Media: Facebook, Twitter Web Forms Community	Support Channels: Community

Part of making this work is also changing how you connect with our Moderators. In the past, every moderator has had their own account to help you. In our new support model, all the Moderators will share one account so you get help as soon as any Moderator is available to help - first come, first served!

Finally, since the Community will now be the only way to get in touch with our support team, we will be disabling our web form queues and direct messages via social media.

We are really excited for this change because we know it will get you help and answers faster than before.

FAQ:

I’m used to sending web forms for support. Why have you changed this?	Great question! A couple of reasons why we decided to make the change: Very few customers were using web forms Most of the web form questions we received were general inquiries; with answers that can be found in our Community. And yet, we still had to have a team checking web forms, taking time away from the Community (where most of our customers are)! By streamlining how to get help, we make sure that you get help faster!
With the new support model, will I need to have a registered Community Profile to directly communicate with your support team, In addition to my Self Serve account?	Yes. Register for a Community Profile by clicking here
When should I reach out to the support team?	When you can’t find the answer you’re looking for in the Community, or a fellow Community member advises you to reach out to our support team
How do I contact support?	Follow these instructions here
Who is Simon? Not referring to our awesome 'mod' @Simon_O	Simon, is a ‘ChatBot’ that can help answer any general inquiries you might have about our products or services. More info on Simon can be found here
What are the Contact Support’s hours of operation?	Monday - Friday 9AM (EDT) - 9PM (EDT) Saturday - Sunday 9AM (EDT) - 7:30PM (EDT)
What is the average wait time to get account assistance from the Support Team?	During business hours, we strive to answer all customer messages/inquiries as soon as possible. Usually, that is within an hour, but in peak periods, it could be as much as within 48 hours of receiving the message.
What/Who are Oracles?	The Oracles are a small group of Community members who really know their stuff. Find out more about our Oracles by clicking here
How do I post a question to the Community?	Sign-in to the Community (by clicking ‘Sign-In’ close to the top of your webpage) Choose a category that would best suit your question On your right-hand side click on ‘Start a topic’ Type your question and click on ‘Post’ For detailed instructions click here
How do I know if the Support Team has answered my question?	If your email notifications are enabled, you will get an email notifying you that we responded to you.
How do I enable email notifications?	This function should be automatically enabled. You can check here to make sure ‘Receive email notifications for new private messages’ is checked.
How do I contact support? How will I know who a Moderator is?	There are two ways that you are able to contact our Community Moderators: Private Messaging: You can do this by ‘searching’ for our unique Community Moderator’s profile (as shown below) then, once on the moderator profile, on the right-side click on “Send this user a private message”.  The unique blue square with ‘MOD’ is how you identify our Moderators. Tagging: If you would like a Moderator to weigh-in on a discussion, simply tag the Moderator profile to the post you created i.e @Moderator_Team
If I’m a Legacy customer will I still have access to the Call Center?	Yes, if you activated before January 27th, 2015, you will still  have access to the call centre
Will I get a ticket # for reference when contacting the Support Teams?	Working on it! We should have this functionality implemented soon!

[Michael77]

Thank you for the information. 🙂

[Rockdaddy22]

Thanks for chiming in Jeremy 🙂

[Jeremy_M]

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@Jamar_so_far wrote:

@TheOldVR

For example, my vision is how to make this work more efficiently is as soon as you sign up for an account and receive the confirmation email, there is either a link that takes you right to a sticky that tells you exactly how to begin a service requests, or it's embedded right into that email. Would this be that difficult to change @Jeremy_M

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We are working on revamping our welcome email including this piece 🙂

[Rockdaddy22]

Also, you don't just post on forums for help. If you need customer service you contact them directly, no need to ever post to a forum.

[Rockdaddy22]

That way they can focus their energy in one place. That person wouldn't of had to 36 hours, that's the point. This model isn't for your parents obviously. Maybe you could help them like I help my family. They've never had to contact Public Mobile, so that helps 🙂

[Crackmacs]

Not sure why everyone is so excited about this change. Sucking up for forum points? 😛

Taking away methods of communication isn't really a step forward. Telling people "yeah you can just post on their forums for help" isn't going to win potential customers over. Lacking a call centre is already crappy enough. Imagine trying to get any of your parents to sign up for Public Mobile? They aren't going to post on forums for help, they're going to want to use what they're familiar with, they can't call someone but they sure can send a Facebook message. 

Instead of removing these channels, figuring out a way to use them more efficiently and effectively should have been a priority. 

Here's a pretty good example https://twitter.com/AQYoung/status/886580167505739778 - a customer tried to use the forums and 36 hours without a response, sends a couple tweets, staff member gets back to him and fills him in on things. Killing this kind of thing isn't going to instill confidence in any one. 

Re-think this.

[TheOldVR]

So these changes are born of the "Less for less" era.... makes sense now.

Sorry, still trying to get over "Less for less".

Good thing Bimmer didn't try to sell me the 335i LESS model..... cause I would have walked, and had a good laugh at the sales person's expense.

[CoolCanada]

These changes are just very bad in my opinion especially at getting new people signed up.

I personally only signed up after chatting with someone on facebook when I had seen one of your ads. The social media presence including direct messages needs to be there to comfort new people who are somewhat uncomfortable with losing call centre support to show it is easy to reach you guys.

Losing the contact form option is also a loss because the community forums can be a very convoluted place. When I had an issue after I got my sim (I didn't know how to set up data), I tried looking here and was just confused. I then decided to go to the contact us page and before I even got to the stage where I wrote up a message, the pre-screening questions had given me the answer. Possibly if you are getting rid of the contact us form, at least keep that auto-answer option.

[Jamar_so_far]

Based on what another user just posted, I doubt it. The email team told him he has to use the forum mod team now as they can't provide service that way. 

[ethos32]

I can still access Public mobile on Facebook and Twitter. Can users still get support on these platforms.

[canucks4life]

They really need some sort of auto response on MOD private message as of now it could just go into oblivion and no one would know...it shouldn't take days just to reset a password.

[Rockdaddy22]

I'm happy to see this announcement is seeing a lot positive support. We'll see how it plays out.

[Quest]

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@Someone_here wrote:
(a little out of the thread topic I know)

The $3 is not for call center, that is only what they said...
The $3 increase was to keep the same plan.
For example I had the $25/month plan for Canada wide talk and text, and the price increased to $28. I was never given the option to opt-out of call center and keep my plan at $25/month... Only option was to keep same plan ($28), switch to Koodo (with postpaid plans, some extra fees, and some drawbacks), or switch to new plans (there was some promos, but none with Canada wide calling)...

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@Someone_here

In that case if $3 increase wasn't done to cover the cost of Live Call Center so what it was for. It looks like for $28 Canada Wide and Live Call Centre PM still have a good profit from Legacy Users.

And by the way if you switched to Koodo there weren't any extra fees. They even give you one month free service and 250MB for two bucks a month as an add-on. If you didn't use data they had special add-on free exclusively for former PM users to send MMS globally without incurring any overage charges.

Switching to one of PM newer plans you could take with you loyalty from past years and be eligible this time for all other perks, as well.

[Someone_here]

(a little out of the thread topic I know)

The $3 is not for call center, that is only what they said...
The $3 increase was to keep the same plan.
For example I had the $25/month plan for Canada wide talk and text, and the price increased to $28. I was never given the option to opt-out of call center and keep my plan at $25/month... Only option was to keep same plan ($28), switch to Koodo (with postpaid plans, some extra fees, and some drawbacks), or switch to new plans (there was some promos, but none with Canada wide calling)...

[Quest]

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@Jamar_so_far wrote:

@Quest Is it worth 36$ a year to have live support? I'm also guessing there is no opt-out for legacy users? 

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@Jamar_so_far

For those who talk and travel a lot but don't use data it is still worth to have $36 a year live support. They don't really need to opt-out.

Public Mobile in the past gave really good options to opt-out for every Legacy User and they still do but on less favorable bases than before. Always "Early bird catch the worm"  

[Jamar_so_far]

@Quest Is it worth 36$ a year to have live support? I'm also guessing there is no opt-out for legacy users? 

[Quest]

Hi there to All,

With this latest changes Public Mobile want to improve communication and speed up problem solving and yet at the same time save even more money. In a long run savings mean increased competitive edge.

Legacy Users have been already charged for a while now $3 extra every month for a privilege of using Live Support Center.

[Chaos_Scorpio]

Glad to see this. 

Now no need to wonder when someone says "well I posted something somewhere else why not fixed, thats why I come to forums ... "

Forum should be only spot for help. 

[Jamar_so_far]

@stonechucker @kav2001c

Lets take baby steps and just get rid of daylight savings times, amirite? 

[stonechucker]

@kav2001c, really!

And why change from where they're based already, Greenwich, England?

The Universal Time Coordinate is the Prime Meridian, so keep it there. 

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@kav2001c wrote:

@stonechucker really?

If timezones were abolished totally we both know it would most likely be based off New York time (possibly LA, but I think world still looks at things from EST, esp since both Washington & Ottawa are also in east)

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[kav2001c]

@stonechucker really?

If timezones were abolished totally we both know it would most likely be based off New York time (possibly LA, but I think world still looks at things from EST, esp since both Washington & Ottawa are also in east)

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@stonechucker wrote:

@kav2001c,

Heck, I want to get rid of time zones too.

If it's 2:00 here in Ontario, it should be 2:00 in Vancouver, Sydney, Oslo, London, Moscow, and Delhi too.

Why make things so complicated?  Time is just a number.

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[kav2001c]

@NDesai well he was quite vocal on the issue, and that was what he publicly posted in his good bye so

I am willing to accept his statements at face value

Heck for my most recent issue, mods acknowledged it and sent off a support ticket. I know Shazia is not a code monkey so all she can do is report issues but Public Mobile's response is essentially I can not use 4 phone lines for an estimated 90 days

Seriously

No outgoing calls or texts

And then the question is CAN they fix the issue?

I can see people quitting for things like that

And in past 6 months I have lost service, Public gave my phone number to another client during an activation (result in my account getting cancelled) AND my billing issue is totally unresolved (ticket opened, closed, declared too hard to fix and please email mods every month for a bill credit)

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@NDesai wrote:

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@kav2001c wrote:

Actually, one of our Oracles quit the PM forums and ported out over unresolved monthly issues

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I really doubt that was the reason. 

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[kav2001c]

@Jamar_so_far mostly computer issues. Sometimes the people working at Public *know* what the issue is, but there is no way to actually *fix* it

Hence manual intervention

From now to eternity lol

(from a technical standpoint, it could cost a million in software or pay someone $20 a month, which is cheaper right)

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@Jamar_so_far wrote:
Hmm...what kind of problems were they having? As this is a new kind of foray for Telecom for me, I'm not sure exactly the problems that exist here in PM.

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[stonechucker]

@kav2001c,

Heck, I want to get rid of time zones too.

If it's 2:00 here in Ontario, it should be 2:00 in Vancouver, Sydney, Oslo, London, Moscow, and Delhi too.

Why make things so complicated?  Time is just a number.

[NDesai]

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@kav2001c wrote:

Actually, one of our Oracles quit the PM forums and ported out over unresolved monthly issues

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I really doubt that was the reason. 

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@Jamar_so_far wrote:
Hmm...what kind of problems were they having? As this is a new kind of foray for Telecom for me, I'm not sure exactly the problems that exist here in PM.

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Customers contacting mods through different channels such as social media, web forms or the community. When the same users contact mods through multiple channels, complication arises as different mods work on different channels. With the new support model, customers contacting on other channels will be redirected to the community so they can all private message. 

[Jamar_so_far]

Hmm...what kind of problems were they having? As this is a new kind of foray for Telecom for me, I'm not sure exactly the problems that exist here in PM.

[Vickel]

Having support only from the community forum is good
No more people jumping the queue just cause they make the most noise on social media

[kav2001c]

@Jamar_so_far some people are contacting mods on a monthly basis

My account will never get fixed so I have resigned myself to this fact

Actually, one of our Oracles quit the PM forums and ported out over unresolved monthly issues

[kav2001c]

@stonechucker lol

Lets just call out the odd balls who do not accept daylight savings time (its actually quite weird in that there is no province where it is universally ignored; SK comes closest but certain cities in SK actually do daylight savings time making thier city different than neighbours)

The red guys on this map ignore daylight savings time

https://fusiontables.googleusercontent.com/embedviz?q=select+col2+from+1HoJ3VFx70QIMW-J6-7JeTsn8Cd3l...

[TheOldVR]

@Jamar_so_far - redundancy is still going to happen. When new customers finally figure things out they will get in to the forum, create multiple threads, tag the MODs, and then send multiple private messages waiting for response. None of this is tied together without a tracking system so it doesn't matter if the request comes in via email, twitter, or a forum thread.

The ticket system is what is needed to address your concerns... at that point it won't matter where a request comes from, or how many requests come in as they will all be associated with a single phone number resulting in huge efficiencies for PM.

I'm not trying to put PM down... the MODs are awesome and I'm very happy with their service. With that said.... limited resources should mandate a focus for greater ROI on projects. The ticket system... would address everything that the current changes are trying to fix, but can't.