Separate public and private support forums

[timothyfriesen]

This is a suggestion based on how TekSavvy handles support on the site DSL forums. They have two separate boards there, one for general discussion (and potential user support) and a private board for support given by the company.

Would Public Mobile be willing to set something like this up? The support forum would be a private board were users would post enough information to validate there account (or post from their Public Mobile account). Public Mobile could then deal with these posts directly instead of constantly monitoring the general discussions for posts that require assistance or posts that specifically mention moderators.

As a followup to this I would recommend having a person on that forum 24 hours a day such that when people lose service they can have that service restored as soon as possible.

It is very inconvenient to lose service and have to potentially wait a day for someone to restore that service.

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As per some comments below I would like to specify that this should only be for account related issues.

[makkahn28]

This idea has some sound, but not sure how PM would be able to fully impliment and rewards still offered

[ute1978]

I already suggested something similar.

[geogolem]

I dont think teksavvy maintains the forums over at dslreports. That is just how dslreports has it set-up. cogeco also uses dslreports. Public Mobile could use it if they wanted, but they have this nice community here with community rewards. Personally, I think the public forums with private messaging is sufficient... I think its nice to have the public forums for discussion and other people searching for solutions to problems that have been previously discussed and addressed by others. If an issue requires private information a private message is always possible.

I do believe having a single moderator available 24 hours a day would be beneficial. Since sometimes we as a community can do nothing other than tell people to PM a moderator and wait until the morning.

[makkahn28]

Depending on the issue

[makkahn28]

If Issue is account related, yes.

If APN or something phone related, then we could offer tips for ppl to try and see if that fixes the issue

[stonechucker]

I tried out PublicMobile back in December 2015 on a 10-Day plan, mostly because the prices listed were terrific for a National plan on a Big 3 network.

While I didn't start full service immediately, it took me until middle August 2016, I came back to PM because of the open community forum, which I've been lurking in since December.

During this period I've seen various support requests handle very quickly, many by community members who simply offered a link to a moderator as a heads up that the issue was a problem that certainly required backend assistance, but at the same time, many were also quick fixes that the poster could do themselves.

Heck, that happened to me last evening!

i came back because I saw how the community cared and helped.  The prices, the plans, and the network were all just bonus.

StoneChucker

Member since 08/19/2016 23:00 EDT 😉

[Brooke_C]

Hey @timothyfriesen and those that supported this idea, 

Thanks for your idea! A similar idea was suggested a little while ago. I posted a response to the initial message so check out the details here. 

Keep the ideas rolling 

Public Mobile Community Team