Downtime is No Time for Pleasant Chatter

by John Tyler


Here it comes again! Another day gone to computer maintenance. After swearing that office automation with optimum efficiency has got to be easier to achieve, you curse a little more and then hunch back in your chair to start rebuilding your desktop.

All offices have their fair share of computer downtime. Sometimes it's a simple problem, perhaps a hidden icon, a loose cable, or a file in the wrong folder. Other times it's more serious: a corrupt file, a hard disk error, or some insidious, conflicting extensions that makes you yearn for the simple days of system 6.

Getting technical support

So you sit down to tackle the problem, if you're able, or call on the office system administrator. But there's the catch: What if you aren't able to solve the problem, or your office doesn't have a sys admin? Well, in a perfect world you phone tech support, wait on hold for a few minutes, get your answer, and quickly fix your problem. In Japan, whether in English or in Japanese, that means you call Apple Japan's Customer Assistance Center (AJCAC).

Don't let the Apple Evange-listers fool you: those of us with Macs have computer problems, too. The Macintosh still has some way to go before it becomes completely worry-free. I've been in offices where, tacked on the wall in 100-point font is the Tech Support telephone number and one simple word: HELP.

AJCAC has been answering customers' calls and complaints since October 1993, and their Performa Hotline has been in operation since June 1994. According to Mr. Sakan, the senior supervisor, they have a staff of about 100: 98 assigned to Japanese customers, and 2 bilingual staff for non-Japanese callers (who average about 120 calls a day).

So, what if you need advice? "They're good in a pinch," says Joe Sgambellone, a Centris-user at work and proud custodian of a cuddly new Performa at home. "But they're best suited to general questions."

"Yes, that has been said," Mr. Sakan agrees. "We get various kinds of problems, and we handle 'how-to-use' (tsukai-kata) questions best. Questions from personal users [as opposed to business users]... are easier to answer."

But what if the questions are complex, if you have specific, detailed questions that require specific, detailed answers? In my experience, you won't get them. When you already know quite a bit about your problem -- like the solution, and you just need either the software or some instructions to implement the solution -- you might be better off helping yourself than calling AJCAC. Those are the times you'll feel you're talking to a part-timer who would rather be off polishing her nails than supporting technical inquiries.

Mr. Shrestha, one of the two English-speaking technicians (and who, incidentally, was extremely helpful during two interviews and one anonymous "help me" call), disagrees with my analysis. "We handle any kind of question," he says. "If the questions are unfamiliar at the operator level, we take the information and send it up to the technical level, and then phone the customer back. As far as we know, we are making the customers happy."

Yes, but...

It's those questions "unfamiliar at the operator level" that cast a shadow over this particular tech support group. I've had little success with AJCAC staff on such issues as English systems or scanner drivers when my questions were detailed, and I knew what I was talking about. It seemed, at first, that they didn't, and others claim the same. "My most common problems have been with the Japanese system and English software," Sgambellone says. "I knew about one incompatibility problem, but I asked anyway, and they gave me the wrong answer."

Being helpful and knowledgeable aren't always one and the same. Apple Japan's support personnel are quite helpful if you (the caller) are patient and understanding. If you help them understand your problem -- which, I'll grant, is not easy when you're uptight at having a down computer -- they will try to help you. And they do try their best. But what is technical support about if not talking to someone with detailed technical knowledge that a regular computer user isn't supposed to know? This isn't a hand-holding support group; it's Apple's official technical support line. If the staff doesn't know what you, the customer, nor they themselves are talking about, that reflects back on Apple itself.

Talking 'bout a revolution

No, I'm not asking for a revolution. But success starts -- and continues -- from the bottom; in this case, the immediate customer-vendor contact level.

Worldwide, Apple Computer probably enjoys the highest level of customer loyalty among any computing product. My question to Apple Japan: Why put off your loyal customers, letting them become more confused and ultimately dissatisfied by talking with ill-informed technical support? If your in-house tech support surveys reveal that most callers are home users who just want simple answers on how to install system software, consider that maybe your business users with real-time dilemmas have simply given up calling in.

John Tyler is an editor, designer, and writer at a private Tokyo magazine. He has been Mac-ing since 1988, and swears that someday the ever-growing mass of computer equipment in his ever-smaller apartment will begin to pay for itself. He can be reached at jltyler@gol.com.