Opinions on VOOM customer service.

[qwacker2]

I've been with VOOM about 3 months, and I am a relatively happy VOOM customer. But customer service a that time was almost impossible. At that time, you had to call sales to transfer you to customer service to even get to talk to a real person (otherwise, they kept you on hold 15 minutes before hanging up on you). Even if you could get through, the CSR never could provide a solution to a problem. Because of this poor service, I haven't even attempted to contact VOOM customer service since I got service. My worst Customer Service moment was when my installer finished the install after Installs Inc had closed. After waiting 1/2 hour for VOOM customer service (transferred from sales), they could not even activate their own box.

I've been following the forum since then, and the impression I get is they added more CSRs to answer the phones, but the service is still just as poor. It seems they have supervisors, but the supervisors are unable to actually resolve any problems. It seems the standard answer for anyone with a problem in this forum is to contact "Wilt", and he takes care of it. In addition, it seems any time anyone posts any info as a result of talking with a CSR, this info is almost automatically rejected. (I infer from this people can actually get trhough to CSRs now).

Most companies I have dealt with can resolve most problems by speaking with a supervisor. I have never read a post here where this was the case.

Is VOOM customer service really this bad?

 

[Tvlman]

Whenever I have dealt with customer service I have received prompt courteous replies to my questions.Sometimes I have to call back because of peak hours but I have no problems with them. My install was scheduled and happened efficiently on time. No complaints.

 

[qwacker2]

Tvlman,

What was the time frame on this - my experience was 3 months ago. Trying to figure if they have improved/fixed their problems.

 

[The Stone Man]

Customer Service experience for me has been very limited.
1. January--initial installation, no problems.
2. March--they called me for a decision on programming when the free period ended.
3. June--called for antenna upgrade, got it a couple days later, no problem.

For technical questions or equipment information, I come here. Thanks Scott.

 

[txdude]

I don't know for certain about this, but chances are that Voom has outsourced its customer service to another company like most other businesses have been doing in recent years. Unfortunately that practice translates into very poor customer service. When you don't actually get paid by the company that you are providing customer service for you have zero company loyalty and little incentive to provide good service. Poor service complaints rarely get acted upon and talking to a "supervisor" is not what you think it is, chances are you will get less help that way. Trust me I've worked for two different outsourcing firms it's all the same. Most of the people working for these firms are temp workers with little training, no benefits and low wages... The turnover rate is extremely high and the ones that have been there for a while are the worst to talk to because they know all the tricks of how not to put out much effort. The outsourcing firms do not care about how well your issue is resolved, they only care about the number of calls taken and the amount of time per call. Those that spend too much time assisting customers are quickly cut loose. This is a very poor way to serve customers, but this world is all about $$$

Personally I have had not had a problem with Voom's customer service. But I do understand the frustration based upon my other experiences with customer service.

 

[Mr. Biggles]

Called to order service back in early March. Install went as planned first try, and to be honest, I haven't needed to call since then. No billing problems since and I already had a self installed antenna for OTA since I was switching over from D*. My STB (besides it's obvious shortcomings) has been re-booted once. That was after the first firmware upgrade.

 

[andrzej]

I don't know for certain about this, but chances are that Voom has outsourced its customer service to another company like most other businesses have been doing in recent years. Unfortunately that practice translates into very poor customer service. When you don't actually get paid by the company that you are providing customer service for you have zero company loyalty and little incentive to provide good service. Poor service complaints rarely get acted upon and talking to a "supervisor" in not what you think it is, chances are you will get less help that way. Trust me I've worked for two different outsourcing firms it's all the same. Most of the people working for these firms are temp workers with little training, no benefits and low wages... The turnover rate is extremely high and the ones that have been there for a while are the worst to talk to because they know all the tricks of how not to put out much effort. The outsourcing firms do not care about how well your issue is resolved, they only care about the number of calls taken and the amount of time per call. Those that spend too much time assisting customers are quickly cut loose. This is a very poor way to serve customers, but this world is all about $$$

Personally I have had not had a problem with Voom's customer service. But I do understand the frustration based upon my other experiences with customer service.

I am afraid that txdude is right on the money. Personally, I am trying to avoid calling ANY customer service unless there is absolutely no other way to solve the problem. In these days of the Internet there is almost no point in calling CS to ask technical questions because 99.999% of the time the information you need is available on the Web and your particular problem has already been solved by others.

I called Voom only once - to sign up. I tried to sign up on their Web site but at that time it was not possible.

 

[jailbird]

I called a CSR yesterday about being overcharged on my bill. She was very friendly and helpful. I was actually quite surprised..

Let's just hope that when I get next month's bill the credit will actually be there .

 

[kjs58]

Voom CSRs. Informative and helpful at signup when most of us are naive. Uninformative and Contradictory after you have been a loyal subscriber shelling out your hard earned bucks! As this seems to be the corporate American way to do business these days, should we complain?! Just pick up a newspaper sometime. A loyal Voom wannabe!