Apple Care farmed out of the country??

[StellaBlue]

Hi folks,

Apple Care used to be awesome. When I called I usually got very cool people who knew the macs inside and out, and totally understood my questions. Sometimes they even answered before I finished asking. They also shared cool information for additional things I could do on the mac, in the same area as my questions were.

Lately, I've called twice, and both times I got people with heavy heavy accents, who (I don't want to call stupid) didn't understand my problem - totally misunderstood my question and didn't know how to help me. Then they put me on hold a few times, and came back with basic answers that got me nowhere.

What gives? Anyone else notice this change?

 

[SphericalPear]

yeah, same experience here. you must keep in mind though that, in the past years, apple has been expanding like a corporate whore. that means and includes: shipping your service centers/call centers to india to useless assistants who have gotten a 3-week training before their job, and have ascreen in front of them where they helpless try to read out the standard replies they get when they type in your symptons. don't expect much help from them. what i usually do is demand a technician right away - believe me, it saves you a lot of trouble.

i friend of mine also told me that apple has cut down the per-customer cost of service by 80% in the past 5 years through this ******** outsourcing. guess why their shares are going up like crazy... and their customers going crazy with crappy products.

 

[panzer06]

Hi folks,

Apple Care used to be awesome. When I called I usually got very cool people who knew the macs inside and out, and totally understood my questions. Sometimes they even answered before I finished asking. They also shared cool information for additional things I could do on the mac, in the same area as my questions were.

Lately, I've called twice, and both times I got people with heavy heavy accents, who (I don't want to call stupid) didn't understand my problem - totally misunderstood my question and didn't know how to help me. Then they put me on hold a few times, and came back with basic answers that got me nowhere.

What gives? Anyone else notice this change?

Yes, seems the consumer support has been outsourced. Don't seem to have the same problem calling in MacPro, Xserve or University support. Though it sometimes takes more explanation, I still manage to get my gear serviced.

Cheers,

 

[aristobrat]

What gives? Anyone else notice this change?

What did you call about it? It used to be that all Mac related questions (from US customers) were handled by North American call centers, whereas iPod questions weren't guaranteed to be.

Apple seems to be consistently rated #1 with their Mac tech support, and the company is sitting on billions in cash. I hope they don't blow their tech support rating by getting careless with the quality to save some money.

 

[MowingDevil]

I noticed that w/ an online order if you call to ask a question sometimes I got a N.American person othertimes it sounded like Africa or something based on the accent....seemed to be 50/50.

The bigger Apple gets the more they look like they're going to blow it again. Keeping the call centres within the countries/language of origin should be fairly straight forward. Then again, I imagine AppleCare (like w/ other extended warranties) is quite the cash cow.

 

[Banacek]

When I was buying my Mac Pro using the student developer connection I talked to a few people in Ireland. They were spot on with their level of support. You should be more worried with Apple outsourcing manufacturing to China

 

[otispunkmeyer]

When I was buying my Mac Pro using the student developer connection I talked to a few people in Ireland. They were spot on with their level of support. You should be more worried with Apple outsourcing manufacturing to China

yes same here, im from the UK and every time i ring apple, which included the call to the Higher Education bit to buy the machine, i get an irish person who seems more than willing to bend over backwards for you.

though i do get the sense that they've been taught to keep you on the phone for as long as possible. probably cashing in on british politeness there.... most brits wont put the phone down when theres a nice chap on the other end helping you. we'll jus sit there and take it all in even tho our question was answered about 10minutes ago.

 

[Phatpat]

Yep, this is why I try to stop in an Apple store when I have a problem.

 

[Trajectory]

It would really suck if Apple starts outsourcing it's AppleCare support. It's the one reason I hate Dell so much.