Bloopers and more vids.

Great work Jaime!  Make sure to head on over to YouTube to check out the rest of our new videos.

multimediatastic

So for those of you interested, here’s a video of some of our managers and what they have to say about our tech support offerings and how they separate us from the majority of our competition.

Here’s Jaime, one of our newest employees, and one of our early video reviews.  The reviews are pretty condensed and straight forward and will correspond with written reviews on our website.  Basically, they’re an excuse for us to try breaking things which makes the workday a little more enjoyable (not that it isn’t enjoyable already).  

As soon as “Productman” gets to posting it, I’ll throw up a link to some of our funnier outtakes from our first round of reviews. 

 

Also, I’m open to suggestions if anyone has a specific topic they would like me to talk about.  Kind of like ask a ninja but without shuriken or advertising banners (and probably not nearly as funny).  Feel free to drop me a line.

Randy@posguys.com

Yarrrr…

It be talk like a pirate day. So I shall throw out all grammer and keelhaul the lot of you with my scurvied tongue.

 

There be a new FAQ available on our site t’allow access t’our limitless knowledge, 24/7.  

 

That be all.  I must be tending to my rum.

 

(Pirates were never much for talking, they would get to the point and get out of there.  The next post will show up soon and will be a little longer.  Now, go talk like a pirate!)

Contents may have settled…

So, my cohort Jono is over on his blog talking about screaming goats and grabby seniors. How am I supposed to compete with that? I would love to just secede this little corner of the internet to him and let him do his thing on this blog but his skills are far too valuable and his time far to short, so you’ll have to live with me for the time being.

When things break, it sucks but we’re here to negate that pain as much as possible. Usually products ship directly to the manufacturer or our distributor for replacement. Occasionally, if the product is outside our distributor’s thirty day warranty or it’s part of a complete system we’ll have it returned directly to us and charge a restocking fee. This brings me to the topic of today’s discussion:

PACKING PRODUCTS FOR SHIPMENT

(I’d like to preface this by saying that the overwhelming majority of our customers do a wonderful job when returning products to us and I realize that the customers who might benefit from these instructions will probably never read this post so I’m putting this out there as a fun story to share with my 3 or 4 adoring fans purely for entertainment’s sake).

There is one goal to packing up a product to send to us: Try to get the product to us in as close to new condition as possible.

While striving to reach this goal you must understand that there will be many pitfalls that your poor little package will face on the way to our doorstep. I know from experience that UPS routes the majority of their packages through a cage full of drunk skunk apes (those labeled fragile go through an elephant pin). FedEX too has some sort of “animal helper” program but I’m not quite as familiar with it.

To deal with this you can either pretend your packing up your little brother in a barrel for a ride over Niagra Falls or just look to our packaging and how we cared for your product as a great example to follow.  Original packaging is always preferable since it’s designed to take the abuse.  Double-boxing prevents labels, marks, and stains from finding their way on the the Original packaging making it hard to resell.  If original packaging is not available, start with a box at least three inches larger in all dimensions than the product itself.  Place the product in a bag and seal if possible (packing peanuts and paper tend to disentigrate and will hightail it for any vent or opening in a printer or monitor they can find making it nearly impossible to clean). Place some packing material in the bottom of the box (paper, packing peanuts, or newsprint preferably, see below), place your product in the box, fill it the rest of the way, and tape it shut.  That’s all there is to it.

Now for the fun part, THINGS NOT TO DO (taken from real experiences):

Do not use a box that you have to squeeze the product into. This leaves no space for packing material to cushion the product. I can normally poke a hole in a box with one finger, imagine what a skunk ape can do with a claw hammer. A little space is your best bet.

Don’t try to get too creative with packing materials. Paper works great, expired bags of potato chips do not, they just burst open, break into little crumbs, and march their way into your receipt printer allowing it to bounce around the box like a superball. We have learned to identify these boxes by the tell tale gease stains soaking through the boxes and will just send them back to the customer unopened in most cases.

DON’T try to get too creative with packing materials. I understand you might not have any paper or other suitable material around but that does not make it okay to resort to adult diapers. Clean or not, they’re made for a specific purpose and that’s not protecting your barcode scanner. Anyone thinking it would be funny to send a bunch of diapers in the mail may also think it’d be funny to send a soiled diaper along too. Gross.

DON’T try to get too creative with packing materials! I know you may own a salon and figure that since the packing material is just going to be thrown out anyways, trash is a good option. That does not mean you should try cushioning your computer with bags full of hair. It makes me all skeevy just thinking about it. It’s bad enough itching four hours after a haircut, it’s infinitely worse when it’s not Your hair doing the itching.

Good rules to follow no matter what your shipping, and I’d like to welcome anyone who found their way here after Googleing “skunk ape”

A bit of non-fiction

So, we had a customer call in a couple weeks ago who had purchased a complete cash register system. The system this customer purchased included a small computer (a little smaller than most cash drawers) and a basic 15 inch LCD monitor. The customer got the register up and running rather quickly with a couple of general questions and seemed very satisfied. Unfortunately,  the customer called their salesperson about a week later to complain that the computer was sucking their brain energies. The sales person of course contacted me and I had to inform him that we didn’t install that option on this customer’s computer and it must be some sort of mistake. We ended up speaking with the customer for a few days (it’s very hard to track down which component might actually be feeding off brain energy) and eventually decided that even though this PC had been used for over a month and most likely had nothing physically wrong with it, we would take it back and allow the customer to exchange it for an all-in-one PC like the customer’s friend had (which had never attempted to suck out a brain).  In the end the customer was happy, which makes me happy. We received the brain sucking PC back and I allowed one of my techs to attempt an exorcism. The PC should be fine but the tech may need a few days off to recover or at least carry a bucket with him wherever he goes.

One option to avoid issues like this is on-site installation! You can sit back and let our techs put their brain energies on the line while connecting and testing your brand new point-of-sale station anywhere in the US. Our systems are pretty straight forward with everything preinstalled, a nice printout showing exactly where to plug everything into and a nice little note from our support department letting you know we’re here to help so don’t feel like on-site install is absolutely necessary. If your lacking in time, fearing for your brain energies, or just lazy in general, on-site may be just the thing for you. It might even be entertaining to stare at the tech for an hour or two asking all kinds of odd questions.  Additionally I’ll give you my promise that our technician’s will not smell.

I’m working on an on-site install as I type this which is probably why I’ve chosen to share this with the interwebs today. And it’s kinda cool.

Working 7 to 4

(that sure doesn’t roll off the tongue like 9 to 5)

First thing’s first.  I’m not the only one here struggling to think up cool things to say.  My cohorts Jono and Stephen are also trying their luck at this.  Jono has had the products bolg up for a while and enjoys posting up quirky vids and sharing his knowledge of the all-mighty Google, while Stephen is just getting started and enjoys long walks on the beach.  Eventually I might try linking to some media but it’s hard for me to find something that’s relevant AND fun.

For now I’ll just pretend to be self centered and share with you, the reader, the different things we do throughout the day.  So, we (the Support department) usually roll into the office around 6:45.  Phones aren’t on until 7:30 and we spend that first hour or so responding to emails or researching issues.  Once or twice a week, we’ll come in a little early and focus on department training where we learn from a variety of topics and generally share our knowledge amongst everyone in the department.  At 7:30 the phones kick on and it’s off to the races.  Some techs will take calls, others will return voice mails, and others still will handle online requests for help.  Those not on the phones will test returned equipment and deal with manufacturers to get them repaired.  This goes on pretty much non-stop until 4 pm with everyone getting breaks for lunch and some people contacting customers to provide training on their new complete register systems.  Some techs also get a break from the phones to build up those same systems (software and settings don’t install themselves).  At 4 everyone gets to go home (unless they’re in the middle of helping a customer) and forget about work until the next morning except for one lucky person that spends the night tethered to a cell phone ready to leap into action at a moments notice if a customer finds theirself in a dire predicament like strapped to a countertop with a laser scanner on a conveyor belt inching closer and closer to burning their retina unless we can disable it (or they can close their eyes.  Obviously, being unable to process credit cards or print receipts might be a little more dire and in the realm of what we might handle.

Now that that’s been laid out there, I shouldn’t have to type it ever again.  If anyone ever has a question or topic they wish me to discuss please feel free to ask.

Last weeks fun calls included setting up POS equipment in OSX and Linux (yes, it can be done, just give us a call), a customer who swore her cash register was possessed and was trying to eat her brain, and numerous funny prank phone calls that start to wear thin after about the 10th time (I can’t wait for summer school vacations to be over!)

Communication breakdown/ getting in shape with point of sale

I find it hard enough to explain technical things to my own wife.  Speaking with someone over the phone 3 timezones away is considerably more difficult.  Throw in the fact that a PC is still a foreign concept to many people in the world and things don’t get much easier.  So, when a customer calls in from a southern hair salon having issues with their point of sale software refusing to open and it takes 2 minutes to help them find the Start button in Windows XP, I normally reach for a drink and try to get comfortable because I know I’m going to spend the next two hours tethered to my phone.

I know as a customer too that this is not the most enjoyable way to spend a couple hours.  If I could have only spent half the time I have on the phone with support as a consumer I would have a huge Xbox Live gamerscore, about 10k more miles on my motorcycle and six pack abs (yep, time on the phone with support departments is the only thing holding me back in life).

So, in an effort to make sure all of our customers can have more fun and/or six pack abs we’re trying to cut down actual on-phone time by using cool programs like Gotoassist.  Anyone familiar with VNC, remote desktop, or gotomypc has a good idea of what this can allow us to do.  For those of you who aren’t, it basically turns my computer in to a big ol’ remote control for your computer.  I get to see everything on your computer (including that adorable desktop wallpaper pic of you little Mikie) and I get to use my mouse and keyboard to control your mouse and keyboard.  So with a brief phone call and a decent internet connection you could have a virtual technician sitting at your system solving all of your problems.  There are a few little extras thrown in like transferring files and some troubleshooting options but I’m sure you get the gist and it’s all at the extremely low price of absolutely nothing!

So, back to the hair salon.  Instead of that call taking 2 hours like it use to when I first started here, we can now figure out what the issue is, walk you through connecting to gotoassist (1-2 minutes) and let you run off to the gym while we work on fixing the problem.  We’ll give you a call when it’s all fixed and make sure you don’t need any more help and we’re both on our merry way.

Many customers prefer to hang out near the computer and impress their coworkers with their l337 telepathic troubleshooting skills and that’s cool, we’ll let you take all of the credit.  Some customers forget that we’re working on their PC and freak out when things start moving all by themselves.  Overall though people seem to love it.  With one notable exception, the software has been very safe (sorry for hitting you in the head with that cash drawer Jon in Iowa).

I know some customers might be sad because we don’t get to chat about the weather or how the kids are doing in school these days but they can always call in just to chat if they aren’t willing to part with their beer gut.

“Thank you for calling…

… My name is Randy.  How can I help you?”

I think that’s about the only way I can come up with to introduce myself.  Over the last 4 years of answering calls from frustrated customers I’ve forgotten most other socially acceptable ways of introducing myself.  So, if you’re calling POSGuys for anything other than purchasing a barcode scanner or paying that past due bill on your receipt printer, I’m probably going to be the one you’re speaking to (most likely indirectly through one of my many talented minions).

I’ll be the one making the final decisions to get your defective cash drawer replaced as quickly as UPS-ly possible and I’ll be there looking over the technician’s shoulder if they’re having issues getting new items to show up in your software’s new menu.  At the end of the day, if you called in and something was adequately memorable about our interaction, you’ll be able to come here and read about it while telling all of your friends that you’re internet-famous.  Even the calls that aren’t memorable can be memorable for just that reason.  I’m all for celebrating those monotonous yet fun milestones like the 100th call explaining how to add a tab to the end of a barcode scanner’s output (it never gets old for us!).