I often get the question, “Eric, why should I get Internet Access from you when I can get the same thing from AT&T or Embarq?” An excellent question, with an equally excellent answer. It is true that as an independent ISP we purchase wholesale access from AT&T and Embarq to provide DSL access and that the equipment that our DSL rides on is the EXACT same equipment that you would use if you got Internet Access from one of the incumbents. To make things worse we charge more for DSL than you can get it directly from the incumbents, but this is where the similarities end.
We came to the conclusion long ago that we are not selling DSL, we are selling PortBridge Internet. What is in a name? LOTS! This is not some country club where just being a member carry weight. Our customers expect, and receive an unparalleled level of customer support. When you call or email us for support you are going to get the highest qualified and experienced support engineer to be found. Our support staff helps customers work through issues, many of which are not even related to their Internet access. What’s more, it is nothing special for our guys to spend hours on the phone with a customer until their problem is solved or even go to a customers business to help with a problem.
This at a time when our national competitors are slashing support budgets and moving support over seas. Why are the doing this? Simple - they have cut the price of their services so much that they can no longer afford to service the customers that they do have. Heck, Embarq just announced their plans to put ‘live representative back on the phone’ (http://investors.embarq.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=197829&p=NewsArticle&id=1229537). Apparently, their research has shown that people want to speak to a live person - WOW - I wonder how much our YOUR money they spent on this research.
My favorite quote is “Customer surveys show that consumers are dissatisfied with automated customer care, so we are conducting this trial to see if our customers agree.” this from Bob Crawford, Director of Customer Satisfaction for EMBARQ. Man-o-man Bob, I am willing to bet that your customers DO agree. The part of the quote you need to focus on is that this is a ‘trial’ arrangement - which means - they are going to try this until budgets cuts force them to plug back in the automated attendant!
Now, Embarq and AT&T have us beat on coverage hours - being a small company we cannot afford to put up support 24×7 but what we CAN do is put you back in touch with the same guy you spoke with before so you don’t have to explain your story again and again and try the same silly initial measure to correct your problem that the last support guy talked you through.
We track our support performance and as long as we have tracked it, one questions always stands out, “Given the chance would you recommend PortBridge?” - consistently over the past 5 years the response to this questions has been YES for 98% of the respondents. Not to shabby, eh?
Anyhow - that is my story and I am sticking to it - just like we have for over 10 years now.
Tags: customer service, DSL, portbridge, support
You are right on that. You guys rock and I’m always recommending you guys to friends and family!
Your statement above about staying on the phone for hours…with a problem not not even related to Internet access couldn’t be more true. Every day last week and a day or two the week before I was on the phone with Robert. One afternoon we spent over 2-1/2 going through set-ups, downloads, updates, and reboots. During some of that time he was doing the work through the remote user screen. He was helping me work through a severe problem with our home computer. (We had already tried a local repair place which we think did more “damage” than help.) I can’t imagine any of the “Big Boys”
going to that extreme to help us. “Support” doesn’t do the effort justice. It was more like “family”. We are Portbridge Lifers, no doubt.