Turbines Lack of Informing players of issues

[Rip-V-Winkle]

Really is sad people post about having issues.
Yet it takes 3 hours for some Lame comment to be posted admitting they had issues.
Quality customer care is some thing they have no idea about.

[teh_meh]

awesome post. high five.

[captain1z]

In all fairness, using the phone company for example:

If a 8 customers are getting dropped calls and start calling thier provider to see whats going on, the provider (or at least the one your talking to) has no idea whats going on, other than what you tell them.

This info gets rolled up and eventually, after multiple complaints, someone who can test it verifies there is a problem.
He tells his boss, who says "go fix it" , then he goes to the pr guy and says "send down a memo on what to tell customers having problems and update it as we find out more".

My point? The wheels have been turning but until they have accurate info to tell us, its probably best to say nothing. The problem could have been client side or carrier or limited to a few and to not have this info could steer some in the wrong direction.

Well, thats the optomistic pov anyway.

[FestusHood]

There's a post in the "forums acting wonky" thread saying that they were having some problems, and now they are ironed out. I'm not sure what else they are supposed to say. I don't need a detailed walkthrough of how they troubleshot it and fixed it.

[levesque2004]

using the phone company as an example proves the op's point. with the possible exception of cable companies, the phone company has a reputation for the worst customer service. remember that SNL skit from way back? "we don't care, we don't have to, we're the phone company."

turbine is not the phone company. they don't have a monopoly. if they plan on impressing the supposed flood of ex wow'ers, they'd better get the servers working properly. game servers were not exactly wonderful tonight either. much stuttering in places i don't usually stutter.

[Rip-V-Winkle]

All it would take is a quick post saying they are looking into it.
But it is no word at all.
That is just poor business.
And it has been getting worse and worse.
Seem they have the lets grab the money.
And say kiss off on open customer support.
But I guess I am from the old school and believe in communication.
I helped managed a Network for 600 students at a Tech school.
Before I started the help had the attitude that the Instructors were just being PITA's.
They had no Clue that the ones they were giving the shaft were the students that paid the bills for the staff.
30k for 20 months of classes 600 students every 20 months.

[FestusHood]

So let me try to imagine what this might look like. Cordovan starts a thread as soon as they realize they are having a problem, saying "we're having a problem, but we're working on it". Then, approximately every 2-3 minutes after that, he would post "we're still working on it". Or is that not frequent enough? Perhaps every one minute he should give us an update. By the way the problem i was having was that i couldn't access the forums so posting info here would have been useless to me.

[Dysmetria]

So let me try to imagine what this might look like. Cordovan starts a thread as soon as they realize they are having a problem, saying "we're having a problem, but we're working on it". Then, approximately every 2-3 minutes after that, he would post "we're still working on it". Or is that not frequent enough? Perhaps every one minute he should give us an update. By the way the problem i was having was that i couldn't access the forums so posting info here would have been useless to me.

To give us an update every minute, he would have to contact whoever is working on the issue every minute and ask them for an update, or whoever it is that goes between them, who would then have to stop working on the issue every minute to respond.

I'd rather they fix the problem ASAP instead,

[FestusHood]

To give us an update every minute, he would have to contact whoever is working on the issue every minute and ask them for an update, or whoever it is that goes between them, who would then have to stop working on the issue every minute to respond.

I'd rather they fix the problem ASAP instead,

That's all i'm saying. In case you couldn't tell, i was being sarcastic. Just like when the power goes out, or anything else of that type, you know someone is looking into it. If it persisted for a day with no word, i could see getting worried about it. But not after an hour and a half.

[arkonas]

exactly they even have had 2 videos this week. im sorry guys they cant always be there every freaking minute to give us walk through on everything they do. they respond quite often when there is an issue. they dont need to if there isnt as much.

[Nullaer]

People could just wait until the issue is addressed. It's not the end of the world.

I saw my launcher was having issues, so I just waited. And it launched after a couple minutes, then I started playing again.

[Rip-V-Winkle]

Okay well excuse me for not liking being treated like a Mushroom.
For those of you that like it Keep on paying.
Money grab is getting so common place in the world.
And Turbine is getting a better at Grabbing it form some people.

[FestusHood]

Okay well excuse me for not liking being treated like a Mushroom.
For those of you that like it Keep on paying.
Money grab is getting so common place in the world.
And Turbine is getting a better at Grabbing it form some people.

Maybe you can explain to me the correlation between not calling you personally long distance to tell you they are having a technical problem, and money grabbing? Cuz i can't make that stretch.

[locus]

Hey, would you mind attempting to rhyme the ends of your sentences, if you're going to post in verse - thanks!

[Beethoven]

Quality customer care is some thing they have no idea about.

Dude, there have been cases of poor quality customer service, developers getting back to work on an issue which occurred late night, working on it and informing their players at what is roughly midnight for them ain't it.

[LOOON375]

You do know that the issues yesterday EVENING were during OFF hours, right?

The people that operate this game have real lives to personally deal with, just like you and I do.

I help run and moderate a military discussion forum much like this one. Every member of our staff can't be on hand, constantly for 24 hours a day. When we have an issue with our website, we get to it and fix and address the issues as quickly as possible.

Some people will throw a temper tantrum like a 3 yr old child over nothing.

I am impressed at their usual response times during OFF HOURS. Meaning they were probably at home having dinner with their families.

Yeah, they were just trying to personally screw some of you. (sarcasm)

[FrancisP.Fancypants]

This thread is an open pit with spikes at the bottom and a sign that says "fanboi meeting below". There's not even any bait.

[eris2323]

You do know that the issues yesterday EVENING were during OFF hours, right?

The people that operate this game have real lives to personally deal with, just like you and I do.

In help run and moderate a military discussion forum much like this one. Every member of our staff can't be on hand, constantly for 24 hours a day. When we have an issue with our website, we get to it and fix and address the issues as quickly as possible.

Some people will throw a temper tantrum like a 3 yr old child over nothing.

I am impressed at their usual response times during OFF HOURS. Meaning they were probably at home having dinner with their families.

Yeah, they were just trying to personally screw some of you. (sarcasm)

Turbine is staffed 24 hours a day - you can prove this to yourself by viewing many online sources, their job postings, and 'that site that tells people whether not it is good company to work for'.

The issue went on for more than an hour - it could have been communicated clearer - many of my guildies had no idea what was going on.

[Memnir]

In the specific case of the forums yesterday, this is what I imagine happened:

• forums started having an issue, Turbine internally saw it
• they began to work on a fix
• unsure on the public exposure to the problem, they said nothing - why call attention to a negative?
• once the "wonky" post was made, a Mod responded to the issue within an hour and ha half - after hours
• problem was fixed shortly thereafter

I'm okay with calling Turbine on the carpet when I think they've erred - but in this case I think the reaction was both swift and appropriate. If it's a minor problem, they won't say anything - nor will most companies. Can Turbine do a better job at talking to us? Yes, absolutely. But, they need to do better communicating on bigger issues... not a few hours of forum oddness. Yesterday's forum hiccups were not handled poorly, imho.

[Hendrik]

Really is sad people post about having issues.
Yet it takes 3 hours for some Lame comment to be posted admitting they had issues.
Quality customer care is some thing they have no idea about.

Blatantly FALSE!

First post was at 9.16pm. Your post in the thread was at 9.30 pm. Jerry posted at 10.46pm with everything is now fixed.

1.5 hours is NOT 3 hours.