[Ken98045]

Are all Tivo "customer service" reps just ignorant/stupid, liars, or lazy?

Over the last 10 days I have had the pleasure of spending 4+ hours on the phone with Tivo customer service reps.

It is apparent that the lowest level reps know zero about the Tivo products. The second level "supervisors" (four of them I've talked to) are not quite so bad. However, they keep making promises to me that have not been kept. It is unclear to me if they are just lying to make me go away, or if they are all just as ignorant but they hide it better. Maybe they are just powerless to make anything happen to keep their promises. Maybe they don't even try?

I'm curious what people think.

 

[ThAbtO]

They are outsourced to India and Phillippines, scripted even.

 

[Ken98045]

I am aware that they are outsourced. However, there is a huge quality difference between different companies. Some companies use people that have actually been trained to use a product. Some of them have even held a product in their hands. The lower tier people for Tivo haven't been trained at all. Yes, they do have scripts. Some of those scripts even work. However, if you ask them anything at all technical be prepared for a 20 minute wait while they "consult" with other techs. I had hopes that the next tier people actually knew something about the product. They do to some extent, but for the most part they know less than I do about the products. What is really annoying is that they make promises they can't keep. For instance they keep promising me they will ship me a power supply. Apparently none of the "supervisors" know how to get that done. However, they keep promising me that it will get done. I asked for expedited shipping. They even charged me for it. However, 8 days later it hasn't shipped. I think that most of them are just lying and pretend to know how to do things within the Tivo company, but they don't have a clue (and they know it).

 

[Ken98045]

After doing some research it appears that the root of many of Tivo's problems may be that the new corporate owner Xperi doesn't really give a fig about the Tivo products. They just bought the company for the Tivo patents. If the Tivo arm makes a profit that is good, but they aren't going to put much effort into the DVRs. I think that to them customer service is just an expense; it isn't a way to keep and grow the customer base.

 

[kdmorse]

After doing some research it appears that the root of many of Tivo's problems may be that the new corporate owner Xperi doesn't really give a fig about the Tivo products. They just bought the company for the Tivo patents. If the Tivo arm makes a profit that is good, but they aren't going to put much effort into the DVRs. I think that to them customer service is just an expense; it isn't a way to keep and grow the customer base.

The problems actually go back farther than that. It was well before the Xperi that support went offshore, then off a cliff. I want to say it was pretty soon after the Rovi merger some years back. (Someone else feel free to correct me)

 

[dianebrat]

"Never attribute malice to that which may be explained by incompetence."

From the other current CS fiasco thread...

 

[klia]

The problems actually go back farther than that. It was well before the Xperi that support went offshore, then off a cliff. I want to say it was pretty soon after the Rovi merger some years back. (Someone else feel free to correct me)

Yeah, the Rovi merger is when everything went to hell -- things that were rock solid, like daily guide updates, suddenly got really wonky and inconsistent (hey, thanks for those 24-hour blocks of "X-channel Programming" like we got today and months-out-of-date program schedule templates, those are really useful). IIRC, they outsourced CS to Mexico first?

Atm, I'm trying to get them to fix a colossal screw-up from yesterday, a "line-up change" that erroneously mass-deleted most of my HD channels and all the relevant guide data. /o\