Twitter support, your problems are far and wide
I recently posted about the lack of response from Twitter Support. I am unhappy to say that my issue has not been resolved yet. And as I’ve gone deeper and deeper down the Twitter support hole, I’ve learned just how broken the support department at Twitter actually is.
Most everyone is aware of the Twitter hack that happened earlier this month. My understanding is that it was due to security flaws in their support queue. Happily they fixed the issue by replacing their support queue with a new system called Zendesk ( they blog about this change at Twitter Blog: The Zen of Twitter Support ) and more recently rolled out Get Satisfaction for support as well.
I applaud the team for making changes in response to a problem, but, in my opinion, they really made a mess of things. Let me explain how.
First off, by removing the old support system, my existing tickets were deleted. I’ve been waiting over two months for a response and had to resubmit my ticket. Thanks Twitter.
Secondly, the new Zendesk support system has a MAJOR flaw. Your login for the system is your Twitter login. When you submit a support request via the web interface, it attaches the ticket to your Twitter account. That’s fine and dandy, however Twitter recommends that people with a Terms of Service matter (that would be me) submit their request to .
Do you see the fatal flaw yet?
The flaw is that tickets submitted via email don’t attach to an account. As a result, you are unable to view responses from Twitter to that ticket.
Try it yourself. Logout of Twitter. Submit an email to . You’ll receive a confirmation email with a link to view the ticket. Click the link. You’re taken to a page that says - “You do not have access to request #[ticket number]. It may have been deleted”.
WTF?
Did anyone at Twitter actually go through the process that you created? Because, it appears as if you didn’t.
And finally, the rolling out of Get Satisfaction for support. Again, I applaud you for the effort, however, you now have two separate support systems! For a company that is already spread thin when it comes to support, does it make sense to add complexity?
This entire experience has led me to giving this advice to anyone looking to implement support for their customers.
- Respond to your tickets. Use a simple method of categorizing tickets by priority and assigning SLA’s to each category. Assign someone the job of monitoring SLA’s. If you are constantly missing them, maybe it’s time to hire more people, or better yet review and improve your current process (Hint Hint Twitter).
- Experience your own support. This is unbelievably easy to do, but can give you invaluable insight. Submit a ticket as an end user, see what happens. Click on links, make sure they work. See how long it takes to get help. Again, simple, but really really effective.
- Use a central support system. Managing multiple systems is too much overhead and causes confusion for your customers. Besides, not all systems are created equal and they require varied methods for managing. Pick the right solution, and stick with it.
Posted by Jeremy Hilton on Jan. 30, 2009
Comments
Andrei,
Sorry to hear about your issue.
I’m happy to report that eventually did receive help from Twitter support. Although, from the time of my original post, it took another 3 months.
My advice to you: Stay persistent in your efforts without being a nuisance. They will eventually address your ticket. My sense is that their support staff is grossly understaffed and just can’t keep up with our requests.
Posted by Jeremy Hilton on 05/29/2009 03:04 PM
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Posted by Blisseinidift on 07/06/2009 02:15 PM
Jeremy, i was wondering if you did get any help from their support center after all?
I experience a similar problem, with a ticket being submitted two weeks ago and still no answer. 2 weeks with my account suspended from unknown reasons that is..
Posted by Andrei on 05/27/2009 07:56 AM