Quality in software–customer service and support
If you have found a
software application that fits your business needs well, it is important to
realize that the software comes with a whole environment to assist you as a customer
to use it well and with no issues. In fact, very good software may come with
terrible customer support, leaving you in trouble for a long time when there is
something you do not understand. I remember acquiring a top-notch product in
the USA, to only find out that its support organization in Europe was not
working at all: 10 different phone numbers in different countries, and none of
them were working or could answer our pressing questions!
The need for good
customer service starts right already with your acquisition process.
Clarity: while you are still in the middle of the
procurement process, it should be easy to get clarity on the precise features,
legal arrangement (contract conditions), and the “total cost of ownership” that
the application is going to give you. It should be easy to find out what
additional costs may be incurred and what the exact scope of the contract is,
to avoid any unpleasant surprises.
Implementation: how easy is it for your organization to use
the software? Is your new vendor going to assist you with your data migration
(or digitalization in case you did not use IT for this process before)? Is
there training of personnel? Is their help in the adaptation of your business
processes to use the software smoothly? Do their consultants come on-site to
help you do all the changes and is that expensive?
Professional help
desk: a software vendor who
takes customer service seriously will have a professional helpdesk that professionally
processes all incoming calls and uses this information to improve its services.
It has a smooth escalation model for more complex questions and problems. As a
customer, you will have the confidence that your problem is being always dealt
with by the right person. Professional service personnel are always polite and
take you seriously.
Frequently asked
questions: for the most common
and returning questions about the use of the software, simple and clear web pages
and instruction videos should be available to help you out, in the early stage
of using a new application.
Easy contact: it should be easy to get in contact with the
right person to discuss questions or problems. Currently, a lot of applications
have in-built chat functionality in the software or on their website. These
“Chatbots” may or not be able to communicate with you properly and should
quickly lead you to an actual human to deal with your matter. It should be easy
to find support for all your users.
Response time: when an issue occurs, and you are stuck using
the software, your vendor should be able to solve the issue quickly regardless of
the cause of the problem. “Downtime” can be defined as the number of minutes or
hours per month that the software is not working, which obviously should be as
limited as possible. If caused by maintenance, this should be announced and
planned carefully by the vendor in such a way that business continuity is
guaranteed.
Some software
companies even have a feature where you grant the service employee to “take
over your screen” to see what is wrong and help you fix the issue quickly.
Continuous
improvement: while you do not
want the software, you acquired to change constantly; it is important that
feedback from customers is regularly used to improve the software. This may
include new features that are very useful, fixing small bugs, or improvement of
features that are causing confusion for the users. Good customer service
implies that your vendor listens to you and is constantly willing to improve
its product.
Authors: Diana van der
Stelt (Member, Institute of ICT Professionals Ghana) and Anthony Yeboah Asare,
Trinity Software Center in Kumasi, sales director, and quality engineer
www.trinitysoftwarecenter.com | info@trinitysoftwarecenter.com
Source: www.iipgh.org
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