Anything but Creative

I don’t really like using my blog to rant about companies – I prefer to use things like Plebble.  But on this occasion the frustration I’m feeling hasn’t been quelled by a rant on Plebble so I’m using this space.  Bear with me.  Or join me – whichever.

I bought a Creative Zen X-Fi2 from the Creative website.  Before all the Apple fans get grumpy I have had bad experiences with Apple (3 ipods that all broke in succession – the 3rd time it was a month out of warranty and Apple washed their hands of the debacle, despite their terrible track record).  I used a Creative Zen for years and never had a problem so I thought I’d be safe with the new X-Fi2.

Alas, I ran into difficulties straight away – problems transferring playlists, problems with the player freezing, problems with the ‘touch’ screen.  I felt like Jay-Z.

I visited the support pages and found them hard to understand but followed the instructions as best I could.  Nothing worked.  As a last resort I contacted the support team by email.  What follows is the correspondence, starting with the first email.  I’m not sure I handled it all right (for example I might have gone a bit overboard with the CAPS LOCK) but it’s hard to communicate properly with robots who are programmed to follow a dehumanised process.

This represents everything that’s wrong with customer service – I daresay there isn’t a single person who hasn’t experienced a variation of this problem at some point.  The relationship between customer and business is non-existant and the customer service staff are given no autonomy to use their common sense and human brain to establish a relationship.  The result is pain on both sides – expense for the company and a loss of repeat business, and frustration for the customer with an unresolved issue.

If anyone knows anyone at Creative I’d be really grateful if you could alert them to this post.  At this point (this has been going on for about a month) I’m past caring whether it’s fixed or not, but a good will gesture would go a long way.

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Subject: CLE – Technical Support Request – (ZEN X-Fi2)
Name: Carrie Bishop
E-mail Address: carriebish@gmail.com
Self Description: Intermediate PC User
Region: Europe
Country: United Kingdom

Support Inquiry: My Creative hardware stopped functioning correctly
Product: ZEN X-Fi2
CCPP Certificate Number:
Serial Number: C6PF2493937M00239L
Purchase Date: Nov/06/2009

Operating System: Windows Vista 32-bit
Firmware Version: 1.10.04
Creative Model Number:
Connected To:

Detailed Problem Description:
I have a Zen X-Fi2 player. I cannot seem to get playlists to transfer -
Creative Centrale shows that the playlists are on the player, but they
do not appear on the player itself. Also, I have experienced the player
freezing several times (especially when trying to access the A-Z index
of artists). Finally, I am finding the touch-screen interface very
unresponsive. I m not sure if this is specific to my player or whether
it s a more general design fault with the model.

==================================

CLE Customer Support wrote:

Dear Carrie,

Thank you for reaching us at Creative Technical Support; we appreciate the opportunity to assist you.

Can you see the playlist in the player when you connect your player to the computer?

Playlists created by Windows Media Player are in a different file format from the one in the MP3 player so when you transfer the playlist to the MP3 player with WMP 11, only the songs can be transferred while no playlists can be transferred and also there is no application available to convert the playlist format. You can create the playlist with Creative Centrale and sync the playlist to the MP3 player with it following the article below: Creative Centrale Controls, Ripping CDs, Tagging/Fixing/Watching Media Files and Playlist Creation http://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?sid=52954

If music files are not shown in Album in Creative ZEN X-Fi2 player, please visit this knowledge base article to resolve this issue at: http://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?sid=81618

In case you need any clarification, please do not hesitate to contact us again. Thank you.

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Freeze

Gently press the reset button to restart the player. The reset button for the ZEN X-Fi2 is located at the bottom side of the player, with the menu buttons facing you. Refer to the article below to access the recovery mode and perform a
Clean Up. SID 78881: Accessing the Recovery/Rescue Mode of your Player http://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?url=http://203.211.142.197:80/srvs/cgi-bin/webcgi.exe/,/?st=303,e=0000000000880558200,k=4019,sxi=8,varset=ws:http://uk.europe.creative.com,case=78881

Note:
Clean Up scans a player’s hard disk/memory card and removes any invalid links from the music library. It does not affect the working music files at all. It is recommended that you perform “Clean Up” first before formatting or reloading the player’s firmware. It is advisable for you to clean up your player regularly if you are frequently transferring files from you computer to your player or vice
versa.

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Best Regards
Galkowska Agata Ewa
Creative Customer Support Services
Creative Labs Europe

=====================================

Hi there

Thanks for your email.  I have followed the instructions but as per my previous email they have not worked, which is why I have contacted you.  I have created new playlists with converted files and they show up on the player when it is connected to the computer.  However they do not appear on the player itself when it is disconnected.

Please advise me on the procedure for returning the product as I think it is faulty

Carrie Bishop

=====================================

CLE Customer Support wrote:
Dear Carrie,

Thank you for reaching us at Creative Technical Support; we appreciate the opportunity to assist you.

With regards to your concern, since you are experiencing Playlist content not appear on the player, freezing up, and touch-screen interface is unresponsive, please try to update your current firmware to fix this issue.

To download and install the firmware, do the following:

NOTE: Please back up the content on the player before updating the firmware.

1. Please visit this website to download at: http://support.creative.com/downloads/download.aspx?nDownloadId=11211
2. Download the ZENX-Fi2_PCFW_L22_1_11_01.exe file to your local hard disk.
3. Close all application windows that are currently running on your computer.
4. Connect your player to your computer.
5. Double-click the downloaded file and follow the instructions on the screen.

Please try to creative playlist and transfer to the player with the following knowledge base article at: http://support.creative.com/kb/ShowArticle.aspx?sid=52954

In case you need any clarification, please do not hesitate to contact us again. Thank you.

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Best Regards,

Chen Yan
Creative Customer Support Services
Creative Labs Europe

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Hi

I have already updated my firmware (as I confirmed in my initial contact on the website) and as I have explained I have contacted the support service because I have tried everything in the help section and on the forums and nothing has worked.

Please tell me how I can return my player as it does not work.

Carrie Bishop

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CLE Customer Support wrote:
Dear Carrie,

Thank you for replying to Creative Technical Support.

You may schedule your product for repair or replacement.

To arrange this, please follow the link below and fill in a service request form. Ensure that you have your product serial number, proof of purchase and date of purchase available in advance.

http://rma-online.europe.creative.com/

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Best Regards,

Chen Yan
Creative Customer Support Services
Creative Labs Europe

=====================================

I am absolutely disgusted with this process.  Having been fobbed off with referrals back to the support pages WHICH I MADE CLEAR I HAD ALREADY CONSULTED TO NO AVAIL I am finally advised to fill in a service request form.  Except when I go to your crappy website I get a page that DOES NOT WORK.  This is unacceptable.  See attached screen shot to understand why I have resorted to using CAPS LOCK.

1.  Having entered the serial number and date of purchase the site tells me I own an 8GB player which is not true, it is a 32GB player and there is no way to correct the error.
2.  I am asked to select a colour and given two options, which both say ‘one version’ – I have no idea which to select or why it is even there.
3.  Regardless of which non-option I select I am not given options of ‘fault’ or ‘problem’ to select, meaning I CANNOT SUBMIT MY SERVICE REQUEST FORM AT ALL.

I would like a refund on my product since it is defective and you seem unable to give me any kind of customer support to resolve the issue.  I have attached my proof of purchase and if I do not receive a refund I will be contacting the UK trading standards authority to clarify my legal rights in this situation, as well as publishing matters on my blog and Twitter network.

=====================================

CLE Customer Support wrote:
Dear Carrie,

Thank you for replying to Creative Technical Support.

If you are unable to issue RMA online, please provide us the following details so that we can create RMA for you manually:

a) Any previous CRS or RMA that was issued to you before? :
b) First Name:
c) Last Name:
d) Email Address:
For the address provided, we need someone to be there between Mon to Fri, 9.30am to 5.30pm, if we are to create an RMA or send a package to you.
e) Company Name (if you are a Creative retailer/reseller, or if we are sending the package to your workplace)
f) Street:
g) City:
h) State/Province:
i) Post/Zip code:
j) Country:
k) Phone (Home or Mobile):
l) Creative Product Serial Number (http://support.creative.com/kb/showarticle.aspx?sid=6843):
m) Date of Purchase (DD/MMM/YYYY: please provide Proof of Purchase and send it as an attachment when replying to this email)
n) Country where the Creative product was purchased from? :
o) Product Name:
p) Product Colour (if applicable):
q) Issues with the Creative product

With the above information, we will create a record for you in our database as well as the RMA manually. This is provided your product is still covered by its warranty and that you have in possession a copy of the Proof of Purchase. It will also be good if you are able to provide us with a scanned picture of the serial number (S/N) on the Creative product.

If you have any other questions or clarifications in this regard, please do feel free to send me e-mail.

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Best Regards,

Yang Ge
Creative Customer Support Services
Creative Labs Europe

=====================================

I have provided you with the information in bold below, even though you already have the majority of it from previous correspondence.  I am very disappointed that you have not even offered me an apology for what is clearly a series of errors on your part.  I will not be buying any Creative products in the future due to the appalling customer service I have received.

=====================================

2010/1/6 CLE Customer Support <support@europe.creative.com>

Dear Carrie,

Thank you for replying to Creative Technical Support.

With regards to your refund request, I’m sorry to inform you that we are unable to arrange refund for you since your product has been purchased for more than 30 days according to the purchase date, 1th Nov 2009.

However, we are able to process for you a Repair/Replacement (RMA) option since you are still within the product warranty.

We’d like to seek your kindly understanding and apologize for any inconvenience caused.

In case you need any clarification, please do not hesitate to contact us again. Thank you.

Please retain all the previous correspondence when replying to this email.

Best Regards,

Yang Ge
Creative Customer Support Services
Creative Labs Europe

=====================================

Thank you for your apology,  however further to this extremely frustrating and useless chain of  emails I still have not received an RMA number, nor a refund.  Please  supply me with one or the other.

I’ll update here as the saga continues…

Tell Us Once goes national

So I saw something on Twitter about the government’s intention to roll-out the Tell Us Once programme nationally.  And then someone asked me what I thought about it…

I think it’s a laudable goal to try to simplify the bureaucracy that citizens experience when dealing with the state in all its guises. However I think TUO is problematic for three reasons:

1. It’s not addressing the real issue, namely that the state is too bureaucratic.  TUO is a work-around because the state isn’t organised around actual people.  It’s sticking plaster that gives an artificial sense of coherence to a flawed system.  And everyone knows that papering over the cracks is unsustainable.
2. It’s not giving citizens control over their data.  It’s channelling data between bits of government and the scope for error is still huge.  Accepting that the hideous bureaucracy isn’t going anywhere any time soon, it would be better to make it clear to people who they need to contact with what information and how.  Then I can send one email (or better still an RSS feed)* to all the relevant departments and I can be sure that the data they get is accurate and that they actually get it – it’s my data, after all, and I firmly believe that a state employee does not have a role as an intermediary for my data.
3. The basic principle of the government sharing data between departments is fraught with problems.  At best it’s paternalistic and at worse it’s the stuff of Big Brother nightmares.  Sure, our current government might not be organised enough to actually make use of the data shared between departments, but it sets us on a dangerous path in which ultimately any information about me can be shared between departments and quangos – I don’t get a say in who gets what and what they do with it.  To some that sounds over-dramatic but there are others who have seen the effects of regimes that do this in their lifetime.

In short, Tell Us Once is a shonky fix for a bigger problem.  It does not give individuals control of their own data and it has very scary potential.

*Yes, some people don’t have access to email or RSS (though they are few) but we have to start somewhere.

VRM and the public sector

I spoke at VRM Hub this week about the implications of VRM on the public sector.  If you’re new to the idea of VRM (Vendor Relationship Management) then you should check out this nifty explanation by Adriana Lukas.

I thought it would probably be best to start with trying to figure out what I mean by ‘the state’, since we could be talking about a variety of bits of the spaghetti of government.  In fact, the full list of all the different bits are on the Direct Gov website.  There’s a prize if you can find the weirdest bit of government.  I’m also thinking that in some cases charities or voluntary sector organisations could count as ‘the state’ since they are often grant funded by the government and therefore do their bidding.

The big question is why VRM matters for the state – there’s lots of good stuff about how it can help us transact with companies better but not much out there on how it can help us improve the balance in our relationship with government institutions.  I think it’s crucial.  For a start off, interaction with the state is complex and you can’t take control.  We have little choice over how our data is used or kept safe (missing memory stick, anyone?) and we never have a complete picture of all our interactions.

We can be residents, citizens, customers, clients, patients, victims, criminals, volunteers and donors to name just a few, and we can be all of those things simultaneously.  In some cases, lives are at stake.  If we could understand more about our interactions with the state then we’d become better citizens – more informed people can take better decisions and maybe even provide for themselves, easing pressure on an already burdened system.

I nearly typed ‘broken system’ then because just the thought of introducing the idea of VRM to the public sector is not for the fainthearted.  There are lots of hurdles, from the extreme risk aversion (AKA ‘blame aversion’) of officials (‘what if no one shares their data with us????!!’) through to worries about digital inclusion (‘we shouldn’t adopt new ways of engaging digitally when there are still some poor/old/disabled people who don’t have computers or broadband’).

There is also the difficulty of going too fast.  I know – fast isn’t usually the problem with government.  But I’m very nervous about the rush to ‘scale’ VRM before any tools have been properly built or adopted.  We had some debate at the VRM Hub session about how you could authenticate your bits and bobs like your passport, birth certificate, driving licence and soforth in order to make it easier to transact with the government.

While it’s obvious we will need a way to do this, I think it’s too soon to start trying to invent those ways now.  I’m more interested in people being able to tell their local council their preferences, ideas, suggestions, needs and views and for the council to really listen to what people are saying and then design services accordingly.  Maybe once the state is used to interacting with citizens on their own terms we will start to see entirely new ways of transacting, and only then will we be ready to design solutions to help this more balanced relationship to scale.

While there are undoubtedly challenges to bringing VRM tools to bear on the state, there are also some open doors.  I think VRM will save state institutions money – possibly through having less of a need to store data (since we will be the source of our data); probably through deleting many of the pointless consultation teams that exist throughout local authorities and departments; but definitely through more accurate service design.

Another opportunity is the increasing acceptance that the government might actually need to have a relationship of sorts with its citizens – most recently expressed through the delightful ‘duty to involve‘ placed upon councils, which makes talking to people a legal requirement.  I tend to think that if you have to rely on a law to make that happen then you’ve already lost the battle, but at least it’s bringing questions of how best to talk to people to the fore – make way for social media and of course, VRM.  And with faith in political institutions at an all time low, there’s never been a better opportunity to introduce a radical re-think of the relationship between people and state.

If you’re interested in VRM and want to find out more, you should totally come along to the next VRM Hub meeting in June.  They usually happen on the last Thursday of the month in central London, and you will find details and sign-up here nearer the time.

Please sir, I want some data

I like this thing.  It’s an unofficial place where people can tell the government’s new Digital Engagement Director what they would like his task list to look like.

There’s lots on the list about freeing up data and getting government to be more open – I’d love to say DUH, because I think that’s kind of obvious, but alas we still need to say it.  We need to free up the  data sets so developers can use them creatively and make sites people will actually use.

If only we could go further, though.  I want to see the data that the government has about me – from my medical records through to my CRM record with Camden Council, my Congestion Charge journeys as well as my tube and bus journeys, every image of me on CCTV, even.  I could benefit from this information.  I could learn stuff about my travel habits, for example, and start to move around the city more efficiently.  I could cross refer my medical records with my dietary and exercise information to manage my health.  I could find out when and why I have contacted the council over the last few years and start to become a better informed resident, perhaps even pre-empting when the lids of my recycling boxes get stolen to be used as a makeshift sledge during snowy weather so I don’t have to order new ones every year.

Ever hopeful (?!) I’ve stuck my wish on the Digital Engagment Director’s list of Things To Do.  Give it a few votes if you fancy.

VRM Open Space

Back in November we held a VRM Hub conference which was brain-stretching to say the least.  Naturally, being gluttons for that kind of punishment we’ve decided to have another event, but this time it’s even more brain-stretchy in that it’s a free-for-all ‘open space’ event.

In the briefest summary, ‘open space’ is where the attendees choose what they want to talk about as well as what they want to listen to.  If you’ve got something you want to have a chat about, you can stick your hand up and start a discussion.  Heard enough?  Just move on to another discussion.  Heard something inspiring and want to take the conversation further?  Just start your own discussion on that topic.  Naturally this appeals to my way of doing things   And the craziest thing of all is that somehow it just works.  I think it is the closest you can get to ‘organised chaos’.

OK, well maybe that summary wasn’t so brief, but there’s a better explanation and all the details about the event on the VRM Hub site.

I’m already thinking about what discussion I’ll be starting, and you can bet it will be something to do with the way VRM can be applied in the ‘public sector’, which is what occupies an increasingly large corner of my brain.  I’m completely convinced that The Future is about people having control of their lives – and not just in terms of buying stuff, but in terms of their lives in the broadest sense.  That’s sort of related to why the term ‘vendor relationship management’ has never really sat well with me – I want to have all sorts of relationships on my own terms, not just the ones about buying stuff (but maybe that rant is for another day!)

My pet hate is when ‘the government’ talks about ‘empowering’ people.  Actually, government, I think you’ll find that WE empower YOU through free and (not quite) fair elections.  For me, VRM is one way to even out that balance of power or, heaven forbid, actually shift things in citizens’ favour.  Anyway, more of this sort of thing at the open space next week.