Am I the only one who missed support@blackbaud.com?

Jean McCoy

I am not liking CHAT, especially since they are "chatting" with multiple clients and it takes a long long time for them to answer your questions.  Especially if their answer is not working.  Just curious if I'm the only one not happy wiith the support I'm paying for these days at Blackbaud.

Joanne Felci 2

I've actually had good luck with using Chat - though it depends on the specialist you end up with


I would think waiting for an answer by email would take longer


And for some reason calling them just raises my blood pressure


Sorry you are having a bad experience with them 

Rosemary Hopkins 2

I don't like it either.  If I am having an issue I want the undivided attention of the support person. 

Jean McCoy

Hi Joanne,

Yes, I  would wait longer for the email answer but at least I could shoot out the email and go on with my work.  It's being chained to this CHAT window, especially if they are troubleshooting because they don't know the answer right away.    I hear you about calling them as well.  Thanks so much for replying!


Joanne Felci:

I've actually had good luck with using Chat - though it depends on the specialist you end up with


I would think waiting for an answer by email would take longer


And for some reason calling them just raises my blood pressure


Sorry you are having a bad experience with them 

 

Jen Claudy

If you have something else you're working on or need to step away from Chat, you can tell the Support Analyst, and either arrange a time to start up the Chat again (also giving them time to work on a solution for you) or continue the conversation via email.  You can sign in to the Blackbaud Portal > My Blackbaud and look for My Support Cases Tile on the right side.  This shows all of the Cases for your organization.  If you click on one, even if it's closed, you can reopen it and request response by phone or by email.

Jennifer McHale

Ha! I find I like chat support because I CAN keep working on other items while I wait.

In fact .... it's usually the support analyst that is asking are you still there? because I get sidetracked

Daniel Noga 2

That's kind of funny--I just got done filling out a customer support survey in which I brought up this very issue.


Chat is hit or miss. I've had some really great, helpful interactions and I've had some that were no help whatsoever. Generally, the support staff seem helpful, but I have wondered if they're helping multiple people since it often seems to take forever for them to answer me. That would also help to explain the lack of attention to detail that sometimes rears its head; sometimes I get answers that are not relevant to the question I posed, or they ask a followup question that I had already addressed, showing that they weren't paying attention.


On the one hand, it's frustrating, because I feel that I make a good effort to be thorough and clear in my communications with support so they can do their job more effectively; their help is only as good as our ability to explain our issues to them, after all. Since the conversation is text-based and everything that's been said is right there in front of both of us, missing details must be a matter of distraction. We pay a premium for this and more attention would be nice.


On the other hand, there have also been times when I opened a support case prematurely, asking a question I could have found the answer to on the Knowledgebase if I'd looked. Sometimes I smack myself upside the head when they give an answer and it's one I should have come up with on my own. I wonder how many times a day each worker gets those? They're probably gritting their teeth at me too.





 

Ryan Hyde

Personally, I love chat support. I've learned half of what I know through chat support - I've honestly never really had a bad experience. 

Melissa S Graves

I like chat support but typically only for something I think I know but need confirmed by support. It I am truly in a bind, I often need screensharing and I need to call up to get that (chat can schedule a screensharing session but never the same day that I know of).


I liked support@ because I could send a screenshot of my issue and the analyst was that far ahead in researching the issue when they called me back.

Karen Stuhlfeier

I think too that you have to take the inititative to tell them if you're not getting the help that you need. They seem to be very receptive to accelorating your issue up to the next level of support if necessary.  

Daniel Noga 2

Karen Stuhlfeier:

I think too that you have to take the inititative to tell them if you're not getting the help that you need. They seem to be very receptive to accelorating your issue up to the next level of support if necessary.  

I agree. On a couple of occasions, I have pressed the issue and found them very receptive. Sometimes I don't have time for that, and take their answer and go off to work my own issue out.


I am definitely not bashing the analysts here. They are skilled and they also seem to care about doing a good job. I think they may be expected to juggle too much at once though, and that would not be their fault.


 

Nora MacDonald

I do miss the ability to send screen shots, especially when I get an error message.  But I do also find chat convenient, though it was a lot nicer when no one used it and wait times were much shorter!

Ryan Hyde

Nora MacDonald:

I do miss the ability to send screen shots, especially when I get an error message.  But I do also find chat convenient, though it was a lot nicer when no one used it and wait times were much shorter!

You can still send screen shots. I do this all the time! Just tell the person you're chatting with that you have a screeshot of the error code and they'll give you their email address to send it to I've never been denied a rep's email address in these situations.


I do wish there were a place to share screenshots within the chat client, though. That would make life easier. 

Matt Page

I'm a fan of chat, although I also like to use the phone from time to time as well. It feels instant enough to know I won't have to wait too long for an answer, but doesn't require me to be articulate or quick thinking on the phone. Plus, as has been said I can get on with other stuffinstead of being stuck in a phone queue listening to the on-hold music.


Matt

Michael Sherman 2

I'm a bad person. I will call support and while I'm waiting on hold I'll hit up chat. If chat responds first I'll hang up the phone. If phone support answers first I close the chat window. I tend to be impatient. 

Jill Freidmutter

Hi All,


I miss being able to open a case myself. When I work late trying more complicated RE stuff, I will end the day when I hit a stumbling block. Then I'd open a case and leave my questions, and the answers were in my inbox in the morning. If I wanted help at the moment, or thought a screen share was necessary, I'd call in. It seemed that call wait times used to be shorter. And because I'd already left a description of my issue, perhaps cases were delegated to folks with more experience with that topic?

When I first started using chat, it felt like a waste of time for me to type and then to wait for the support person to type. Perhaps I am not as clear as I think I am when I'm describing my problem. Often I want to just show them with a screen share.


After several months I am getting used to using chat. Perhaps using it for smaller questions that are easier to find out the answers to in this format. Or using it to start a conversation and then calling in with a case number.


Thanks for bringing up the topic! I've mentioned it in different ways to customer support. What I was told is that most people don't like to open their own cases and wait for a response. Perhaps in this forum customer support will find a way to be more responsive to the various ways that different customers prefer to work.



 

Daniel Bayer

While it's true that some chat support people are better than others, I honestly like it MUCH better than the phone tech support - wait times are generally shorter, and as long as your volume is on, the window gives a little DING! when there's a new message in that support window, so I can do other things while I'm waiting. Sometimes I do get a bit impatient with how long it takes them to come up with an answer, but on the whole it takes about the same amount of time as any other form of support BB has offered - and often less! I have sent screenshots to the tech's email numerous times, and have always gotten timely follow-up emails/phone calls.


As long as you voice your opinion they seem to be very responsive to it, so keep doing it!

Jill Freidmutter

Michael Sherman:

I'm a bad person. I will call support and while I'm waiting on hold I'll hit up chat. If chat responds first I'll hang up the phone. If phone support answers first I close the chat window. I tend to be impatient. 

I've done this too...   

JoAnn Strommen

I've had same issues as Jill - liked ability to open my own case afterhours or even wanting an explanation for an issue I'm having but really don't have half an hour to sit on chat and don't need an immediate answer.  


Agreed that some of the staff on support are better than others.  Sort of wish they had a way to filter and direct you to a support person with expertise in a specific area.  Over the years I've had a couple that kept trying to go right to find a solution when we needed to go left.  Hard to be an expert on all things BB.

John Budzien

I have, more often than not, had positive experiences with the chat support.  Although, there are times when it can be very frustrating trying to describe the problem that promted the support in the first place.


When I have a screen shot of the error, the chat tech has always supplied an email address where it can be sent.


One discouraging thing has been the number of times I have been told that I caled with "an interesting" problem - clearly code for "this is going to take a while because only one tech on the floor has any hope of being able to answer it."  Those chat sessions have lasted up to an hour, but I am sure that it would have also been an hour on the phone.


I also get frustrated when the solution offered fails, the follow-up solution fails, and it takes 4 or more of these trial and error troubleshooting solutions before the problem is resolved.  However - I have never had a case where the problem was not eventually fixed.


As with any tech support team, some are better than others, but they have been more patient than I often have.


 

Debra Holcomb

I don't like the 'new' support services either.  As a west coast client, I can no longer submit a case when an issue arises after support closes on east coast time, which used to be very helpful.  Previously, if I was working in the evenings or on a weekend and ran into an issue, I could create a case that would be waiting for support the next business day. Now, I lose three hours of possible resolution time and it creates a greater interruption to my day to recreate the issue.  It's been suggested to my by Blackbaud that I should come into the office at 6AM to make sure I can get the support I need if I'm doing an upgrade or another project that requires all of the users to be out of the system which may require an analyst's assistance.  My staff doesn't even bother to contact support any more and I use support much less.  Now you all have me wondering why I pay extra for their service.  

John Cioni

So far I've had pretty good luck with the Chat feature. Sometimes it takes longer to come up with a resolution because I'm having to type out my issue or I'm waiting on the rep to respond.


You can definitely tell they're responding to multiple clients but if you're in a bind I would probably call. Although, when I do call they usually tell me to use the chat feature...


 

JoAnn Strommen

Guess I figured when I was waiting during conversation the chat support person was actually researching my issue.   The waiting has not been as big of an issue for me as just quickly getting a workable solution.  But perhaps calling late in the day from Mountain Time zone means they're not quite as busy as when east coast is still at work.  Agree with John - part of the time factor is typing - sometimes the support person's typing is slow also.


As to solving all issues, believe I gave them my third or fourth one last month.  Still waiting.  Do find that they will mark as closed even when no true solution found.

Matt Page

One problem I do find with Chat is that it does seem to be offline quite often (here in the UK at least, and we can't access the US Chat desk).

Sharon Harder

Joanne Felci:

I've actually had good luck with using Chat - though it depends on the specialist you end up with


I would think waiting for an answer by email would take longer


And for some reason calling them just raises my blood pressure


Sorry you are having a bad experience with them 

Recent experience: After changing google email accounts from gmail back to my original email, I was not able to log into Blackbaud knowledgebase. In one of my original messages, I asked if the account could be reset from logging in with Google, back to logging in with Blackbaud. After a week-long back-and-forth chat and email dialogue with various support people at Blackbaud, in which the first didn't think it could be done, I finally got a support person who knew what he was doing. He requested the gmail account that was linked to my original be removed. After that, I was able to log in without any problems. If the situation had been urgent, I would have called Blackbaud, but I didn't have time to wait on the phone for support. It was interesting the final solution to my problem was nearly the same solution that I had suggested. If I had been able to reset the account from my end, I wouldn't have needed support. 

F. O.

In general, I've had a good experience with chat support...but I do agree that in the last 1-2 years response time has gotten longer, and it doesn't help that analysts are on multiple chats at the same time. I also use Luminate Online chat support and the difference in response time is dramatic (LO analysts are more quick to respond).

Evan Rodwell

I vastly prefer the Chat support to the Phone support, but being able to open my own cases after hours is something I definitely miss.


With the chat, I'll tend to type out a detailed description of my problem (just as I would when I could create my own cases) and then paste it into the chat window.  Since the chat transcript gets saved in your case anyway, the only real difference between chat and being able to open our own cases is that we can only do it during the day.

Grace de Castro

I am please using chat.  I find their support personnel is knowledgeable.  If they cannot find the answer to my problem they have an analyst directly call me.

Nicki Rix

I don't care for chat when I am in a situation that needs resolved immediately. Just last week it was all stop until I could get the problem resolved which unfortunately took 45 minutes of chat when I feel it could have been completed within 5 minutes on the phone. There is no substitute for hearing a friendly helpful voice on the other end that you know is dedicating their time to resolving your problem. 

JoAnn Strommen

Missing it again now.  Used chat yesterday a.m.  Person could not resolve issue.  Said her next available time to do screen share was next Monday afternoon.  (It's July 4th I don't plan to be working and need to resolve for closing out the month.)


So, I played around more and have resolved the issue.  Don't know why RE did what it did and how gift date and post date can change from that shown on batch commit report to gift record but....  So clicked link from email to update case.  No case on file with that # and does not show in those for our org.  Not the first time case doesn't show up in case central but usually it does 24 hours later.  Ugh!

Melinda Dietrich

Ryan Hyde:

Nora MacDonald:

I do miss the ability to send screen shots, especially when I get an error message.  But I do also find chat convenient, though it was a lot nicer when no one used it and wait times were much shorter!

You can still send screen shots. I do this all the time! Just tell the person you're chatting with that you have a screeshot of the error code and they'll give you their email address to send it to I've never been denied a rep's email address in these situations.


I do wish there were a place to share screenshots within the chat client, though. That would make life easier. 

 

We use a Snagit to capture screenshots.  This tool includes a screencast.com link that allows me to copy the shot and place a link in the chat window, quite like support shares screenshots with me.  Jing is another product that can be used to get to screencast.com.  All are TechSmith products.