Earthlink DSL → Managements Request...:(

OK...I'm gonna keep this short....

The other day I was informed by a senior person in my division that my helping people out on here is a "bad career move" if I am going to have to make vendor calls and take time out of my day. I was also advised that if I disagree with this policy it might be time to start looking around for other jobs....well for the moment I need this job, so while I will still help out with configuration issues and help as much as possible over the board, I will not be allowed to have telephone contact during my working hours with anyone here, as it is "impacting my efficiency". So I'll do what I can on these boards, but no more posting during downtime at work and no more callbacks for you guys when you are having trouble, will still do everything I can to help though.

Wow I'm pissed off...

Ravenink

Heaven forbid that Earthlink provide good customer service. Management must think people love to spend hours on hold on the phone. I bet when their connection doesn't work, they don't have to wait like normal customers.

Thanks for everything you have done for the Community. We cannot thank you enough for all the help and support you have given us. Glad your still planning to stick around.
GoodLuck with your Job!

ERRRGGHHHH!!!! Earthlink is retarded!!! Ravenink is possibly the best tech earthlink has in their offices, he unlike every other tech's would actually take his off time to help people like me on this board who had problems... And now earthlink threatens him to stop posting or lose his job, that is absolutely crazy! If anything, working on this board has boosted his efficiency... Anyway BRAVO Ravenink, fight the power!!!

Not that surprising! Earthlink is playing the generic ISP strategy. Sign up lots of customers and leverage down costs on everything else like network maintenance, tech support and call center infrastructure. It's hard to make money in a commodity low margin business but Earthlink is trying.

Your bossess focus on the customer support tech to subscriber ratio and dream about the day it equals zero. Helping people on this forum means that you are helping people that do not come in the traditional customer support channels and this impacts the ratio. Earthlink metrics are probably process based and not part of a balanced scorecard which includes customer sat. So, execs do not care about customer satisfaction. Guess the execs fear wall street more than pissing customers off. Not realizing yet that the two are linked.

It was nice to see a throwback to the old Mindspring where support techs who knew their thing went out of their way to help customers. You are a dying breed man! thanks for the help.

I am gonna say that I am very sorry to hear this. It makes EL look quite a bit worse in my eyes as far as CS. Ravenink was helping me as of last week and I tried to get ahold of him again/left messages-now I can assume what happened. Finally get a good tech and I am on the *forbidden DSLR member* list now, so back to the looooonnnng wait on hold times.
Again, sorry to hear about poor (mis)management decisions, and I can certainly see why you are PO'ed-try to sincerely help people and this is what happens. A slap in the face.

mike

Greetings!

Ravenink, you're a credit to your employer, and it's too bad about their tunnel vision. If it were up to me, you'd be in charge of tech support for EL/MS, because the clueless, rude people some of us have had to deal with (in honesty I have not as yet) should either take their cues from you or leave.

I'll have to say I'm not all that surprised, because I've seen my share of appallingly stupid management decisions, and have actually begun to see the rationale behind some of them (have to go home and meditate for 6-12 hours to clear this up) on occasion. They see a rule book and they know the way they run their company. Anything else is different, and different is bad, and needs to be stamped out.

EL is, as large, the-rule-book-is-gospel type companies go, about average. They're cutting off their noses to spite their faces because they're mad about having shot themselves in the feet earlier (all upper management collectively, all at once) that day.

I've done things unofficially in my career that could have gotten me in hot water several times, because it was just the right thing to do at the time, and each time it helped my employer's reputation as well as my own. I think most of us here understand that by-the-book is the way we do things officially, but unofficially we do what our conscience demands, only quietly. SSSHHHHH!

Thanks for all your help.

-DrStrange

Hang in there Ravenink. We will pull for you.

You have given much needed advice and counsel to those of us who are troubled souls in the DSL land called EarthLink/Mindspring.
Now, take a long deep breathe, let it out slowly, and you'll feel relaxed again. That way you can still do your job the right way, and when you get home, you can come here and counsel us once again.

Hopefully, (then again, maybe not) your bosses will see the error of their ways and change their minds. Until then, hang tough and don't let it get you down.

If EL was smart, more of their techs would be in here learning from us
Seriously though, it would seem cheaper to use the net, than to have a bank of 800#'s on hold for hours. If I remember right, they are by the minute billing for 800 calls.
Too bad, I have told Darrin that I think you guys should be in here.
Good luck, too bad, do your job, whatever they want.
Sounds like the 'process' is bad though.

There's not much else I can add to the comments above -- they pretty much say it all. Thanks Ravenink for your continued dedication... I'm sure that, in whatever capacity you continue to frequent this forum, you'll be helping as usual!