back to employment wisdom

phone leech:


SpaceNeeded asks: "Numbers of you will probably recognize the start of the situation. Because I work with systems, I perform occasional builds. This occasionally crosses over to support (especially where it's my kit I'm asked to support). This isn't a problem, nor is it a problem when I get the occasional support query from someone I haven't supplied a system to, but who needs assistance. This is all well and good, but I've had pretty poor year personally. I've lost two relatives and a third is in a pretty bad way in hospital. An eleven year relationship ended a couple of months back, and I'm now having to perform _all_ the domestic tasks that used to be shared. Between these few things and my regular job I'm finding I have a whole lot less time to allow to support calls. What methods do you know of for gently cutting off someone, support-wise?"



======================
 The Dreaded Customer
======================

I work at a computer sales/repair shop, and I am all too familiar with your problem. There are three customers I can think of off-hand that match that description. They are customers that will call you at the drop of a hat, to ask you basic computer use questions. They are people that call you 2 minutes after they encounter a problem, having spent basically no time trying to solve the problem on their own. They will call you and ask you to walk them through what you realize is a 20 minute procedure. And they'll call sometimes 5-10 times per day when they are having particular problems. It's common for them to call back less than 5 minutes after the end of their previous call.

I don't intend to be mean about it, but there ARE people that are "too stupid to own a computer", and they can be a serious problem for the local computer shops.

This almost always gets started because someone at the store initially gives the person an absurd amount of phone support. The customer lacks basic consideration and common sense, and now considers you to be their personal technical support and will now call you at the drop of a hat because you are "so helpful". The customer is certainly part of the problem, but you've done it to yourself.

These customers are particularly difficult to deal with when they are good, frequent, paying customers. It's hard to say no to someone that buys several thousand dollars of your product every year. It's been my experience that most customers are easy to "show the light" that they are being unreasonable, and will happily scale back their calls if requested. We also have a professional teacher that specializes in computer training that we refer to such customers. Many times the customer is quite happy to pay ~$25/hr to have a professional come to their house and answer every question they have and show them how to do something. Very often one or two visits by this man solves the entire problem with a customer. We encourage the customers to get a paper and pencil and leave it by their computer, and write down questions as they encounter them, and arrange for an appointment from our tech support person at most once a week, say on Mondays, to answer the week's long list of questions. This helps them to get all their questions answered and minimizes the number of visits required. It also encourages them to think on their questions, most of which they end up answering themselves before Monday rolls around. It also helps the customer to mentally establish a price tag for your support time and realize that they are trying to get something for nothing. A few of the tightwads realize this and when you advise them over the phone "maybe we need to send someone out to help you with that" they will point out "but that costs money". They know what's going on, and they are boldly trying to leech from you.

Remember that even a good customer can burn up any money you have made off them with astonishing speed by taking up the time of your sales staff for 10 minutes a day over the course of a year. To put it in perspective, that's over a week's fulltime pay for one of your sales staff. Is the customer REALLY worth that much money just given to them over the course of a year? Are you really clearing more than that much profit from them? Probably not.

We have problems with new employees because the "leech" customers will quickly realize they have a new un-jaded ear to talk with and will usually ask for the new guy by name when they call, because they have subconsciously figured out that the new guy will spend absurd amounts of time on the phone to help them. (you might hear them say "but Joe is soo helpful!") So it's important to train the new people on how to handle the tech support leeches. We try to enforce a "5 minute rule". This means if at any point in the conversation it occurs to us that it will take more than 5 minutes on the phone to help the customer, we ask them instead to bring in their equipment or schedule an on-site. MOST customers will either bring it in, schedule an on-site, or get offended at the idea of spending their money for assistance after a purchase and will hang up on you or ask to speak to your manager. A few will simply continue to insist that you help them for "just a few more minutes". Those are the inconsiderate ones, the true leeches, and often times you simply have to put your foot down, despite customer relations. We use peer pressure to help with this, and if we spot an employee on the phone for a long time with a customer, we will hold up an open hand and mouth "five minutes" to them to remind them.

We try to use analogies with some customers, to show them why we cannot talk with them on the phone all day. One of my favorites is the car analogy. "When you buy a new car, the salesman will help you with how to operate the new power seats, show you where the spare tire is at, and tell you about what regular maintenance the car needs. They will not teach you how to drive or help you change your oil. That's not their job. You have to learn that for yourself, hire it done, or pay someone to teach you how to do it". It's amazing how this pulls things into focus for most users, hits them like a bat, and knocks some sense into them. Be prepared for customers to occasionally respond "but I already know how to drive a car". It doesn't make sense as a reply, but you will get it from time to time. It means this customer "doesn't get it". Good luck with that one. That is the customer that honestly *expects* you to spend your entire day helping them, and sees absolutely nothing wrong with that. You will have to be blunt to the point of being rude to get that one to stop. Even if the customer stomps out and never comes back, you have actually just saved your company a good deal of money so don't feel bad. Some customers are simply not worth the trouble they bring you.

I'm not sure of your exact circumstances, but it sounds like you are doing support for software you wrote. This puts you in a little different class than me. In your case, you should adopt a paid subscription based support. Require them to pay you say, $150/month for a phone support contact to go with your software. (set the dollar amount appropriately considering the past phone support you have given previously) Make sure they realize there are clearly defined differences between paid and unpaid support. Make unpaid support by EMAIL ONLY. Guarantee a 3 day turn-around on emails. (and make a point to NOT give them instant turn-around on emails or they will get used to it and expect it!) If they continue to call you despite not paying for phone support, when they call, tell them you are busy workin on another client's project and do not have time to talk with them right now. Direct them to send an email to you with their request. Some of them will get flustered, "but I need an answer NOW!" and that is the perfect time to negotiate the service contract. They may agree to it just to get you to answer their questions immediately, and then neglect to send you the cheque. Give them three chances. On the third call, be firm, no more phone support until I have your cheque in my hand or your credit card number on my machine. (you will always then be told the check is in the mail, and you will actually receive about 1 in 4) Also be sure to specify what time and day range you will accept phone calls, or you WILL get phone calls Saturday night at 11pm. You may have to arrange for two tiers of phone support, or specify an additional per-call charge for calls outside your normal support hours. If you are supporting several clients, I suggest getting a second cell phone, and give out that as your support number, and only turn on the phone during your hours. If they try to call you at 10pm they'll get your voice mail and you can handle it in the morning. NEVER give your personal cell phone number to anyone that you would not be willing to take a call at 2am from, because if they have an emergency they WILL call you, whatever day or time.

Just remember... unless there is a price tag attached to your phone support in some way, your customers will always abuse the freebies, it's in their nature.




last updated 11/20/2025 at 09:14:02 by make_www_index.command version 2025.11.05.A