What is going on with Tech support!?


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What the hell is going on with Tech support?

 

Had a customer contact Avast yesterday because he says his paid license was going to Expire soon, but it wasn't suppose to be up for renewal for 6 more months. The support guy tells him he's been hacked into by the heart bleed virus, but don't worry the guy who made heart bleed had been caught and is incarcerated. (Face Palm) He then wants $160 to clean his computer. In which the guy pays him

 

Today I got a call from a customer who says he recently got a new Epson printer which he setup on wireless and it worked great for a week then stopped printing (Shocker). So he said he called Epson and they told him he had a lot of viruses (Showed him the event viewer) and said it was going to be x number of dollars to clean it. He told the guy no, that he had a local computer guy and that he was going to call him instead.

 

It's not just Avast and Epson, i've heard the SAME exact stories from people who contact,

 

HP

Linksys (Cisco)

Netgear

Dlink

 

Just to name a few. I ask them where they get the phone numbers from and they say from the companies website.

 

So my question is, what s going on with Tech support? Are they all scams now?

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Why don't they call you first?

 

Well the Epson Printer was a week old so they figure that should be covered under Epson Warranty.

 

The Avast Subscription they bought, they thought they would have to contact Avast about.

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Companies want to make money.  In this industry.. it's about getting people to pay more than they should for goods/services.  I remember a guy telling me that he used to run ethernet cable for companies.  He could buy all the cable, ends, etc he would need for the office for under 150$, but would charge over 5000$ for a 3-5 hour install.

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Companies want to make money.

 

Of course they want to make money, but what they are doing is lying to a customer to cleanup an infection they don't have.

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Of course they want to make money, but what they are doing is lying to a customer to cleanup an infection they don't have.

 

Like going to a mechanic to find out all your filters are disgusting, your fluids have debris in them, your oil is sludge and your timing belt is frayed.. even though you had it in 6 months prior for the oil change, filters, etc and there was no issue.

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Like going to a mechanic to find out all your filters are disgusting, your fluids have debris in them, your oil is sludge and your timing belt is frayed.. even though you had it in 6 months prior for the oil change, filters, etc and there was no issue.

 

Just because others do it doesn't make it any less dishonest and a scam.

 

It's pretty much Exactly the same as those Microsoft Scam phone calls you get, except you call them first.

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Race to the bottom. Companies just want to churn out crap and expect you to buy another when it fails. Supporting a product they already made money on is a crazy notion to them. I will say Lenovo has their ###### together. We bought a refurb Helix Ultrabook from their site a month or so ago. Even though its been sent back for a bad battery and is now going back again today for a keyboard dock failure, support has picked up the phone damn quick and taken care of me right effing now. English speaking, based in US support even!

 

I might not chance buying another refurb, my next new laptop will be from them. Screw Dell and their ###### support.

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Just because others do it doesn't make it any less dishonest and a scam.

 

I agree, my point was that it's not just related to computer support. It's also gone on for many many years.  About 12 years ago, rogers cut off our internet.  Said we had a virus and that they wouldn't return our connection (yet still bill us) until we got it fixed.  We took it to two places both required 50$ before even looking at it.  We paid the one, they did the check and said they found nothing wrong with it (still charged 50$) so called up Rogers and they offered to clean it for us but would require a tech and was another 50$.   We said no and promptly cancelled the rogers account. 

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The guy probably just called the same number twice and the dude on the phone couldnt beleive his luck!! I can imagine the phone call....Is that Epson...Err yeah this is Epson, Your having trouble with your printer you say....Viruses!!

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...(Showed him the event viewer)...

 

A sure sign of a scammer's tactics. Genuine tech support won't be doing that.

 

Where are these people getting the phone numbers from?

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I caught someone at my place trying to push the same BS onto one of our users earlier this year. Apparently using a laser mouse on an unstable surface and having the SHIFT key stuck = H4X()()R3D!!!111

 

I blame Hollywood, I really do.

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"Showing them the event viewer" is a classic scam tactic. No reputable company would do that. Either someone rang them and told them to visit a particular site, or sent an email with a link/number. HP and others don't do crap like this.
 
Often, the scammer will want the target to visit a site like Logmein, which can establish a remote connection by various means (standalone executable, plugins, etc). They then proceed to lockdown the machine until the target pays a fee. It's all pretty standard stuff. Still, many do fall for it. A friend of mine nearly did, but fortunately I'd wiped Windows and installed Xubuntu on it. The executable wouldn't run :rofl:

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This is pretty weird, since i've worked with some of those companies you mentioned and the tech support (not the enterprise but the consumer) is nothing like that, that just sounds pretty unprofessional. Unless the clients are lying or the telephones they called aren't the real support from those brands (maybe it's partners or even scam companies), i find this whole very hard to believe - the bad diagnostics, not the charging, mind you.

 

Also warwagon, the best you could do is to report those cases directly to the companies - HP for example, has strict discipline with cases like those.

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What the hell is going on with Tech support?

 

Had a customer contact Avast yesterday because he says his paid license was going to Expire soon, but it wasn't suppose to be up for renewal for 6 more months. The support guy tells him he's been hacked into by the heart bleed virus, but don't worry the guy who made heart bleed had been caught and is incarcerated. (Face Palm) He then wants $160 to clean his computer. In which the guy pays him

 

Today I got a call from a customer who says he recently got a new Epson printer which he setup on wireless and it worked great for a week then stopped printing (Shocker). So he said he called Epson and they told him he had a lot of viruses (Showed him the event viewer) and said it was going to be x number of dollars to clean it. He told the guy no, that he had a local computer guy and that he was going to call him instead.

 

It's not just Avast and Epson, i've heard the SAME exact stories from people who contact,

 

HP

Linksys (Cisco)

Netgear

Dlink

 

Just to name a few. I ask them where they get the phone numbers from and they say from the companies website.

 

So my question is, what s going on with Tech support? Are they all scams now?

 

Almost all of these companies use a 3rd party company for tech support.  That's where its happening.  I've had horror stories from my customers that spent hundreds on removing malware that didn't exists.  And these are not uneducated people.  It's an appalling practice that these companies should be held responsible for.  It's honestly no different from the Princes in Africa emails.

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One company that is HELLACIOUS to deal with for support is Aruba Networks. Very thick accent people from India that you have to repeat things 5x to. They take 4 hours to do something that would take 30 minutes. They waste more time when you have to repeat things to them 5x to. and They don't seem to listen well at all.

 

This is an ENTERPRISE GRADE HARDWARE COMPANY WE ARE TALKING ABOUT! and not some crappy 50 dollar router... I'm talking about 500+ dollar access points!

 

Then they take 2-5 days to answer support tickets. They drive me to drink and I'm about to ask them to re-inbuse me for all the rum I've needed to cope!

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