| When I first moved to the small town of Belleville, | | | | call was not going to be a quick fix. |
| Ont. from the big city of Toronto I was quite | | | | Another problem I found with this form of |
| taken back by the small size of the town and the | | | | communication was the lack of anything |
| lack of job opportunities. For the first few months | | | | personable. With the phone chats I had learned |
| I became quite distressed until I happened upon a | | | | American history from a retired army general, |
| job where I could deal with customers from the | | | | cooking tips from a grandma of 15, how to |
| States for the company Hewlett- Packard as a | | | | groom a poodle for a dog show, and the |
| Tech Rep/ Customer Service Representative. | | | | temperature of any city in the country I talked |
| The work was quite nice as I could talk on the | | | | to. I looked forward to going to work everyday |
| phone with the customers and then type up the | | | | not knowing what interesting information I would |
| work orders, general inquiries, or complaints. I later | | | | absorb for the day. |
| received the opportunity to just communicate | | | | I found my sales stats plummeted when I |
| with the customers through emails and live chat. | | | | switched to just the Internet communication. |
| That way of communication turned out to be not | | | | On the positive side though, it is a quicker |
| as efficient I found for more than one reason. | | | | response time with live chat through the Internet. |
| The first problem was the time factor. If you | | | | If you just had a quick question or concern, such |
| were corresponding with an older person, you | | | | as the status of delivery on your new computer, |
| could pretty well guarantee that it would add an | | | | it is the ideal method. |
| additional 20 min. type time to get the whole issue | | | | So in conclusion, if I was to offer my advice, I |
| understood. Between the slow two finger typing, | | | | would say a friendly and knowledgeable voice on |
| and the lack of knowledge of the computer | | | | the other end of the line would get my vote for |
| system they were trying to correspond with, the | | | | the perfect form of virtual customer service. |