Joe,
I apologize if you were dissatisfied with the support we provided.  To answer your questions, for your type of issue, our policy is to request a picture or video (if possible) for troubleshooting purposes.  The 'bleeding' effect you were describing was a little hard to identify, as 'bleeding' could mean many things, and this is why we asked for a photo or video.  From what I take, there was some confusion regarding the support your received and I found out why.  You submitted two separate support tickets to us regarding the same issue.  Two different reps (Matt and Shawn) took the tickets not knowing that you had submitted another.  One of them asked if you could submit a photo, the other asked for a video.  Please understand that we do not expect everyone to be able to submit photos or videos.  But if they have the ability to do so, it's a request we make so we can see if the issue can be fixed without sending the unit in for repair.

All in all, after you submitted both tickets, the diagnosis was that your touchscreen was not engaging at all, therefore it warrants a replacement, which we have offered.  Please let me know if our request to bring your chumby in for repair/replacement is not satisfactory.

Thanks,
Sam
Chumby Support Manager

Dont be such an arrogant prick.. Mistakes happen, they wanted to make sure you werent seeing a common artifact and it would have helped to see the problem.. It *appeared* to them as two tickets were issue... This may not be the case but you shouldnt go ripping into people blindly. Attachments sometimes get lost in transit... They are trying to save costs of returning a unit where a simple calibration would have gotten you up and running...  And the fact you have a degree doesnt mean you have to wave it in other peoples faces... Frankly I hope UPS shatters your chumby in a million pieces cuz your atitude is not the kind of thing we need in the Chumby community..

Just because theres a occasional miscommunication or gap you get all whiney...
You remind me of a professor who condescends the cleaning staff cuz they find them to be lesser people... Where I was employed used to have a policy in place that even tenured staff could be terminated for doing this... Because they were mistreating people...

Your no different than someone who expects people to bend over backwards for them even when its YOUR problem..

Reclarify yourself, calmly and take a chill pill.. Personally at this point id ignore any CS email you sent me if I was a CSR at this point.. it would almost be worth the few customers you take by word of mouth trashing and condenscending people.

You can only please some of the people some of the time, and pretentious snots such as yourself can never be happy or accept things happen...

Do us all a favor and go back to playing in your sandbox... you obviously do not have the interpersonal skills to deal with real life.

Unfortunately i have been on both sides of the CSR cycle.. Both as a CSR rep and as a customer...
Perhaps if you actually worked in customer service you could see how things not entirely under your control can go wrong... and there are usually standard troubleshooting procedures (yes some are very scripted) and have to rely on things just working when they get passed on to different people and departments..

Don't hold your breath on an apology. Your not the first person whose abused a CS rep and to be frank. not the last.. I'v had to put up with customer abuse and do NOT like seeing it pushed on anyone else... You came into the forum expecting a response or people to sympathize with you to generally deride the usually above and beyond support of Chumby and expected us to all side with you... Iv actually have not seen a company that has gone out of their way to help developers even at the possible expense of "not" providing the entire infastructure/ecosystem.. and are usually answering the forums 7 days a week..

As to the fact you posted this remark publically, be prepared for people to answer you honestly.. If you dont like the response, dont put it in a public forum and send private emails to all involved.. I will *not* stay out of it/none of my business.... Its now a public matter not a private one the moment you posted it to the forum.. Just because you don't like my answer, doesn't mean im not entitled to my own opinion. And if there is *more* to it, then you only posted part of the issue, and only posting what you think would support your cause, is intentionally painting an incomplete picture for people to make comment on...

As to the insults, they are intended as a wake up call..  Just because you have been so eloquent enough not to use any doesnt mean your not intentionally insulting someones character.

These views are those of MY experience as a CSR and are not necessarily the views of Chumby or any of its affiliates...

If you feel like eating crow... Feel free to email me a PM
Note the exits are clearly marked..

joecage...

I don't work for Chumby... and I don't work with tech support anywhere, but I can see the logic and frustration with involved with all parties...

It can take some time to figure out if a problem is hardware related... either due to it being flat-out defective, or there being some sort of misconfiguration (I got my Chumby almost a year ago... It took a good two weeks till I felt like I had managed to REALLY get the touch screen aligned), or if it's user error. And terminology for damage can vary... can anyone not looking at your Chumby know for sure if "bleeding" is an accurate description, or if it's a group of discolored pixels that respond differently to touch than the others... My husband, for instance, said his father got a error on his machine on boot... and showed me a message regarding a .dll file. When libraries are loaded in the operating system, to me, that's far past "on boot"...  On boot would be post messages or beeps.... or something telling me to find a system disk. My father in law has no idea what "boot" means, and my husband has been around computers long enough to know there is a difference between booting and loading and whenever it is you decide to click your first icon on the desktop...

Hardware and tech issues are annoying for all parties involved. You may be sure and one hundred percent correct from the start that the screen is borked. But customer service can't  see your Chumby or  have any idea how much you know about the hardware you're working with. They can't know what you've done to test the issue unless they've been told -- I am assuming of course that you did point them to the video/images you took in your original support request and they missed it... and that's why you're itchy about the fact it wasn't addressed first time around.

There's this saying in medicine that you're more likely to find a horse than a zebra.... Works here too. Customer support sees a lot of horses, but that doesn't mean there aren't zebras (and I'm thinking... customer support is usually far more willing to consider a zebra than a doctor, but hey...) But they've got to rule out "horse" first. It takes time... it's annoying... but they've got to do it.

I spent two hours, for instance, on the phone with my internet provider because I lost my network connection. My Linux boxes and my Chumby couldn't connect to the internet, and, because the tech couldn't use anything but Windows to troubleshoot, I started our XP machine for that purpose. After two hours on the phone... I am told to reinstall Internet Explorer, and everything will work. EVERYTHING. And when I asked the fine tech support guy... "So reinstalling IE will make all my Linux machines connect to the internet, and will allow me to ping from this XP box and not still be getting a 100% packet loss status?" He told me his name (which was different, incidentally, than the one he told me originally) and to have a good evening.

My modem burned out some bit of the board somewhere.

Is it unreasonable to ask for EVERYTHING back when returning a defective product? Maybe. But every other hardware manufacturer on earth does it.  If a hard drive in my new build goes belly up after a week, I am welcome to RMA to where ever I got it... along with its original packaging (box, WITH UPC) and any cables, drivers or package inserts for refund or replacement. Pretty standard. The hardware manufacturers don't usually *replace*  just the defective bit. They put it aside, and send you a new one, to save you time, and give them a chance to troubleshoot and potentially spot design errors.

They could let you keep your charms, bags, power cord and booklet and just send you a naked, lonely Chumby. And if  (I'm sure this isn't the case, but that's not to say things like this can't happen) there's some weirdness going on with the way your power cord is delivering power to the Chumby and it bleeds out your screen again... Nobody's gotten anywhere.

Granted, I didn't see if the responses (which probably were canned, that's where most troubleshooting processes start... horse/zebra) were polite or whatever.  Then, I've done enough dealing with hardware to realize that the first request to tech support is  generic,  even when my details were specific. It's okay, it's annoying, but it's not unique to any one hardware manufacturer. If they miss a point you mentioned, or have to ask a further question just for their own records... it's not personal, they aren't necessarily blowing off (until they tell you to reinstall IE and have a nice night.) 

I don't think there was anything particularly offensive about Sam's tone (at least on the forum). I don't think there was anything unreasonable about the manner in which Chumby handled this. It seems pretty industry standard. It doesn't mean it's not a pain you could have lived with out to return your Chumby for a new one... but they didn't seem to make you jump over any more barrels than any other place.

Fed Ex confusion happens (and a year on, I still have my Chumby web order... and the packaging) and maybe you printed out the email with the correct address in it and INCLUDED it with your  RMA'd Chumby, or perhaps you didn't and thought that someone in packing and labeling the order had access to the support ticket and emails with your mailing changes. I like and trust the guys at Chumby, and hey, NewEgg and a lot of other tech retailers.  But I also don't really want to hedge my bets, or know that somebody printing FedEx slips can see my whole store profile and every communication therein. And hey,  yes, I know... I may not understand the specifics of what went on there, because they weren't actually supplied.

You did not call Sam a name, I agree. But to post an issue on the forum, and then tell others that they don't understand the specifics and to stay out of it is pretty unrealistic. If you had the issue with Sam or CS in general, or the way things were handled... fine, tell Chumby Industries. Tell Sam's  supervisor, or tell Steve Tomlin.  But coming here to ask if anyone else has gone through this,  and then telling them to stay out of it can lead someone to the conclusion that it didn't matter to you at all how the matter was resolved.

Bzzt. wrong answer... You were trying to imply that the CSR did not put in any effort and intentionally dropped the ball.. Your just angry we all didnt come running to your "aid" and give you sympathy/pity... Reason I suggest you eating crow is your playing a swan song on the worlds tiniest violin and noones listening.. Your just making yourself look like a fool.  You insulted ME by insulting my previous occupation (Customer Service Rep).... And touche on the remark "When you call people outside of their name, it's much more a commentary on you than it is them." Didn't you just call me a FANBOY..... Pot, Kettle, JET BLACK.
I am not going to go away ...

Funny thing too, I don't hear anyone else complaining about their customer service on this thread... Perhaps part of the problem is between the chumby and the user in addition to the hardware problems.

Well now I have the grammar and spelling police after me. How quaint. And you're <--- (to clarify and stroke the ego of the grammar police) basically doing the same thing you accused me of...frivolous name calling.  But now I realize that you have been only skimming my posts, not understanding them so Ill just let you continue to gripe and moan on your own. Leaving you to vent in your hypocritical way.

And to clarify insulting me... By being abusive and whiney to another Customer Service Representative, you are insulting ME and my occupation... its the same as if you are insulting ME.... is that as clear as crystal, or do I need to translate it or fingerspell it for you?

And your repetitive use of the word fanboy is simply tired and unoriginal... and speaks volumes of yourself.

You have the capacity to hit the E-mail button... if you need any further clarification.