Why is EN tech support so bad and what can I do about it?

[BillSanders 3]

The EverNote database on my wife's computer has been corrupted two different times. She gets the message that EverNote cannot synch.

 

I looked at her log file and it was too confusing. So I deleted the log file, restarted EN and tried to synch. I opened the log file and found an error message and little more. So I figured that the error message must reflect the problem. I copied the error message into a support request.

 

A couple of days later, I got an e-mail from EN saying they had received my support request and needed my log file. Clearly this must have been an automatic reply and nobody had bothered to actually read my e-mail.

 

I gave up and sent the log file.

 

The same exact problem has happened again. I enclosed another self-explanatory error message from a refreshed log file and received another automatic request for a copy of the log file.

 

This is the message I sent:

 

    Evernote cannot synch

    The log shows the error:

          [2572] 100% Cannot commit transaction "adsList", error: ATTR_NOT_FOUND (Can't kill uid=9413, error: database disk
          image is malformed, database disk image is malformed)

    I do not have a local backup

 

I really like EverNote and use it frequently. However, the company's tech support is probably the stupidest I have experienced in decades. (I have been a designer of computer hardware and software since 1959.)

 

I figure if this is happening to me, it must be happening to others.

 

DOES ANYBODY HAVE A SUGGESTION FOR HOW I MIGHT CONTACT EVERNOTE MANAGEMENT AND TRY TO CORRECT THIS PROBLEM?

 

 

[jbenson2 2,147]

Support can only do so much. I think your issue relates more to the product itself.

 

Earlier this year the CEO of Evernote became aware of a variety of quality issues and made some promises to address them with a new focus.

http://www.gottabemobile.com/2014/01/05/evernotes-phil-libin-responds-to-some-user-complaints-but-not-all/

[Metrodon 2,184]

If you are a Premium user,  you could try Chat to get a more immediate response. It's not unreasonable for an organisation that is supporting many millions of users to have a step by step process that they follow.

[ScottLougheed 1,316]

While you wait for support, here's a thread for a similar sounding issue. It's for windows, but the principles of the solution should be the same.

https://discussion.evernote.com/topic/22756-database-disk-image-is-malformed-database-disk-image-is-malformed/

[DutchPete 247]

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

[BillSanders 3]

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

Not my experience at all. I submmited an offical request on 1 August. I received the reply from tech support on 13 August. The reply asked for information that I had already supplied. It offered no help or suggestions. Maybe DutchPete and I live in parallel universes.

[Wordsgood 526]

May I suggest you quote your Support Ticket number here so one of the Forum moderators can flag it with EN for you?

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

Not my experience at all. I submmited an offical request on 1 August. I received the reply from tech support on 13 August. The reply asked for information that I had already supplied. It offered no help or suggestions. Maybe DutchPete and I live in parallel universes.

[gbarry 2,658]

 

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

Not my experience at all. I submmited an offical request on 1 August. I received the reply from tech support on 13 August. The reply asked for information that I had already supplied. It offered no help or suggestions. Maybe DutchPete and I live in parallel universes.

 

 

I'm not finding anything recent in the support system--the last ticket was from a few months back. Can you send along your ticket number?

[moe52 1]

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

 

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

[BillSanders 3]

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

 

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

I agree!! Does anyone know how to discuss this issue with the management?

[BillSanders 3]

 

 

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

Not my experience at all. I submmited an offical request on 1 August. I received the reply from tech support on 13 August. The reply asked for information that I had already supplied. It offered no help or suggestions. Maybe DutchPete and I live in parallel universes.

 

 

I'm not finding anything recent in the support system--the last ticket was from a few months back. Can you send along your ticket number?

 

#668678

[ScottLougheed 1,316]

 

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

 

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

I agree!! Does anyone know how to discuss this issue with the management?

 

Posting here is about as close as anyone is going to get I imagine. As indicated by staff's participation in this very thread, staff read and participate in these forums. 

 

That being said, it is odd that a free user has to wait 5 weeks to find out that they are not actually eligible for support. In my opinion if free users are in fact not eligible, they shouldn't be allowed to submit a ticket in the first instance. It's not really fair to have users waiting around under the impression they will actually receive help. Perhaps this is a partially-implemented and as yet unannounced change. Time will tell I suppose. 

[Wordsgood 526]

AUGUST 25, 2014 EDIT:

As you can see further along in this thread, it turns out - as verified by GBarry (an EN staff member) - that Evernote was indeed phasing out Tech Support for Free Users. As of this moment in time, I have no idea if they are still answering any Support Tickets from us Free users. I am doubting that they are based on a post elsewhere in the forum made by one of our esteemed Moderators, saying that a ticket for for one of her free accounts was made over a month ago and as of August 23, she had heard nothing in reply. So my advice now? Don't count on it. Use the Forum and the EN Knowledge Base instead.

I am *not* going to delete this note as much of the information contained in it, *does* apply to Premium Users. When I'm more awake and have the time, I will come back and edit this. (If I can remember, that is.)

END OF EDIT

None of us are happy about the delay in assisting free users, but I disagree that it is non-existent.

After the first 10 or so days that you submitted a ticket and recieved no response, did do as is commonly recommended to all users - free or paid - and post your ticket number, along with details about your problem, i.e.

➡ The date you submitted your Support request and the Ticket number the first auto-reply email would have assigned to your case.

➡ What the issue you were seeking Support help for.

➡ Details as to what you had (if anything) done to try resolving it on your own, including searching both the Forum and the Evernote Knowledge Base.

➡ State which client(s) (platforms/devices) you are using, i.e. Windows 7, Windows 8, Mac, iPad, Web, IOS, Android, Windows mobile, etc.

The current recommendation is that if you have *successfuly* submitted a Support Request - you will know your request was successful if you recieve an auto-reply email with a Case Ticket number shortly after pressing the Submit button - and are a free user, is that you wait 10 full *business* days and if you haven't heard back or feel the Tech who handled your case was negligent, then post the below information here on the forum.

Premium users who run into any issues with Evernote Support should post all of the above detailed info after 3 days *business* days have gone by without a response. Premium users also have the option of using Live Chat. Just as with free users, if going the email route, you can be assured of a successful support request *only if* you recieve an auto-email shortly after pressing the Submit with a Ticket number assigned to your case. If you don't get such an email, something went wrong and Evernote has no clue you tried to reach them.

(Remember that Evernote is open Monday to Friday from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, Pacific Time. After hours, weekends and holidays are not considered business days.)

Moderators will then alert Evernote Staff to your situation, forum thread and Ticket number to see if there is anything else that might be done on their end to assist you. Depending on their workload, you might recieve an immediate response from an EN Staffer such as GBarry or Charboyd, or it could take a few days more. There is no guarantee they *can* help, but they will investigate each reported case to see how it was handled and if anything further can be done in the way of assistance.

In the meantime, other users on the forum will see your post and if they think they might be able to help, will jump in (as they have time) to offer suggested solutions and/or workarounds.

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

[charboyd 272]

 

You should submit an official support request, for which a ticket with a number will be generated. You will initially get an automated message with the text of your request & the ticket number shown. Soon afterwards someone who has read your issue will contact you. I have been using EN for 1.5 years now & have found their support excellent & quick.

Not my experience at all. I submmited an offical request on 1 August. I received the reply from tech support on 13 August. The reply asked for information that I had already supplied. It offered no help or suggestions. Maybe DutchPete and I live in parallel universes.

 

I've escalated this issue in the queue. You should be contacted via email shortly.

[BillSanders 3]

None of us are happy about the delay in assisting free users, but I disagree that it is non-existent.

After the first 10 or so days that you submitted a ticket and recieved no response, did do as is commonly recommended to all users - free or paid - and post your ticket number, along with details about your problem, i.e.

➡ The date you submitted your Support request and the Ticket number the first auto-reply email would have assigned to your case.

➡ What the issue you were seeking Support help for.

➡ Details as to what you had (if anything) done to try resolving it on your own, including searching both the Forum and the Evernote Knowledge Base.

➡ State which client(s) (platforms/devices) you are using, i.e. Windows 7, Windows 8, Mac, iPad, Web, IOS, Android, Windows mobile, etc.

The current recommendation is that if you have *successfuly* submitted a Support Request - you will know your request was successful if you recieve an auto-reply email with a Case Ticket number shortly after pressing the Submit button - and are a free user, is that you wait 10 full *business* days and if you haven't heard back or feel the Tech who handled your case was negligent, then post the below information here on the forum.

Premium users who run into any issues with Evernote Support should post all of the above detailed info after 3 days *business* days have gone by without a response. Premium users also have the option of using Live Chat. Just as with free users, if going the email route, you can be assured of a successful support request *only if* you recieve an auto-email shortly after pressing the Submit with a Ticket number assigned to your case. If you don't get such an email, something went wrong and Evernote has no clue you tried to reach them.

(Remember that Evernote is open Monday to Friday from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, Pacific Time. After hours, weekends and holidays are not considered business days.)

Moderators will then alert Evernote Staff to your situation, forum thread and Ticket number to see if there is anything else that might be done on their end to assist you. Depending on their workload, you might recieve an immediate response from an EN Staffer such as GBarry or Charboyd, or it could take a few days more. There is no guarantee they *can* help, but they will investigate each reported case to see how it was handled and if anything further can be done in the way of assistance.

In the meantime, other users on the forum will see your post and if they think they might be able to help, will jump in (as they have time) to offer suggested solutions and/or workarounds.

 

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

 

As I said in my original post:

 

However, the company's tech support is probably the stupidest I have experienced in decades. (I have been a

designer of computer hardware and software since 1959.)

 

May I add that I was Senior Research Scientist at Stanford University (now retired) and I have run my own software

company and always offered excellent (same-day where possible) support.

 

For my accomplishments, I have been included in Who's Who in the World.

 

So I believe I know whereof I speak.

 

I suggest that Customer Service for Dummies should be required reading for your management.

 

I have stopped recommending Evernote and am currently looking for a substitute.

[moe52 1]

Thanks for all the followups. I understand someone's comment was that non-Premium support takes 10 business days; if that expectation was set up in the Support form or the standard reply, then I missed it. 10 days is two weeks. That's a loooooong time for a support request. 

 

For what it's worth, I waited three days then complained and heard no reply. At that point, I also applied my own fix (reinstalling the application), which worked. I mentioned that in my reply so maybe that's why no reply until today, when the odd, "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today..." message. 

 

Anyway, my point remains not that they offer better support for a free product but that they set expectations. Good company, good products; I think they are hurting themselves for no reason.

[gbarry 2,658]

Anyway, my point remains not that they offer better support for a free product but that they set expectations. Good company, good products; I think they are hurting themselves for no reason.

 

Thanks for the feedback--we are working on fixing this, though it is happening in a staged manner and may cause some dissonance while we transition. We're doing our best to filter and handle as many free user issues as we can, but in some cases users will end up receiving the message you received. Removing the support expectation for free users and also ensuring you have strong resources available to you here in the forums (and KB) are top priorities.

[Wordsgood 526]

GBarrry, just to be super clear, are you saying that tech support for free users is being phased out and at some point will cease to be and option altogether? Aside from this forum and an improved KB, I mean?

Anyway, my point remains not that they offer better support for a free product but that they set expectations. Good company, good products; I think they are hurting themselves for no reason.

Thanks for the feedback--we are working on fixing this, though it is happening in a staged manner and may cause some dissonance while we transition. We're doing our best to filter and handle as many free user issues as we can, but in some cases users will end up receiving the message you received. Removing the support expectation for free users and also ensuring you have strong resources available to you here in the forums (and KB) are top priorities.

[DutchPete 247]

GBarrry, just to be super clear, are you saying that tech support for free users is being phased out and at some point will cease to be and option altogether? Aside from this forum and an improved KB, I mean?

 

 

Anyway, my point remains not that they offer better support for a free product but that they set expectations. Good company, good products; I think they are hurting themselves for no reason.

Thanks for the feedback--we are working on fixing this, though it is happening in a staged manner and may cause some dissonance while we transition. We're doing our best to filter and handle as many free user issues as we can, but in some cases users will end up receiving the message you received. Removing the support expectation for free users and also ensuring you have strong resources available to you here in the forums (and KB) are top priorities.

 

 

Good question, and obviously what Gbarry said above is perhaps more than they meant to tell us at this stage.

[BillSanders 3]

 

None of us are happy about the delay in assisting free users, but I disagree that it is non-existent.

After the first 10 or so days that you submitted a ticket and recieved no response, did do as is commonly recommended to all users - free or paid - and post your ticket number, along with details about your problem, i.e.

➡ The date you submitted your Support request and the Ticket number the first auto-reply email would have assigned to your case.

➡ What the issue you were seeking Support help for.

➡ Details as to what you had (if anything) done to try resolving it on your own, including searching both the Forum and the Evernote Knowledge Base.

➡ State which client(s) (platforms/devices) you are using, i.e. Windows 7, Windows 8, Mac, iPad, Web, IOS, Android, Windows mobile, etc.

The current recommendation is that if you have *successfuly* submitted a Support Request - you will know your request was successful if you recieve an auto-reply email with a Case Ticket number shortly after pressing the Submit button - and are a free user, is that you wait 10 full *business* days and if you haven't heard back or feel the Tech who handled your case was negligent, then post the below information here on the forum.

Premium users who run into any issues with Evernote Support should post all of the above detailed info after 3 days *business* days have gone by without a response. Premium users also have the option of using Live Chat. Just as with free users, if going the email route, you can be assured of a successful support request *only if* you recieve an auto-email shortly after pressing the Submit with a Ticket number assigned to your case. If you don't get such an email, something went wrong and Evernote has no clue you tried to reach them.

(Remember that Evernote is open Monday to Friday from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, Pacific Time. After hours, weekends and holidays are not considered business days.)

Moderators will then alert Evernote Staff to your situation, forum thread and Ticket number to see if there is anything else that might be done on their end to assist you. Depending on their workload, you might recieve an immediate response from an EN Staffer such as GBarry or Charboyd, or it could take a few days more. There is no guarantee they *can* help, but they will investigate each reported case to see how it was handled and if anything further can be done in the way of assistance.

In the meantime, other users on the forum will see your post and if they think they might be able to help, will jump in (as they have time) to offer suggested solutions and/or workarounds.

 

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

 

As I said in my original post:

 

However, the company's tech support is probably the stupidest I have experienced in decades. (I have been a

designer of computer hardware and software since 1959.)

 

May I add that I was Senior Research Scientist at Stanford University (now retired) and I have run my own software

company and always offered excellent (same-day where possible) support.

 

For my accomplishments, I have been included in Who's Who in the World.

 

So I believe I know whereof I speak.

 

I suggest that Customer Service for Dummies should be required reading for your management.

 

I have stopped recommending Evernote and am currently looking for a substitute.

 

 

I would like to add to my post:

 

Although Evernote tech support is poor, their software developers deserve the major blame.

 

The problem with corrupted databases seems to affect many users, yet they have been been either unable or not interested in fixing it.

 

And, as far as I can tell, they have made no admission of the problem nor have they offered any detailed recovery instructions

that allow users to restore their databases without fear and trepidation.

 

I downloaded and installed OneNote last night.

 

I found a free program (evernote2onenote.exe) that painlessly converted my Evernote database to OneNote.

It worked very well for me and I recommend it.

[gbarry 2,658]

GBarrry, just to be super clear, are you saying that tech support for free users is being phased out and at some point will cease to be and option altogether? Aside from this forum and an improved KB, I mean?

 

 

Anyway, my point remains not that they offer better support for a free product but that they set expectations. Good company, good products; I think they are hurting themselves for no reason.

Thanks for the feedback--we are working on fixing this, though it is happening in a staged manner and may cause some dissonance while we transition. We're doing our best to filter and handle as many free user issues as we can, but in some cases users will end up receiving the message you received. Removing the support expectation for free users and also ensuring you have strong resources available to you here in the forums (and KB) are top priorities.

 

 

Some clarification to my previous post: we are doing our best to handle as many free user issues as we can. Going forward, we are focusing on self-support for free users. I want to be clear that throughout this process we are monitoring all changes. We will adjust accordingly based on the resources we have available. 

 

In the future, this is what support free users should be able to expect: 

 

* Continually improving Community, guide, and self-help (knowledge base) resources

* Support from our agents for login/account access issues

* Support from our agents for payment issues

* Ability to report bugs to our developers (although we will only reply if more information is needed to identify the bug)

[DutchPete 247]

Gbarry, I know you & perhaps 1 or more colleagues follow the General Discussion forum, but it might be good to involve 3-4 of the evangelists in discussions as to which issues  should have priority. One of the frustrations of users is that they are not sure that Evernote is aware of what is a "burning" issue. If Evernote were to engage some Evangelists they could moderate the discussions more effectively. This would also be to Evernote's benefit because people would feel not "abandoned" & be less inclined to walk for the wrong reasons.

[ScottLougheed 1,316]

Gbarry, I know you & perhaps 1 or more colleagues follow the General Discussion forum, but it might be good to involve 3-4 of the evangelists in discussions as to which issues  should have priority. One of the frustrations of users is that they are not sure that Evernote is aware of what is a "burning" issue. If Evernote were to engage some Evangelists they could moderate the discussions more effectively. This would also be to Evernote's benefit because people would feel not "abandoned" & be less inclined to walk for the wrong reasons.

Pete,

There have been some recent changes to the way the community here is structured, including the elimination of the "Evangelist" role:

https://discussion.evernote.com/topic/65693-moderation-and-member-leveling-changes-to-the-forum/#entry297115

It means that many more users are going to be able to take up some Moderators tasks. This raises a LOT of active users UP a notch in the forum hierarchy.

 

As much as I would have liked to have us (former) evangelists call some shots about what Evernote does, Evernote ultimately has a vast array of data from which they can derive statistics about forum usage, popular topics which topics pop up most often, and plenty of others that I'm sure I can't even conceive of. Further, they have all their support ticket data. In general, if things are appearing on the forums, and support tickets are being submitted on an issue, they know about it and they know how big of a deal it is. What that means is that if something remains un-addressed, it is because they either chose not to address it (for better or for worse), or they aren't able to address it (technically challenging, too few resources, etc). Most likely when something remains unchanged, it is not out of ignorance.  Now, obviously there are some things they may not know about, but the community here is fairly active and fairly vocal. We here would let Evernote know if they missed something. 

[DutchPete 247]

 

Gbarry, I know you & perhaps 1 or more colleagues follow the General Discussion forum, but it might be good to involve 3-4 of the evangelists in discussions as to which issues  should have priority. One of the frustrations of users is that they are not sure that Evernote is aware of what is a "burning" issue. If Evernote were to engage some Evangelists they could moderate the discussions more effectively. This would also be to Evernote's benefit because people would feel not "abandoned" & be less inclined to walk for the wrong reasons.

Pete,

There have been some recent changes to the way the community here is structured, including the elimination of the "Evangelist" role:

https://discussion.evernote.com/topic/65693-moderation-and-member-leveling-changes-to-the-forum/#entry297115

It means that many more users are going to be able to take up some Moderators tasks. This raises a LOT of active users UP a notch in the forum hierarchy.

 

As much as I would have liked to have us (former) evangelists call some shots about what Evernote does, Evernote ultimately has a vast array of data from which they can derive statistics about forum usage, popular topics which topics pop up most often, and plenty of others that I'm sure I can't even conceive of. Further, they have all their support ticket data. In general, if things are appearing on the forums, and support tickets are being submitted on an issue, they know about it and they know how big of a deal it is. What that means is that if something remains un-addressed, it is because they either chose not to address it (for better or for worse), or they aren't able to address it (technically challenging, too few resources, etc). Most likely when something remains unchanged, it is not out of ignorance.  Now, obviously there are some things they may not know about, but the community here is fairly active and fairly vocal. We here would let Evernote know if they missed something. 

 

 

Scott, I read about the new structure as I received a personal email to inform me. I was not sure about the elimination of the term "evangelist" but I'll now take that to be part of the new structure too. It does make it things clearer & shows that anyone who is active & keen on the forums can eventually evolve into a moderator. There wasn't that clarity (at least not for me) about Evangelists & how one gets to be one.

I understand the point you are making about the sources of users' info that Evernote receives & agree that the new structure should further improve communication and/or perception of understanding among the users. Let's see how it all pans out with time.

Thanks for your time to answer my post, it helps to bounce ideas off one another

[ScottLougheed 1,316]

 

 

Gbarry, I know you & perhaps 1 or more colleagues follow the General Discussion forum, but it might be good to involve 3-4 of the evangelists in discussions as to which issues  should have priority. One of the frustrations of users is that they are not sure that Evernote is aware of what is a "burning" issue. If Evernote were to engage some Evangelists they could moderate the discussions more effectively. This would also be to Evernote's benefit because people would feel not "abandoned" & be less inclined to walk for the wrong reasons.

Pete,

There have been some recent changes to the way the community here is structured, including the elimination of the "Evangelist" role:

https://discussion.evernote.com/topic/65693-moderation-and-member-leveling-changes-to-the-forum/#entry297115

It means that many more users are going to be able to take up some Moderators tasks. This raises a LOT of active users UP a notch in the forum hierarchy.

 

As much as I would have liked to have us (former) evangelists call some shots about what Evernote does, Evernote ultimately has a vast array of data from which they can derive statistics about forum usage, popular topics which topics pop up most often, and plenty of others that I'm sure I can't even conceive of. Further, they have all their support ticket data. In general, if things are appearing on the forums, and support tickets are being submitted on an issue, they know about it and they know how big of a deal it is. What that means is that if something remains un-addressed, it is because they either chose not to address it (for better or for worse), or they aren't able to address it (technically challenging, too few resources, etc). Most likely when something remains unchanged, it is not out of ignorance.  Now, obviously there are some things they may not know about, but the community here is fairly active and fairly vocal. We here would let Evernote know if they missed something. 

 

 

Scott, I read about the new structure as I received a personal email to inform me. I was not sure about the elimination of the term "evangelist" but I'll now take that to be part of the new structure too. It does make it things clearer & shows that anyone who is active & keen on the forums can eventually evolve into a moderator. There wasn't that clarity (at least not for me) about Evangelists & how one gets to be one.

I understand the point you are making about the sources of users' info that Evernote receives & agree that the new structure should further improve communication and/or perception of understanding among the users. Let's see how it all pans out with time.

Thanks for your time to answer my post, it helps to bounce ideas off one another

 

Thank you, Pete! Indeed, I realize of course we are just "spitballing" (A term I really dislike....) here! I think there are a lot of really fantastic users who contribute very valuably to this community (you are among them), but under the Evangelist system, could never really be given any recognition for it (because you can't have that many "evangelists"). This way users should be at least recognized with a fancy name (and a few moderating privileges) for their efforts! (of course, whether moderator privileges counts as a "reward" or not is up to the user )

[BillSanders 3]

 

None of us are happy about the delay in assisting free users, but I disagree that it is non-existent.

After the first 10 or so days that you submitted a ticket and recieved no response, did do as is commonly recommended to all users - free or paid - and post your ticket number, along with details about your problem, i.e.

➡ The date you submitted your Support request and the Ticket number the first auto-reply email would have assigned to your case.

➡ What the issue you were seeking Support help for.

➡ Details as to what you had (if anything) done to try resolving it on your own, including searching both the Forum and the Evernote Knowledge Base.

➡ State which client(s) (platforms/devices) you are using, i.e. Windows 7, Windows 8, Mac, iPad, Web, IOS, Android, Windows mobile, etc.

The current recommendation is that if you have *successfuly* submitted a Support Request - you will know your request was successful if you recieve an auto-reply email with a Case Ticket number shortly after pressing the Submit button - and are a free user, is that you wait 10 full *business* days and if you haven't heard back or feel the Tech who handled your case was negligent, then post the below information here on the forum.

Premium users who run into any issues with Evernote Support should post all of the above detailed info after 3 days *business* days have gone by without a response. Premium users also have the option of using Live Chat. Just as with free users, if going the email route, you can be assured of a successful support request *only if* you recieve an auto-email shortly after pressing the Submit with a Ticket number assigned to your case. If you don't get such an email, something went wrong and Evernote has no clue you tried to reach them.

(Remember that Evernote is open Monday to Friday from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, Pacific Time. After hours, weekends and holidays are not considered business days.)

Moderators will then alert Evernote Staff to your situation, forum thread and Ticket number to see if there is anything else that might be done on their end to assist you. Depending on their workload, you might recieve an immediate response from an EN Staffer such as GBarry or Charboyd, or it could take a few days more. There is no guarantee they *can* help, but they will investigate each reported case to see how it was handled and if anything further can be done in the way of assistance.

In the meantime, other users on the forum will see your post and if they think they might be able to help, will jump in (as they have time) to offer suggested solutions and/or workarounds.

 

Evernote support for non-Premium users is non-existent. When you submit a request, it warns you that Premium users get first priority. That's understandable. What it doesn't say is that non-premium users get NO priority. My request was unanswered, as were followups, until, 5 weeks later, I got a messages saying "We are unable to personally answer your inquiry. I'm closing this request today and encourage you to find the answer to your inquiry via a search on the Evernote Support page or with our active user community in the Evernote forums."

If the company is not offering support to free users, that's OK with me, I understand -- JUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO SAY SO!

 

As I said in my original post:

 

However, the company's tech support is probably the stupidest I have experienced in decades. (I have been a

designer of computer hardware and software since 1959.)

 

May I add that I was Senior Research Scientist at Stanford University (now retired) and I have run my own software

company and always offered excellent (same-day where possible) support.

 

For my accomplishments, I have been included in Who's Who in the World.

 

So I believe I know whereof I speak.

 

I suggest that Customer Service for Dummies should be required reading for your management.

 

I have stopped recommending Evernote and am currently looking for a substitute.

 

 

Just to finish my part of the discussion, I sent the following to tech support today:

 

I gave up and switched to OneNote.

It was a painless transition and OneNote seems to fulfill my needs.

We live in Palo Alto and see the Evernote sign whenever we drive north on the Bayshore.

I was really wishing well for your company, but IMHO, you have shot yourselves in the foot

with very poor product support. Maybe you should stop working on add-ons and make

the basic product bug-free. (A thorough software audit might be in order.)

[Wordsgood 526]

Bill Sanders, I didn't feel up to re-quoting that various threads you did, then cutting it down to a readable size as I'm using my cell and it's a pain doing it that way. But I wanted to respond and wish you the best of luck.

And to let you know that despite having written the long post on Aug. 18, defending Evernote, and that you quoted in the above response, you and others turned out to be quite right. They are indeed eliminating Tech Support for free users. In fact, it may be completely gone now...I honestly don't know. The verification came out a few days after my post.

My apologies to anyone I've unintentionally mislead about this issue.

[jefito 5,589]

And to let you know that despite having written the long post on Aug. 18, defending Evernote, and that you quoted in the above response, you and others turned out to be quite right. They are indeed eliminating Tech Support for free users. In fact, it may be completely gone now...I honestly don't know. The verification came out a few days after my post.

As Geoff has said above, they're going to try to handle as many free users as they can; the unsaid implication is that free users will be prioritized after premium users, probably with some exceptions (e.g. they'll want to tend quickly to free users who have some problem upgrading to premium). I expect that a free user who files a sufficiently clear report for a critical bug will be handled, or at least the issue will probably be expedited to the dev team. Practically speaking, I'd guess that the chances of getting personal support as a free user will be slim, but I don't have any handle on their internal support numbers, so I wouldn't say for sure.

[Wordsgood 526]

That makes sense. Thanks Jefito!

[DutchPete 247]

There are few, if any, quality web services that give free total support. I am surprised EN has been able to go on with it for so long. But, there is always the option that, if one has an issue that is not put at the front of the queue but is sufficiently important for an individual user, that user can take out a premium subscription for just 1 month, in which case they will get full support.

 

After resolution of the issue the user could revert back to Free, or remain Premium of course. It is horses for courses, as they say.

[BillSanders 3]

As I said before, I have been writing software for over 50 years.

 

I currently run a small company that sells specialized medical image analysis software that I developed.

 

I always have believed that a trouble report is a gift - an opportunity to improve my product.

 

Whether a user with a problem is a paying customer or a free user, I still want my software to be excellent.

 

Sometimes the manual wasn't as helpful as it could be.

 

Sometimes it was because there was a bug in my software.

 

If I had received more than one report that a database was corrupted, I would assume

that there was something wrong with my software.

 

Rather than either ignoring the reports or just telling the users to rebuild their databases, I

would  spend as much time as needed to find the cause of the corruption, fix it, issue a

new release, inform my users of the new release and tell them how to recover their databases.

 

In my opinion, that is how excellent companies do business.

[RapidFinancialSolutions 18]

I agree, Evernote's support is terrible AND now I'm thinking twice about whether I want to even pay for Premium because of how I've been treated for over a year now when I needed help.

 

1. Most of the time they don't even understand what I say.
2. We go around in circles over & over again until I finally give up or I notice the problem has been fixed.
3. It usually takes them 2-4 weeks to respond.

I've often wondered if support is being outsourced overseas & I'm dealing with braindead people.

 

I've stopped recommended Evernote to people after all of this.

 

I just got an e-mail saying they won't help me via my ticket & they've closed it. This was AFTER I lost data in my notes & reported it.

 

How LOVELY!

[BillSanders 3]

I agree, Evernote's support is terrible AND now I'm thinking twice about whether I want to even pay for Premium because of how I've been treated for over a year now when I needed help.

 

1. Most of the time they don't even understand what I say.
2. We go around in circles over & over again until I finally give up or I notice the problem has been fixed.
3. It usually takes them 2-4 weeks to respond.

I've often wondered if support is being outsourced overseas & I'm dealing with braindead people.

 

I've stopped recommended Evernote to people after all of this.

 

I just got an e-mail saying they won't help me via my ticket & they've closed it. This was AFTER I lost data in my notes & reported it.

 

How LOVELY!

 

I suggest that you try OneNote. It's working fine for me and has reduced my stress level.

[moe52 1]

I think a lot of the responses are overly critical. I made one of the original postings on this topic and my beef is not, "hey, how come you give such crappy free support," it's "please set expectations." If Evernote tells me free users get no support, I am ok with that. If they tell me to wait two weeks, that's ok. I just need to know and not wait many days for a promised answer that will come in a month (or never). 

 

If I need support, I will sign up for Premium, or I will rely on the discussion groups. Now I know what to expect, and that's fine. And if that's not ok, I'll try OneNote which I hear keeps getting awesomer. 

 

(As regards the database issues, for me they have always resolved by reinstalling the application, no data lost. For what it's worth.)

[RapidFinancialSolutions 18]

I was never told to wait a specific amount of time. I was very patient with them, but whenever I did get a response, it went nowhere.  And today's e-mail just said we aren't answering you (gave no reason why).

 

That's not support IMO.

 

As for OneNote, that's not free is it?

 

I need something where the search is very accurate. I need to be able to search the entire DB of notes by a single word, 2 words together, etc. Does anyone know if One note does that & how similar it is to Evernote?

 

Thanks

[BillSanders 3]

I think a lot of the responses are overly critical. I made one of the original postings on this topic and my beef is not, "hey, how come you give such crappy free support," it's "please set expectations." If Evernote tells me free users get no support, I am ok with that. If they tell me to wait two weeks, that's ok. I just need to know and not wait many days for a promised answer that will come in a month (or never). 

 

If I need support, I will sign up for Premium, or I will rely on the discussion groups. Now I know what to expect, and that's fine. And if that's not ok, I'll try OneNote which I hear keeps getting awesomer. 

 

(As regards the database issues, for me they have always resolved by reinstalling the application, no data lost. For what it's worth.)

 

What I have been trying to say is that it's not OK that you must occasionally reinstall Evernote. Good software doesn't work that way.

[RapidFinancialSolutions 18]

It NEVER ceases to amaze me, that the worst software or sites out there are the MOST popular. I can list off several off the top of my head.

 

I'm not a programmer, but I'm a netrepreneur, & so I know how applications are supposed to work. In this case missing entries isn't a good sign & the fact that I have to click twice into a note before it allows me to copy (I complained about this when I first started with EN) clearly tells me there is something wrong.

 

I know there's a lot of die hard followers here who LOVE EN. I learned that the first time I tried to post a thread & my entire thread labeled as spam or something & got deleted for no reason (didn't say a negative word about EN, only asked about their search function that wasn't working properly.)

 

When I finally tracked down a manager, he apologized & they didn't even have a record of my thread so I could prove there was nothing wrong with it.

 

Just saying, that first instance always left a bad taste in my mouth, but I've tried to remain open.

[moe52 1]

 

 

What I have been trying to say is that it's not OK that you must occasionally reinstall Evernote. Good software doesn't work that way.

 

 

I can't disagree with that.