H&R Block’s Online Chat Stinks
I need to go in to H&R Block as many of us do this time of year, and saw that on their website they have a nifty little chat tool so you can schedule an appointment. Nice! Or so I thought.
Once you enter your zip code, there’s a little "Chat to Schedule Appointment" button. I click on it, fill out the intake form, but when I get down to the date entry (which requires MM/DD/YYYY format) I fill it out completely, but when I click on the "Next" button the "6" in "2006" gets erased and it says I have entered the date incorrectly. I try this about 10 times before realizing…I’m using Firefox…I wonder if that’s the problem.
Sure enough it was. Used IE, got in without a problem. But the pain did not end there. The chat window refreshed every 5 seconds or so and each time it did, I lost my cursor. Furthermore, when I mentioned to the representative, after scheduling my appointment, that their form did not work in Firefox and described what I’d encountered with the cursor-stealing, we had an interesting exchange.
H&R Block rep: Thank you for your feedback.
Sarah: Is there a technical support division or webmaster that I could contact about this issue?
H&R Block rep: Your appointment has been scheduled for March 13th at noon.
Sarah: Is there someone I can contact about the problem I encountered?
H&R Block rep: Please bring all necessary tax materials to your appointment.
Sarah: Can you please give me some contact information for technical support for the website?
H&R Block rep: Thank you for using H&R Block. We look forward to serving you again. Goodbye!
Now, I’m pretty darn sure that this was not a robot, but was a live person. Whether or not she simply didn’t have that information and was ignoring me intentionally, or was so in the rhythm of scheduling appointments that she totally missed my question, I don’t know. But it was bad service all around.
Having an online chat available to schedule appointments is very cool. I like that. But having it not be cross-browser compatible (with no warnings on the chat form or the Help pages) is bad, having a chat window that steals your cursor is bad, and being ignored by a rep is also bad. Oh well, let’s hope they can at least do my taxes right.
It is a reminder of how much worse all of our library online chat clients could be. It’s also a reminder of the good service we provide as librarians, and that users cannot always expect that same level of helpfulness and professionalism from other commercial chat services.
March 8th, 2006 at 8:07 am
I am wary of online chat tools provided by companies, and for just the reasons you describe. I find that the reps are less helpful than if you call, and these chat programs just aren’t as fast as real chat. If I wanted to sit around and wait I’d e-mail you or call. I’m using online chat because it should be just that — a quick chat. Not some long, painful first date converstaion that involves lots of awkward silences. I just don’t get why these companies don’t use the software that’s already out there — AIM, Trillian, Yahoo! MSN, etc. I’ve never read anything on the topic, but I think that the people most likely to use the “chat customer service” option probably have some kind of chat software on their computer already, and know how to use it.
March 8th, 2006 at 9:31 am
I had trouble just using H&R Block in Firefox. I couldn’t file my taxes or do anything until I switched over to IE so their whole site must be Microsoft friendly and exclude all others.
March 8th, 2006 at 12:11 pm
Well, I don’t think that most people would already have commercial chat on their computers. I think there are many savvy computers users, particularly those 40+, who just don’t use IM. Pew and other surveys bear that out. That’s the same reason that I beleive libraries need to offer both IM reference & web-based chat–you get two totally different audiences. Still, it would be nice if the commercial chat services like H&R Block’s actually worked well.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
It is even worse if you do speak to a representative, because from my experience they know less about taxes than you do