Neil
Day
Hi
All
I have just honoured a refund request for the Custom PDF Maker because,
according to the purchaser - "it was too complicated and the
product was misleading"!!!!!?????
Fair enough. It is quite tricky to get to grips with but that is made
quite clear on the salesletter. And to make matters worse ....
Personally, if I was having problems with a product I would at least
ask the vendor if there was a solution or at least visit the support
forum that is mentioned a number of times on the salesletter AND in
the PDF manual that comes with the package. I haven't seen hide nor
hair of this person on the forum - or if they did visit they couldn't
be bothered to spend time asking questions :mad2:
I think the total time from purchasing the product to asking for the
refund was about an hour? He obviously spent a great deal of time
looking the product over eh??
I don't know ... some people never cease to amaze me. Oh! And the
final feather in the cap. This person obviously forgets that the Internet
is a world wide web. And here is the bit that really p**ses me off
:1pissed:. He gave me an ultimatum of starting the refund process
within the hour or he would start the chargeback process.... now that
is soemthing I definitely don't want hanging round my neck.
I wish people would think before making such drastic decisions.
Anyway ... enough moaning. Enjoy the rest of your weekend (those who
still have some to go).
All the best
Neil D
Yoon
Ho Um
Hi
Neil,
sad, sad people...
In this Age of the Microwave, I Want It Now,
You Do It For Me, Me, Me Mentality it's not
hard seeing what you just went through...
Refund request within 1 hour...? It's not like
we all stick around glued to the computer
24/7!
Too many people want that quick fix and
don't(refuse even) try to learn how to do
anything. And they try to blame you
for it...
-"you must do this for me because I said so"
-"it's your fault"
-"your product sucks"
Whatever happened to "please help" and
"thank you"
What? It's too inconvenient to ask for help?
Is there something wrong with saying "Thanks"?
Ignorance can be excused, but outright rudeness
and stupidity...?
Don't get me started...
enough venting :mad2: ... for now. :)
williec
Hi
Neal,
It's a lot worse when they order like a $10 product, download
the product, forget where they saved it, then do a chargeback.
The chargeback costs you $25 or more... and hurts your rating
with your creditcard processor, and it's all for a $10 purchase
and they were afraid of being ripped off for $10.
So they cost you $35 or more. It's almost enough to cause me to not
offer downloads for less than $97.
Enough venting. I've actually discovered that customers who
order higher end products are a LOT less hassle. I'm sure
part of it is educating those unfamiliar with the process.
Willie Crawford
williec
Hi
Neil,
Sorry I mispelled your name. Thats another one of my pet
peeves. All Neils should have to spell their names the same.
All Willie's do....
Well maybe not.
Willie
Louis
Originally
posted by williec
Enough venting. I've actually discovered that customers who
order higher end products are a LOT less hassle. I'm sure
part of it is educating those unfamiliar with the process.
I've noticed something similar too. Ever since I've got rid of the
$1 trial (for 10 days) at my membership site customer support issues
have been greatly reduced.
Even though I felt it was quite clear, people often didn't realise
that the $1 went to full membership after 10 days, so I got a few
disgruntled emails from that.
One thing I'm really interested in which I must test when the time
comes is the following offer for physically delivered products:
"Just pay for shipping now and then the full price of $xxx.xx
in 30 days if you decide to keep it"
I can see many potential customer support issues with this, but since
I often see this used I'm assuming the sales it generates justify
any extra hassle.
And it's really got me wondering - if the credit card doesn't go through
after 30 days for whatever reason, does the customer receive an invoice,
or is that order forgotten and the loss accepted?
dmgammage
Louis;
The $1.00 trial was a great idea, the only real problems I see all
the time are the fact that people DON'T READ.
They see what they want to see, and disregard any details...then they
get pi**ed off at you for misrepresenting your product, even though
it was right there in writing all along. I actually had a customer
accuse me of "adding the disclaimers" to my website AFTER
he complained about a service...I went so far as to screenshot the
modify date of my pages and send it to him.
Ahh, customer service...sometimes you just have to tell a customer
"I'm sorry, it is obvious that whatever I do, you will not be
satisfied", offer a refund, and delete them from your contact
list. :D
Kennon
Originally
posted by williec
Enough venting. I've actually discovered that customers who
order higher end products are a LOT less hassle. I'm sure
part of it is educating those unfamiliar with the process.
Willie Crawford
Willie, perhaps there's something we could do to our download
pages to trim the number of refund requests. If we re-emphasize
that, it might ease things up a bit. Maybe putting audio on those
pages would be helpful... I've heard all this about "talking"
to
prospects with audio on our sales pages, and even on our order
pages. Why shoud we stop "talking" there? At every step
in the
process if we have a greater continuity, even after the purchase,
I can imagine that might help.
And, yes, there's always going to be that grumpy complainer who
is never satisfied no matter what we do. Hopefully we can avoid
those as much as possible.
Kennon :)
gazam
Hello
Friends,
I tend to agree with most of you who mentioned having more problems
with products that are lower in cost.
I've sold hundreds of a course that sells for over one hundred dollars
and have only had one return from a lady who felt after receiving
the course, she wasn't healthy enough to do it.
I have courses, products, and services that range from $19.95 to $39.95,
and that's where I have customer service issues. In most cases, my
customers don't know how to open up a .pdf file or download adobe
acrobat reader for free. (Yes...I also send step by step instructions.)
I have had a few people ask for refunds on lower priced items, but
that's part of the business.
Overall, selling on the internet has been the most fun business I've
ever been involved with and believe me when I tell you "I've
started, sold, and shut down many businesses."
Good Success!
Vondre'
http://www.sellinfolikecrazy.com
williec
Hi
Ken,
Maybe you're correct. The only refund requests I've gotten
recently are for $10 ebooks that the customer didn't
save properly or saw that it would take too much paper
to print out the ebook. It stems partly from them not
understanding the technology since these customers are
often not net savvy, but often just someone using a friends
computer.... or one in the library.
I deal a lot with customers who are not business to business
and people who don't really understand how websites and
the internet work.
Willie
Originally posted by Kennon
Willie, perhaps there's something we could do to our download
pages to trim the number of refund requests. If we re-emphasize
that, it might ease things up a bit. Maybe putting audio on those
pages would be helpful... I've heard all this about "talking"
to
prospects with audio on our sales pages, and even on our order
pages. Why shoud we stop "talking" there? At every step
in the
process if we have a greater continuity, even after the purchase,
I can imagine that might help.
And, yes, there's always going to be that grumpy complainer who
is never satisfied no matter what we do. Hopefully we can avoid
those as much as possible.
Kennon :)
williec
Originally
posted by gazam
Hello Friends,
I have courses, products, and services that range from $19.95 to $39.95,
and that's where I have customer service issues. In most cases, my
customers don't know how to open up a .pdf file or download adobe
acrobat reader for free. (Yes...I also send step by step instructions.)
I have had a few people ask for refunds on lower priced items, but
that's part of the business.
Vondre'
http://www.sellinfolikecrazy.com
I've had a number of my customers read how to download the
FREE Adobe reader email me telling me that they didn't want
to buy a software product to read my ebook. I had to step
them through the process of downloading the reader... sometimes
over the phone.
I guess that's considered great customer service and that if you
have backend built in it leads to more sales. It's just frustrating
at times when you went to extreme measures to explain how to
download the reader and how to use the product.
Willie
SykkBoy
I
come from the adult side of the business and we tend to see issues
like this a lot. The credit card companies are all too eager to give
someone a chargeback in the interest of keeping their customer happy,
but at the expense of the merchant.
There are a lot of the same issues with people who are all too willing
to chargeback then email customer service or even just politely request
a refund. Refunds never bothered me as I couldn't please everyone,
but chargebacks over ignorance or just impatience is tough to deal
with (especially with Visa/Mastercard tightening the chargeback threshhold
and increasing the fines).
Unfortunately some people are just this way and it has become another
challenge of the Internet business.
My biggest fear with my soon-to-be-released infoproducts aren't so
much someone not being happy and requesting a refund as someone requesting
a refund, then continuing to use my products (although I'm looking
into some of these "locking" programs to shut that down,
but I even fear THAT might cause a backlash and bigger chargeback
problem.
Louis
Originally
posted by SykkBoy
I come from the adult side of the business and we tend to see issues
like this a lot. The credit card companies are all too eager to give
someone a chargeback in the interest of keeping their customer happy,
but at the expense of the merchant.
There are a lot of the same issues with people who are all too willing
to chargeback then email customer service or even just politely request
a refund. Refunds never bothered me as I couldn't please everyone,
but chargebacks over ignorance or just impatience is tough to deal
with (especially with Visa/Mastercard tightening the chargeback threshhold
and increasing the fines).
Unfortunately some people are just this way and it has become another
challenge of the Internet business.
My biggest fear with my soon-to-be-released infoproducts aren't so
much someone not being happy and requesting a refund as someone requesting
a refund, then continuing to use my products (although I'm looking
into some of these "locking" programs to shut that down,
but I even fear THAT might cause a backlash and bigger chargeback
problem.
One thing I have personally seen myself is the more clearly I explain
the billing, the less refunds and chargebacks I receive.
When I was offering membership at 10 days for $1 as a trial, when
I re-emphasized on the order page that they were automatically upgraded
at the end of the 10 days unless they choose to cancel beforehand,
chargebacks pretty much disappeared, and refunds almost vanished completely
too.
Since I've now got rid of the trial completely I've had neither a
single chargeback or refund request, and it's now been two months.
One positive aspect of refund requests for digital products is that
you haven't actually paid anything to deliver the product, so it's
simply a lost sale rather than an actual loss if you had spent money
on printing costs for example.
Phil
Hi
Neal,
You should be thankful because you got to find out quickly never to
do business or waste another second of time on him!
Take Care,
Phil