I've actually been seeing an increase in devs publicly shaming their customers and it's concerning. Not sure if it's covid fueling their stress or too much money coming in but, it's just wrong to be doing this. What are your thoughts? The latest case of this is PA:



Full album here:
https://imgur.com/a/HReBW47

Now, I'm not saying the customer isn't in the wrong for a few things written in their email, but I don't think they deserved to be flamed publicly for it either. This should have been handled internally and it just comes of as disrespectful. Ironically, PA proved that they indeed are screaming F#$K YOU to this customer.

 

Eh, I don't know. It's pretty obvious that the customer has some issues to be soo enraged by it. I don't like this kind of public shaming, but at the very least Dirk didn't show the name of the customer or any other identifiable information. So while I think it's pretty immature of him to post this shame stuff, it's also not the end of the world. He's a bit hot headed sometimes and a bit impulsive, anyone remember how he sent that "all lives matter" Email without understanding why it upset a certain subset of his customer base?

I honestly prefer professional and friendly developers. If he was 100% grounded and content with himself, he wouldn't have needed to post it.

 

Not cool. Every company i worked sometimes received messages like this, but why make them public? There no threats or something like this, but only emotions (and i even can understand this guy, lol)

 

Not very smart business wise, I think he shamed himself harder than the customer

 

It's not cool at all to name and shame someone that loyal and having spent so much with your company. It's not even naming and shaming either, it comes across to me like mocking someone clearly making a desperate plea while they're in hard times (albeit spending that much on kittens' dentistry is nothing short of moronic!). It comes across as almost gloating and rubbing their hands in glee at someone else's difficult times.

I can't see how publishing this isn't just going to:

• piss the guy off even more to kick up more of a fuss for your company;
• piss other customers off who may now boycott you cos of your perceived inappropriate behaviour;
• going to turn off potential future customers to see this is how they treat loyal customers; and
• have the most detrimental affect on Plugin Alliance more than anyone.

My advice to Dirk would be to employ a PR consultant to run future public postings past instead of a CEO

Also, he didn't tell Dirk/Plugin Alliance to "f**k you", but instead says that's how Dirk/Plugin Alliance's treatment of him as a loyal customer appears to be, which this post will just amplify as a result of maybe something lost in translation?!

 

Last edited: Jan 21, 2021

Yeah I agree with you, but doesn't matter if he censored the identifiable details or not, he definitely lost this person as a customer. Clearly the customer needs to figure out their priorities, but imagine spending so much money with a company and ask from some help only to have them ignore your request and shame you for it. I would have maybe given him a coupon and let him be on his merry way.

 

Seriously, i expected a lot worse. He never told them to fuck off, it was taken out of context, the guy sounds frustrated and exhausted from life hitting him hard and we should always have some understanding for such people and never take it too seriously.
The guy sounded on the polite side of things, considering the kind of hate emails companies get.

 

I'm really happy this world is ending ...

 

Seems like a fed customer service rep, and an equally fed up client that had an issue with the policy where vouchers reduce in worth over time.

I don't see a developer engaging anyone in the fore mentioned collection of statements or maybe I am confused because with my bad eye sight I can't read all of it.

Shit like this happens, it isn't right but then again I am sure there is a lot of missing context. Seems there was a voucher then an other amount of monopoly money added Amanda (graciously) but the client kept wanting to get extra value because of his loyalty (which he might or might not get eventually) and Dirk being German had had enough and responded in a Germanic manner.

Americans don't realize this but those central Europeans have a pretty definite line where if you cross it you can take your business and fuck off for all they care. The customer is most definitely not always right, they try to keep it correct but both sides generally know limits of the haggle and swaggel and try to toe it but never cross it.

This was kind of disappointing click bait, I expected something better.

 

reFX Developers

 

Last edited by a moderator: Jan 21, 2021

Worst thing about this is the entitled dev mischaracterised what seems to be reasonable, fair comment from a customer. It wasn't a "**** you" directed at the dev, the reverse. It was (paraphrase) saying that a dev's message: "thank you for making us rich guys!" seemed inappropriate in the year that was 2020. I fully expect the charming, Rubik genius Giancarlo to send out a similar message, any day now!

 

I found the link that made it easier to read.

I actually I think the client was a fucking moron. You can ask for special treatment but if you want to tell someone who to run their business and that you need special treatment because you're more special than all the other special people then you need to either:

1) but the company and change the policies
2) start your own company that comps shit for the bit shotters
3) just go by the same rules as everyone else.

I am not sure that it was wrong for the PA guy to post the letter, it might be in bad taste but w/e some people always want to take a yard when you offer them an inch.

 

Maybe if R2R reverses their stuff for Mac that might shut the dev up lol.... It’s never good to publicly shame a customer even if he’s wrong. But culture is different now & professionalism means something completely different to me than people just 10 years my junior.

 

Not professional to do this not thinking thoroughly enough for the damage this public shaming can cause to the company afterwards

 

the entitlement is strong in the customer and if the company's owner wants to publish that exchange publicly, well, that's on the owner too.
you *do not* come huffing and puffing demanding something angry, then go for a sob story to get your point across. sorry for your troubles, dude, but you dug yourself into that little hole.

 

Was ending from the beginning. Nothing new, honestly.

 

Dirk said he wanted to show everyone the type of email they 'occasionally' receive. If it's only occasional, (and it was a fair email really) then it makes it even worse that he's posted it.

 

i'm older than dirt, but back in my day the customer was always right.

 

i think that the ''ocassional'' was more an irony than a reality.

man the people usually go and fuck everyone else as if they were the owners of the world, without fucking care about others behavior even (i can tell because i have some experience on customer service, the usual one). there are different ways to ask for/or (about) something and this is no exception. for my personal experience, plugin alliance has been awesome, even if i have to wait a few days for them to answer an email, because i know that they are an small company and that what a lot of people don't realize and want them to answer anything instantly without caring about the others who may ask too

 

PA is not as big as facebook or walmart to give an instant answer to anything, considering also the amount of customer they have. as i told before, there are different ways to ask something and the behavior of the guy was really wrong and the dirk's behavior was wrong too, but I think he did it because he exceeds patience considering the capacity of his company ... and even more so as they must be with the pandemic (consider that Germany is not in a very good situation apparently, and working with stress from home does not help much )