Blackbaud support history – A customer Perspective
I am hoping those with better memories than I can help me fill out this list. I am trying to make a sort of timeline of the customer hostile moves that Blackbaud has made in regard to support. I will leave off the Blackbaud support before Whipple Hill merger since for Education customers it isn’t really relevant any longer. These items are sort of chronological, but my memory might be incorrect.
- Training moved behind paywall – When WH joined BB there were pre-recorded webcasts for training available on the support site that anyone could view at any time. Soon they were moved behind the Blackbaud University paywall. Making people pay to learn how to use your product seems silly. Sure, in person, but just streaming a recording?
- Phone support became an upsell – This is not just a WH thing it became an overall BB thing. I understand that some customers might have abused this privilege but assigning a single per customer point of contact, that is a vetted expert should still be allowed.
- Rotating list of point of contacts – I have lost track of the number of sales / customer success people that have been assigned to my school over the 10 years.
- Adding the virtual agent – On the chat window having to go through the same pointless questions. See Virtual agent discussion - Blackbaud Community for more details.
- Limiting support hours to 3 PM Pacific – Those of us on the west coast aren’t allowed to have problems / questions at the end of the school day.
- Moving Tier 1 support overseas – Now the support is a whole new set of people who have no knowledge (it seems) of the product. Additionally, they are 12-15 hours off in time zone so why close support at 6 PM Eastern when support isn’t even in this country?
Comments
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@Brian Hoyt
Gosh, it really is bad isn't it. So hard to support your own community when you can't get support for the products you pay for.6 -
@Brian Hoyt - I always submit a case through Case Central - never through the chat window. I have never used the chat, and I haven't called in more than a decade.
(I understand that some schools don't have the option to create cases online for some unknown reason. I would consider the lack of that Create case button to be hostile to the customer.)
Submitting through Case Central allows me to provide all of the info I have at once, without typing into a tiny chat window. I can attach screenshots and other files as needed. I don't have to stare at the chat window waiting/hoping for a response.
I would use chat or phone to report that my system is down, but I haven't had to do that.
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@Brian Gray This is what frustrates me. I would prefer to submit cases via this method, giving people on both sides time to research and come up with answers. Unfortunately, we are one of those schools with no such button. Blackbaud's response is literally ?♀️ . Several people seem to have looked into it, no one can find the problem. And before someone tells me “it's right there” ?, here's our Case Central corner:
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@David Gillespie How are you surviving! ? I remember the issue of not having the “Create Case” button available for some schools coming up before. That would make me furious. As mentioned by others, that is the ONLY way I contact support any more. I rarely reach out to support with questions, it's usually to let them know someone broke something on their end.
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@Megan Day Yes, definitely people at other schools having mixed experiences. I wonder how many schools out there still don't have the ability to submit cases and have just given up on asking anymore. We know it's not a browser issue - everyone at a site either has the button or doesn't, regardless of access method. We just wish we had it … ?
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@David Gillespie That has got to be a backend permission issue. Almost like an entitlement that your Site ID has purchased support. If someone really wants to figure it out the way to do it is to run a network trace in browser dev tools on someone, who has it and someone who doesn't. Somewhere in there will be a call that determines its visibility. Then you can probably override it client side and prove to Blackbaud the issue. I have the button so if someone that doesn't wants to trade some trace files maybe we can figure it out. I have a call with a BB person tomorrow on support in general I will see if I can get traction on this as well.
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@David Gillespie - You have my sympathies for having to work without the Create case button.
I have a couple of thoughts…
1) Just for fun…it might be worth putting the Case Central page into the browser's developer mode to see if the Create case button is actually there but hidden from you. That may provide a clue as to the cause for some schools but not others.
2) Because I don't use chat, I don't know how it works…does starting a chat create a case on the Case central page? (I can see that it did for us back in 2018, but I don't know about now.) If it does, can you use the chat to create the case and then switch to the web page to enter other info?
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@Brian Gray Ah, that's a good idea - I “Inspect”ed the area and unfortunately there's no button content there, it's just empty comments (but the region exists like something should be there). And I have avoided the chat for a while as well but I think you have to jump through a few hoops and reach a person before it will automatically create a case, but maybe I'll try that next.
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@Brian Hoyt
We didn't have the Create A Case button and had to work with our Customer Success Manager to get it turned on.0 -
@David Gillespie It's been my school's experience that users have to be “approved" to be able to create a case in Case Central. My IT director, who is considered our primary contact, had to add me as an organization contact for me to be able to talk to Blackbaud Support myself. I assume that includes the Create Case button. It makes some sense to me because they could be inundated with requests from multiple teachers of every school for minor issues, so they can control that flood by only allowing approved users at each school. Ideally these are key people who serve as the resident “experts” of the software.
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@Kim McAmis I'm our site's Admin, and no users at our site have the button. Blackbaud couldn't (at the time) figure out why it wouldn't show up. Given @Rochelle Karakey ‘s experience, I will try going back to our CSM and get it added. It’s definitely my own preferred method of contact.
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@Brian Hoyt #6 has felt exponentially worse this school year. I spend a good percentage of my time just putting in tickets to Blackbaud letting them know something isn't working. I've had a number of cases recently where after the usual back and forth, the rep will say, “Ok, the issue has been resolved. I'm changing the status of your case to ”solved". When I go and follow the same steps as I describe in the ticket, I find the issue is not solved.
Support reps have also been making it clear that they do not know the solutions they support. Just today, I had to explain to the rep how to use the Assignment filter to find the assessment I was complaining about. They were only looking at “Assignments due this week” and the assessment in question was due last week. At least they provided me with a screenshot of the filter they were using so I could guide them in the right direction….
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@Brian Hoyt
I'm just jumping in on this older post to vent my frustration with the complete lack of knowledge that the new customer service reps seem to have. I love to submit my cases via Case Central and not a call or chat but when they offer no solutions or solutions that are canned responses that I can find in any knowledgebase article, then there is no point in using this feature. So, then I have to make the call, which can often end up in a waste of my time sitting online for 30-40 minutes. This is leading me to look at other Learning solutions and I'm sure my school is not the only one.4
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