Ted Griffin

I am happily back running/walking in my Brooks Ghosts after a break and they're fantastic. Sadly the customer service is not: they cannot or don't want to comprehend a question and are passive-aggressive. Ie: ignoring the pertinent point in my msg re part of their website not functioning but suggesting it was my error (no, I build websites) before templated screeds about joining their club. Really off-putting but they presumably don't want to invest into customer support or their site at all.

I have a lot of Miele appliances and I still believe they are well-made but the Australian branch of Miele is presumably not operated by them as the support and online experience are just dreadful. An example: I want to buy an extension for my top of the line Miele vacuum cleaner - the website doesn't say which vacuum cleaner it matches with but asks you to input the model number - apparently nothing at all, no extension works with my vc purchased six months ago - not even the extensions that came with it. I would just purchase it and take a gamble it will work as the ones I have which Miele says don't match obviously do BUT the support is so bad, it's not worth it. They cannot answer basic questions and have no product knowledge. Does Miele just think that Australia as a market is not worth putting any effort into? I feel stupid for having bought so much of it when their contempt for customers is so brazen and insulting. So I'm about to buy a knock off extension which I don't like doing but at least I know it will fit my Miele and that they will have customer support - how bad is that and why doesn't Miele gaf anymore?

The actual VPN part of Nord VPN worked really well for me and I had no issue with pausing it when I needed to - for example- connect to my bank's website. The issue is that all the other features it offers led to a - for me - a cluttered interface and I felt pressured to use all the other features. I did add on the NordPass option and that is what prompted me to stop using NordVPN. It intruded everywhere, making it annoying to work on any of my or client's websites that have input forms - even when I tried to white-list some. My plan was to install it and gradually add the log-in deets I wanted remembered but once activated, it pops up on ANY website with a log in that you visit as well, as I said, any database back-end. I also realized that I don't want different "jobs" bundled into one app - I wanted a robust, water-tight VPN - that's it. I'm happy to pay for one without clutter, complexity and add-ons. These things are meant to streamline your life, not add to our to-do and admin lists. But for the record, the VPN itself is excellent.

I've used iHerb for years and always had a good experience but their new "rewarded review" feature has wrecked it. Previously the reviews reflected customer's genuine opinion and experience with a supplement - now that iHerb has "rewarded reviews" most of the reviews are just copy and paste versions of the A.I. summary review. I will still buy there if I know they have something I've bought before but no longer bother browsing through all the bot-written material.

Mail Chimp used to be fantastic. It's gone totally downhill in recent years and the support is now so abysmal that a chat about an actual "information banner" - which happened to be mis-spelled - covering buttons required for functionality in the form builder took nearly an hour with no result. It's a huge hassle for us to move when we're so busy but they're now more or less unusable.

Westpac customer support is getting worse by the day. Their "24-7" customer support is not unless you count their useless bot. Cards with money on them get blocked if their A.I. thinks the purchase is "off pattern" and there is no opportunity to white list the payee, talk to a support person without an hour long wait or not at all if it is after hours or approve the payment.

I found this page while trying to find a quick way to move files from my (about to be defunct) iCloud account to my Sync account and I was surprised to see some negative reviews here. I moved to Sync from Dropbox about four years (?) ago and it's been great. I use it for back-up/storage but also to send people links to download recordings of Zoom sessions and for some shared folders - eg: I dump receipts into one for my book keeper. The one time there was an issue, it was to do with an update that had some weird clash with Mac. Even though it was annoying, the support person stuck with it diligently until solved and seemed to know their product/tech - unlike so many support staff these days. I had major data loss concerns with iCloud and bizarre privacy + support issues with Dropbox so for me, Sync is a delight. I'm also really into the simplicity - yes, thumbnails would be nice most apps are over built with compulsory features you probably don't need and pointless A.I. so something that errs on the side of simplicity is heaven. FYI I very rarely write nice reviews for things.

I had two Mastercard debit cards and have just cancelled one - the other has to be done tomorrow as is a business card. Their new A.I fraud system - admittedly through the Westpac bank is a disaster. Because the A.I flagged me as a fraud risk for myself - too many uber eats orders apparently - the card involved AND my business card are frozen. Each has money on it and I could not get through to the bank to discuss this without the usual identity preamble. To unfreeze my cards, I need to re-identify myself at a branch. They used to send out warnings asking if it was you purchasing - that doesn't happen anymore - you have to figure it out for yourself when your cashed up card is declined. After 20 years of being a customer, I'm looking for a new bank and a credit/debit card company - no big demands just not having my funds frozen for no reason or being spoken to as rudely as I was by Mastercard fraud dept today. This new program is clearly still at beta stage - we are the testers.

They advertise that they have a warranty and that you can return the chair or swap for another model if you're unhappy but it's not true.

Bought from Living Edge in Sydney which is apparently their official stockist and there is no warranty, no returns. The service was surly - I've had better at K-Mart - and buying a $3000 chair as an investment in health + productivity felt flat because of it.

Reached out to Herman Miller for help via their contact form (eg: how do I get their warranty? instructions for the chair aside from the one page provided with the chair) and literally no reply at all.

I regret spending this much money on what I thought would be a premium product and getting less than zero service. I spoke to Steelcase on the phone who are already SO much more informative + friendly than Living Edge/Herman Miller.

I think H.M. is geared toward corporate clients buying in bulk and that they actually don't even have a mechanism to deal with small businesses or home office people - they should make this clearer. I've never gone from being excited about a brand and purchase to being let down and hating it so quickly.

I placed an order for my business and got error saying the card would not process so try again - I knew the card was fine so I did then gave up - the $200.18 has been debited from my account FOUR times but I have no official order, not even one and they have NO website support staff there on the weekend. I was delighted with Officeworks until recently - they introduced a two hour delivery window and expanded their product range. But if that has been at the expense of proper customer support and e-commerce security, it's not worth it. They've got my money and I have to try and look for a reliable, trustworthy store to get the products I need to keep up with a busy workflow. They've become the problem, not the solution. What's more the automatic reply I got back said they may not be able to reply for a quite a while because they're so busy. It's unethical to have a shonky checkout and give customers no way to contact them. I feel massively ripped off - I entered my card details on to their site in good faith and now am nearly $1000 down, having wasted time collecting my products together.

Beware! We had two subscriptions which we set to NOT auto renew as they did not work for us - you cannot actually cancel on Elementor, only set to renew automatically or not. The auto renew mysteriously was reactivated - not by us as we're not even using it - and we were charged. They don't refund for unauthorised auto renewals, they don't let you cancel the subscriptions so you can remove the cc from their system. They're vile to deal with. Do NOT recommend.

The actual app is great but the support is so hostile that I wonder if it is a purposeful policy to discourage customers from 'bothering' them.

If I can find an app with similar privacy features and better support/more features, I'd switch in a heartbeat and pay 2x as much.

The actual email interface is wonderful - clean, well designed and uncluttered compared to Google.