Direct Tech

Our understanding from the complaint filed with the Revdex.com is that the daughter of this client who resides out of state, feels that we “Took advantage of her mother because she is an 85-year-old widow who doesn’t know anything about computers” Accused us of “Elder abuse” “Demanded payment by check, depriving her mother the right to challenge the abusive charges” The facts are: We have been servicing this client since and have had a very good relationship over the years and never received a complaint Our current residential rate for all clients is $per hour and was established in This client has used our services and paid this hourly rate times since Most recently this client contacted our office on January 17, to schedule a service appointment She had purchased a new computer and needed it set up The client explained that she would need data transferred from her old computer to the new computer and requested the service to include picking up the old and new computers from her residence The appointment was scheduled for January 18, at 11:amOur service rate and payment were explained to the client, including that the technician would collect check payment when all service was completed Our technician picked up the clients two laptops and brought the devices to our office Headquarters for the setup, configuration and migration to begin the same day When the computer set up, configuration and migration, our technician delivered the two computers back to the client’s residence, installed the new laptop at her desk, connected speakers, printer and Ethernet and provided a tutorial The total amount of hours billed were Our policy has always been for all clients that payment is due upon completion of service from all our residential clients and an invoice detailing all services is provided Our work process follows Industry Best Practices Before we work on a client’s computer, we always make an image (baof system) of the computer We were not requested to just transfer two photos, we were requested to transfer all the data and re-install software programs from the old computer to the new computer When the client’s daughter spoke with our company owner, she informed her that she felt our rate should be $per hour and all her mother should have been charged to transfer two photos should have been $40.00, although as stated above, our rate is $per hour and scope of service requested and performed was far greater We have been in business since 'and have never offered our service rate at $per hourWe feel, upon review of the service requested, work performed, and work charged for has been fair and equitable We take very seriously, and with great Umbrage to being accused of elder abuse

I have attached a word document responding in detail to the rejection letterI hope this will enlighten the customers daughter and show that we did not abuse or take advantage of her mother in any way, and that we can put this behind us. I have taken time to be very detailed to the response of the customers daughterI hope this will enlighten the customers daughter and show that we did not abuse or take advantage of her mother in any way, and that we can put this behind us. It is true that this company has been servicing the customer since 2004, and was well aware of her age and her lack of computer knowledge, and was aware that she trusted the company;Answer:We agree that our customers use us because they trust us.We agree that the customer is a senior, and in full capacity of her abilities to conduct her own affairs, I know this because I spoke to her a couple of times in the past month, and we mix within the same social circle, we have mutual friends who marvel at her abilities.We agree that the customer lacks computer knowledge, in fact the clear majority of or residential clients specifically use us because they have limited computer knowledge.The customer did not request a pick up of her computer, she asked for the same service she had been receiving since 2004, service at her residence.Answer: The customer called and asked for the specific service of migrating her current data and programs to a new systemOur representative informed the customer that we would not do that in her home as the methods we use to do this would make it very time consuming, thus expensiveWe explained that working on her computers in our office, we only charge for the technician’s time spent working on the computers rather than charging her for all the time spent waiting for the processes to complete if we were to perform the scope of work she needed at her homeWhen this was explained to the customer, she said she was not able to bring the computers into our office, so we arranged to pick up and drop off the computers at time of delivery and install, with a tutorial.The service rate and total charge were not explained to the clientNo one explained that it would be $for a simple set up of a $computer.Answer:The client was informed what our hourly rate was, as she has always been informed of our rates each time she has used our servicesThe ongoing issue is that initially the client’s daughter (the person making this complaint, whom is an attorney in Texas) called us and insisted that we should be charging her mother $per hour and said that we were deliberately over charging her mother because she is an older ladyThe daughter also insisted that our rate was outrageous and said to my wife “and he gets away with that” referring to our RateThe travel time was an hour and the work was one and a quarter hoursThe customer never consulted us on what computer to purchase, the value of the computer is irrelevant to the conversation other than if you purchase a cheap (slower) computer, it does take more time to work on it This business has had similar problems with other customers As one of their reviews on *** said:I was never given a quote to how much it could cost for my computer repairIn there own words: "every customer should know how many hours it will take to repair and you should already know how much it's going to cost you." At least inform customers of your rates before workingThey are very rude and condescendingThey do not care about their customers.Answer: As the customers daughter points out above, this is ONE review on ***, our rating is currently at stars out of stars.To be clear, the review was by a person who brought in a computer with hard drive failureWhen we quoted him the cost of full recovery he got very upset, took his computer with him and has NEVER paid our company one cent! If that is how they want to deal with their customers, that is their decision, except in a special case like this one, where they were well aware, based on a year relationship, that the customer was an elderly widow with little computer knowledge California law provides that it is elder abuse if 1) the person is an “elder;” 2) s/he has been deprived of something/anything; and 3) the perpetrator “should have known” that their actions were “likely” to cause “harm.” This company should have known that it did not make sense to spend $on setting up a $computer, and should have explained what the cost was going to be, and allowed the customer to make an informed decision In the years that the customer has been doing business with the company, the company has gotten bigger and apparently expanded into corporate managed service agreements Another *** reviewer says:I had a similar experience to the other poor reviewer Direct Tech is all about managed service agreements; if it is less than comprehensive service (with expensive monthly fees), there is no guarantee on the work completed and very poor customer service. Answer: This point seems to conflate a few allegations I will try to break it down.This is not a special case, most of our residential customers have been long relationships, many much longer than years, and many of them are elderly and widowedCustomers daughter keeps on harping on a $computer, the cost of the computer has nothing to do with the value of my employee’s time, I still pay them and all my expenses at the same rate, thus my cost of doing business is the same, thus my hourly rate is the sameTo try to give this context, the person making the argument is an attorneyThe attorneys I have worked with have billed me by time, the same way we bill our hourly based customersWhen I have had to resolve a conflict, the attorney billed me based on the time they spent on my case, not what the value of the dispute wasExcept for attorneys who will take a portion of the settlement, in which case the attorney is betting that they will make more than their hourly rate.The reference of the *** review here, the customers daughter who has made sure to vote for all three of the one-star reviews has conveniently partially quoted the reviewerThe case of this reviewer is that we had initially quoted her on our full managed services package, she had decided to go with it, but asked us to make an exception and build out her network before signing the agreementThen once it was built out using services that are only provided to full managed service customers, she said to me that everything was working so well that she did not see the need to become a managed service clientThen two months later she called saying that she was having problems, we told her that we would come and fix it, but because she was not a managed service client, she would have to wait until the next “break fix” appointment opening and that the cost would be xyzThen the morning before the scheduled appointment, we called and made sure that they were still having problems and confirmed what our charges would beThe client cancelled the appointment because she didn’t want to pay the charges for the serviceTwo days later she setup an appointment for the same issue for the following weekJust before going to the client, we called again to confirm the appointment and they cancelled againThen the client wrote me an email saying that she felt that I should not be charging herAt that point I said she was not a good fit and that we would not be doing any further work for herWhen she found a new company, we coordinated with them to make sure they were fully up to date with what we had implemented and transferred the information to them.Address Elder abuse claimI am not an attorney, but I did search the penal code for California the URL is https://oag.ca.gov/bmfea/laws/crim_elderI could not find the language the customers daughter is referring toWe could not have been anywhere near this absurd claim as we did not charge the client anything different than in the course of business, at the same rate charged to the client over the past years Another *** reviewer suspects that being a "little old lady" affected the way she was treated by the company:I wish I were writing a glowing report about DIRECT TECH, but what they did to my computer was simply something I feel obligated to tell others about so they won't suffer the same sickening consequencesAs a writer, I use my computer mainly as a word processor and for emails It doesn't get hard use at allPerhaps being a little old lady (yes, in tennis shoes) they might have thought that the USED HD would outlast me and no-one would know the difference.......just saying.Beyond sad....Answer: As in the previous review, the customers daughter has chosen the parts of the review and left out others, to her benefitIn short, this customer brought her computer to our office with hard drive failureWe told her to replace the drive we would need to order a new drive which would take a day or two to arriveThe customer did not want to wait so we offered her a refurbished drive to help expedite the workThe customer agreed, we fixed the computer, charged her $for the refurbished hard drive as stated on her invoiceThen MONTHS later she came back and was irate that the drive had failed and insisted on her money backNow even if we had sold her a brand-new drive and it had failedThe warranty would not be covered because the manufacturer only warranties it for yearAnd yes, it is SAD that that people feel they can use *** as a threat to bully businesses into providing services and product for freeAlso in the same vein that the current customers daughter threatened us in her abusive call to my wife.While the *** review has three poor reviews but still has stars out of stars, it does not adequately reflect that we have over satisfied customers! While no one at the company took the time to explain the cost and the alternatives to the customer before the work was done, there have been two lengthy calls after the filing of this complaint, in an attempt to dissuade the customer from pursuing the complaint This time might be better spent making sure that all employees explain the rates and charges upfront, and that they are also trained on the special responsibilities owed to the elderly under California law.Answer:I have had two calls with the customer since we completed the workThe first was to ask for authorization to send a copy the invoice to the customers daughter, and the second was to try to resolve the issue, which is obviously been unsuccessfulThere is nothing that could be construed here as a violation of the California Elderly abuse lawThe following script is our company procedure for Dispatch which applies to this circumstance:Ask if they have worked with us beforeAsk questions regarding service needed & determine how best to assist the client (on-site or in-house)Provide hourly rateGather/confirm contact informationSchedule appointment if on-site if neededThe Dispatch employee who handled this client’s call has provided the following statement:“Customer wanted a tech to go on-site because she could not bring the computer to our shopI instead arranged for one of our technicians to pick up the two computers & perform the work here in our office.”“My typical response to new computer setup & data migration service requests are as follows”:Data migration & computer setup can take several hoursIf the machine is at our office we only bill for the time we are touching the computerIf a tech is on-site then the entire time is billableThis will cost considerably more as much of computer setup is waiting for updates/data transfer to completeThis is the time that I bring up hourly rate & the average time of hrsfor new computer setup (which I explain is variable depending on the amount of data, complexity of the setup, and speed of the equipment).We provide professional Best of Class IT Services and take pride in our work and client relationshipsHere is and explanation and rational of why we use the process we do with system set ups and data migration:The Benefits of a Full Operating System migration vs Setting up a New System plus User Data TransferThe old method to move a user from a Windows computer to a newer system used to take much more time and effort, and usually left the client with the daunting task of remembering all their passwords, finding all their old installation disks and having to remember custom settings and changes that they’ve made to their computer that are now reverted to default settings. A proper migration using this method is extremely time consuming and leaves the client with a computer that is unfamiliar to themOften, it will be weeks before the client realizes that their new computer is missing a feature or functionality that is critical to them, even though they didn’t remember that it was at the time of the service.Alternatively, modern operating systems like Windows allow for direct transferring of a full system between computers that do not have matching hardwareFor this service, the following steps are required:Evaluate the health of the old systemThis includes evaluating the system for hard drive health, operating system corruption, malware or virus infections, and operating system compatibility with the new hardwareUpgrade the old operating system to the new versionRemove all branding and bloatware (no Dell software for an HP computer) and any software that is not appropriate to move.Copy the entire disk to the new computer.Test and repair all softwareThis is the most time-consuming part of this process and involves reactivating Windows, Office, and any other software that requires activation when it detects new hardwareCustomization and Testing with the client, this involves testing all printers, scanners, cameras, email, and any other software applications that the client normally usesNormally this is very quick, as most settings are unaffected during migrationUsing this method of migration, the client is left with a computer that is very familiar to themIt prints how they like to print, and looks and behaves largely the way that they expectThis method is also far less time than the old method as most hardware and software does not require any special attention to work correctlyAs most settings and passwords are retained, the client is far less likely to require a return visit by the technician which keeps their costs lowerAs there is rarely a need to re-purchase any software, these costs are mitigated as well

Our understanding from the complaint filed with the Revdex.com is that the daughter of this client who resides out of state, feels that we 1.        “Took advantage of her mother because she is an 85-year-old widow who doesn’t know anything about computers”...

2.       Accused us of “Elder abuse” 3.       “Demanded payment by check, depriving her mother the right to challenge the abusive charges”   The facts are: 1.       We have been servicing this client since 2004 and have had a very good relationship over the years and never received a complaint. 2.       Our current residential rate for all clients is $125.00 per hour and was established in 2014 3.       This client has used our services and paid this hourly rate 3 times since 2014 4.       Most recently this client contacted our office on January 17, 2018 to schedule a service appointment.  She had purchased a new computer and needed it set up.  The client explained that she would need data transferred from her old computer to the new computer and requested the service to include picking up the old and new computers from her residence.    The appointment was scheduled for January 18, 2018 at 11:30 am. Our service rate and payment were explained to the client, including that the technician would collect check payment when all service was completed.  5.       Our technician picked up the clients two laptops and brought the devices to our office Headquarters for the setup, configuration and migration to begin the same day.  When the computer set up, configuration and migration, our technician delivered the two computers back to the client’s residence, installed the new laptop at her desk, connected speakers, printer and Ethernet and provided a tutorial. 6.       The total amount of hours billed were 2.25 7.       Our policy has always been for all clients that payment is due upon completion of service from all our residential clients and an invoice detailing all services is provided. 8.       Our work process follows Industry Best Practices.  Before we work on a client’s computer, we always make an image (back-up of system) of the computer. 9.       We were not requested to just transfer two photos, we were requested to transfer all the data and re-install software programs from the old computer to the new computer.  10.    When the client’s daughter spoke with our company owner, she informed her that she felt our rate should be $40.00 per hour and all her mother should have been charged to transfer two photos should have been $40.00, although as stated above, our rate is $125.00 per hour and scope of service requested and performed was far greater.  We have been in business since '2001 and have never offered our service rate at $40.00 per hour. We feel, upon review of the service requested, work performed, and work charged for has been fair and equitable.  We take very seriously, and with great Umbrage to being accused of elder abuse

Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.The business still has made no offer whatsoever, and I have confirmed with my mother that no one told her any pricing information, and if they had followed their policy and told her it would be $125 per hour and would take 2.5 hours, she never would have agreed to use them. She called and asked for someone to come to her house and set up her computer.  The business told her they would come pick it up without any disclosure whatsoever about the cost.  The business has admitted that they were aware that she was an elderly widow who trusted them. My mother is available to confirm this information by telephone.
Regards,
[redacted] (by daughter but available to confirm at [redacted]).