Anyone else have this experience with Adobe?

[Shawn Miller]

I just had a horrible experience with them yesterday.

-condensed version-
I called to upgrade to CS3 Production Premium, they asked for my serial number (reasonable), they find the serial number, but tell me I’m not the registered user of that software (WTF!) – The sales rep then tells me that she can’t tell me the name OF the registered user and that there’s nothing she can do… then she hangs up on me. I called back, the sales rep asks for my name and serial number, I give both, he asks me my FULL name, I give it to him… he confirms my email address, home address and phone number… BINGO, I AM the registered user. I give him my credit card number and he completes my order.

All I can say is, Adobe customer support has been going down hill lately. This is the second time I’ve had to call them this year, and both times have left me feeling that they’re inept when it comes to customer service.

Shawn

[Craig Wall]

I SHARE your PAIN. Beyond inept.

I am calling again…on hold this very second. Again. I was charged 9 days ago on my card for AE8 but haven’t received.

Every time I call it takes 20 minutes to identify me–and it’s as if they have to sort through 20 databases to identify my order number.

I cannot imagine how complicated they are making the simplest of things.

[Deleted User]

Hello,

Since they took over Macromedia and started charging for support contrcats that was for me when it started to fall apart with the customer services and technical support.

Long wait times, rude customer support being sarcastic towards myself and my friend/co-wokrr when asking about a software problem we were having on 4 seperate machines all the same problem with Premiere Pro 2.0 and Serious Magic Ultra 2 which Adobe have taen over when we were having problems.

Technical support telling us they do not know who or what a Blackmagic Decklink Extreme is or they do not have eperience with Ultra 2 and it works fine and they are not having any of the problems we were experiencing.

I hope they can improve the customer and technical support as well as a 34/7 activation line, as if you hav e a activation problem on Friday night GMT, UK, London. And you have to re-instal and the activation and 30 day grace period fail you have to wait till Monday morning to speak with customer/technical support about getting the software activated again. So i I had a critical project I was wokring on over the weekend then I would be ruined and not able to work and my reputation wil be seriously ruined as it will make me look unreliable.

Any one else thoughts on activation?

Thanks,

Leo

[Tim Vaughan]

They are absolutely terrible! My laptop was stolen quite recently, and I had to purchase a new one. Of course, I somehow wasn’t able to deactivate the adobe license before the stolen (what was I thinking, right??), and trying to relate that to Adobe was impossible. Not only did I have an incredibly HARD time trying to understand the barely able to speak English Indian girl, but I was put on hold 15 times, and on the call for around 45 minutes, with her only to come back on the line and tell me I had to deactivate the software on the (stolen) laptop before I could activate it on the new one. (try and figure that out…) As baffled as I was, I again explained I was NOT in possession of my stolen laptop, that my stolen laptop was NOT in a place where I could deactivate it, and how the person who stole my laptop did not do the courtesy of leaving me a number where he could be reached. Now they tell me there is nothing they can do.
So I end up hanging up on them, went online and purchased an upgrade (as I am on file), –which (talk about lucky) was the last day where they offered their “purchase the AE 7 for $199 and get AE CS3 for free”.
And I am just baffled at how complicated, intricate, and totally useless their new “creative license” is. Anytime you have to attend seminars to understand “simple and quick” instructions, you might not have what you think. They are trying to push their software that we (personnally) have NO need for, and trying to get the upgrade for only what we need is costing us quite a bit. So yes, they have gone downhill even from a year ago, where it was kind of fun to work through a buy. But that’s just my humble opinion. Great software, terrible CS–weoo, that just came out. Customer Service = CS. I guess we are on Customer Service 3 now…

Tim

Tim

[Deleted User]

Hello Tim,

That’s shcoking they told you that you have to buy a new versin when it was stolen from you. They should of given you a new product key!

Looking at the new cs3 production premium, I can;t at this time see why it is worth upgrading

[Tim Vaughan]

I will say After Effects has some new features that I personally think are great. While they don’t really mention it, the new shape tool/feature has been adopted in my arsenal and used more than any other feature right now. Animating the stroke, twisting and starting/moving end points has been invaluable. Something where I would of had to create in another program, add mask, etc now only takes me a few seconds. I LOVE this! –not to mention the cache cleaner, support for multiple processors (which needs to be improved, but good nonetheless), and a few other items have made this update essential to my needs.

https://www.trizonfilms.com/FineNewHomes/CNHN_Charlotte.mov

(example of animated line–created the path/stroke easily in AE and then just animated my end point, (2 keyframes) moved the camera along the path, and added a few pictures, and Wala!)

Tim

Tim

[Shawn Miller]

Nice – I’m looking forward to playing with this feature. I’m also looking forward to using OnLocation for checking focus and exposure on set.

I hope Adobe cleans up its act with respect to their customer service. I love the products… but I’m really starting to dislike the company.

Shawn

[David Franklin]

I’m in the “inconsistent service” camp. I have a MacPro tower, and I was running AE7 under Rosetta, and as is amply explained in the sticky post at the top of the forum, AE7 + MacPro Tower = Crashing.

So I’m one of those who has been champing at the bit to get my hands on AE8 or CS3 or whatevertheh*llthey’recallingittoday, since the beta version I had downloaded wouldn’t run any of my Cycore Plug-ins.

When I first called about upgrading from AE7 to CS3 I waited on hold for over 45 minutes, and finally had to give up the call because I had another appointment.

The next time I called, the phone was answered within a minute by a helpful guy who was definitely able to understand me and everything I said, curteously took my order, and I received the box with my upgrade on Monday of this week.

So one day terrible, the next day fantastic. All I can say is I hope someone over there understands that bad (or even inconsistent) customer service alienates your core customers. And then they switch products.

Like I recently did with Avid and FCP. (Don’t get me started about Avid’s customer “service.”)

Harumph.

[Craig Wall]

After ***literally*** 2.5 hrs and 7 phone calls I finally discovered Adobe had shipped my product…

…to the WRONG address!

[Delete]

Hopefully they shipped you a copy too. I know there’s some law that says you can keep anything that gets shipped to you, even if you didn’t order it.

https://www.xonikz.com/