Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers  

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

If you truly are here to just watch the world burn and have no desire to try to work with anyone about getting it fixed I would love a prusa i3 and would be happy to take it off your hands. ( not joking) cant afford a new one

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Awesome way of looking at it Johnathan 😆

I know the feeling I saved some and put the rest on the credit card to get mine. 😮
Its slowly making its money back though so worth the saving.

Prusa needs a classified section 😀

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

So this conversation is getting little bit toxic guys and not constructive at all. So please get back to the point. I'll wait for jeffs reaction on my post and if it won't come, I'll lock this thread tomorrow.

To lighten up the mood a little I though I would give you a little sneak peek behind how our support works.

We have 15 people working in customer support. Jakub Stranel is the head of the department. They are all in house, next door from me, manufacturing and dev team. They take care of the emails (We use Front app), calls and Livechat. But they also do the final check if the kits before shipping (pack in correct power cable, add the chosen filaments and so on) and the actual shipping.
We had over 7000 conversations with customers just in the month of July mail and livechat, feel free to take a look on the screenshots and judge yourself.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

I am Sorry Josef

I did not want it to be Toxic. I am simply concerned that the forum is becoming very one sided when there should be both positive and negative constructive comments and support for a product.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Honestly I do not think it can go to something else than a toxic post, it's a rant rage post and Jeff is not looking for something else than expressing his frustration in a very negative way. I can understand the frustration when you have high expectation and things does not go as planned, but this way it's hard to make a situation go better.

It's a pity since what's Jeff is needing the most is help and advices from PR or the community members, but he reached a point where he will never accept that.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

My Point proven. Certainly making it a personal forum you two 🙄

[...]

I am considering my second Prusa but the more I read on here the more I wonder what the future holds for its support forum with you two on it running around like you own it. Yes you guys give some great advice but you do also give out some shit comments. Just bare in mind there is some owners who are on here and are annoyed with Prusa but do not say anything merely as they are concerned they may get ridiculed. Its a bloody support forum, you will get problems and unhappy people.
A car forum is littered with problems with cars. You rarely end up with a forum dedicated to how good something is. Its a support forum. 😉

I don't now where you get the idea that some of us are acting like we own the forum? I for one admit freely that I know very little about 3D Printers and just try to give help where I can. No one gets ridiculed on here as far as I can see. The first thing people suggest when a problem crops up is to check thoroughly that you built it correctly as that really is the most common problem with anything that comes in kit form. I made a couple of mistakes when we did our upgrade but luckily spotted them as when finished I went over the whole thing twice to double check our work. Once someone has confirmed that everything is correctly constructed then people on here will generally do everything they can to help. I myself tend to only give very basic help as I don't know that much about the printers yet, I am still very much a newbie. Yes, this is a support forum and obviously your mainly only going to get people with problems posting! I have had no major issues with mine so the only reason I come on here is too try to offer help to others. Please be aware as well that some people are not native English speakers so the tone of their posts may not be quite what they intended to convey, others may just be abrupt yet mean nothing by it. I suffer from severe depression and other mental issues and do try my best to be helpful and light in tone.

On another note you are advised to set the pinda at a certain level, then do a calibration. If it passes calibration you are good to go printing. Now I followed the instructions to the word. The pinda was set perfectly. The pinda is supposed to stop the nozzle hitting the deck. So after calibration why did the pinda not stop the nozzle hitting the deck. That my friends is not my fault as I done everything via the book and to the letter. Funny how Prusa know its a problem because two days later they release a new firmware which guess what..... stops the nozzle hitting the bed because it uses the pinda to check!
Again that was not my fault but a actually a Prusa problem. It is amazing just how many people would say that was their fault. Those who had the pinda miles away from where it should be, that is your fault as the instructions clearly show you where is should be but many others its a firmware problem not using the pinda to check the bed even after calibration. Now if I wanted to make a case to send it back because of that, I could of. I did think it was a cura problem but in fact the pinda once calibrated should have stopped that happening. Even you two should know that yet you still went on to tell me it was my fault!
Now I was only merely having a moan because I wanted a spare part, certainly not saying the printer was a complete load of crud and no one should buy one... Although a few points I felt like that!

In your thread "Complaining?" I was trying to explain why Prusa might not have any spare beds to sell at the moment, not ridiculing you! If you have constructed your printer correctly and used non-alpha/beta/RC firmware and the bed has been damaged then you are certainly entitled to a replacement under warranty. Either way though I was trying to explain why there might be a wait, and I'm sorry if that didn't come over right I was not trying to ridicule you Ben.

Jeff's post could have been ignored by you two after you realised there was no helping him!!

Firstly, we tried to help, then Jeff started throwing insults which hurt so being human we responded, while still trying to help. Once he made it clear he didn't help I for one would have backed away but the name throwing got worse and I felt insulted so felt compelled to respond. In hindsight it would have been better to just walk away, and in future that is what I will do. As I said this is a community orientated hobby and so these sort of things are likely to happen! In 'real life' it would probably all get sorted over a pint down the pup! 😆

I will try to word my posts better in future so they don't sound so patronising as they are not meant that way!

I will bow out now, but I will just say that I honestly hope that both Ben and Jeff get their problems sorted to their satisfaction quickly and are soon up and running again, and having fun printing stuff... which after all is what we are all here for! 😀

P.S. Interesting stats there Josef!

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

3delight. I have obviously mis-understood your posts as that was not how I read your posts so sorry about that too from my end.

I am more then happy with my printer now and Prusa have sorted my problems out. I am more then happy for Prusa to delete my complaining thread too, to save anyone reading it differently when researching.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Before the thread is locked, I'd like to say that I have personally built 3 different printers, and of them the Prusa MK2 was the absolute best experience!
As with all the more cost effective printers it will require the user to have a little knowledge, which is why I think building them from the kit is the best idea. Solving issues is a great way to build further knowledge and perhaps build on the open source with your own tweaks!

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

While we're all venting here, I'd just like to say I'm still very upset about not getting a bag of candy with my MK2 kit that I hear others got. I've been biting my tongue about this long enough, but it needs to come out damnit!

In all seriousness though, as many have said, Jeff should be contacting the place he bought the printer from first and foremost. I drove to filament.ca in Brampton the other month and the guy working there seemed nice enough, so I'm not sure why jeff is hesitant to contact them about the issue.

I would like to weigh in about one thing that has bothered me and is somewhat on topic to this thread since it's about customer service, and that is the heat bed issue where right after I built the MK2 kit and was doing the configuration, the nozzle rammed the PEI. This was by no fault of my own, it was a firmware issue and should never have happened since I followed the early manual/assembly instructions religiously. It wasn't the last time the nozzle ran across the heat bed and marked it up. Now with the latest firmware it's not really an issue anymore, but the point is as an early adopter and guinea pig, I feel Prusa should have sent a new heat bed to anyone having damaged their heat bed due to their software/hardware issue. They should take responsibility for their mistakes, and not tell me I can buy a PEI sheet from them, find some limonene from who knows where, and spend hours of my time replacing it. I can't even imagine something like this happening if I were to buy a new TV and something stopped working due to a defective part, and then the manufacturer told me they would send me a bag of transistors and capacitors and to fix it myself.

It's scary as a new user to 3D printing to jump in head first and buy a printer from another country (that ends up costing more then twice the price due to currency conversion/shipping fees), but when the seller isn't willing to own up to their mistakes and make things right, it's just bad business IMO. I know a lot of people have had no issues with their printers, but as we know a lot has changed since the first kits were sold. The ABS parts are being made with improved spacing and hole locations, the manuals and assembly instructions are being updated all the time, as is the firmware. Just because YOUR printer works great does not mean they were all made the exact same way, and it bothers me when people on here keep implying since their printer works it must be something YOU did wrong. Anyways, just wanted to get that off my chest.

I would like to thank everyone in the forum though, the majority of you guys have been great and I appreciate all your help and the help you provide others on here which in turn often helps me as well. I hope you guys never leave.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

I am soo glad I am not the only one. I was starting to think having a big mouth and saying how I feel was a bad thing 😮

I agree Damian and sorry to hear of your woes.

In regards to the bag of sweets... I too am very upset but I actually got some with mine. I went into the lounge to find the wife and kids had eaten them 😥

Grounds for Divorce and adoption right there, especially after so much hard work 👿

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Yeah, we had the "Gummi Bear" discussion a while back. It seems that E3D always ship a pack with all deliveries, which begs the question: what to the guys at Prusa Research do with all their sweeties???

Peter

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Ben, the forums SHOULD be where we vent our issues if things aren't working out with tech support at Prusa or we think we will get a better solution here. If threads get locked down because people voice their negative opinions on here, people will just take it elsewhere like reddit, where there is a much larger audience, and that could potentially hurt sales for Prusa. Heck, that's where I first heard about the MK2 and the reason I bought my MK2 (and where I heard about people getting candy with their kit... *still bitter* 😡 )

The only reason this thread should be closed is if jeff is just trying to trash prusa without actually trying to make any effort to resolve the issue. He only seems to see one solution, his way or the highway and it's difficult dealing with people like that. Being rude to others isn't necessary and won't help him.

As for your wife and kids eating all the sweets, I share your pain. Time to 3D print a massive lock for your lounge 😀

Peter, maybe they're working on a gummi bear filament or something.... Man, I'd love to eat my failed prints, so much less waste!

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Damian no I completely agree. My reason for starting my complaint on here was exactly that. I meant my complaint thread to be closed as I eventually got the part which has now made my printer perfect again.

This thread is still not sorted but hopefully Jeff's supplier will be able to help.

Now theres a thought. How long till you can get almost instant 3d printed parts. How long till you can get multi filament, multi flavour foods made almost instantly using a 3d printer type machine. It would certainly be cooked ok going through 240+ nozzle.
Put me down for a 1kg Haribo star mix filament pack. 😉 😆

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Damian and Ben,

Totally off topic but...
http://www.magiccandyfactory.com/

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

*slams open the door to this 'room' 😡

HEY, no fair! I take my leave of the room and everyone starts talking about sweeties!!! 👿

LOL! 😆 😀

I got a bag of Haribo with my MK2 upgrade kit, and with an order from e3d... only problem? I'm diabetic... Waaahhhhhhhhh! 😥 😥

I gave them away to one of my wife's friends in the end... 🙁 If I'd have known you could've had mine damian.d!

Looking at those stats Josef posted... 160+ support chats a day, plus all the printers and upgrade kits they have to make and pack, plus the spares they sell... PLUS doing research... they must have to live on sugary sweets to keep going!!!

*sigh I remember the days... stuffing sweets like they were going out of fashion... why did I have to go and get diabetes?! 😉 😀 😆

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

If you are thinking about purchasing this unit, go ahead and do it. My company purchased a printer that cost $50,000 last year, no faster than the MK2 just a very large bed. Support, is about the same but we have to pay for someone to come and work on it. Yes, it is under warranty. The warranty does not cover travel and we sure are not going to disassemble it to send it back.

I have purchased two MK2 printers and I am very happy with the printer and the support. The printer is basically open source so we can work on it, no secrets here.

I had a fan go bad on one and had the replacement fan in 3 days. Both of the MK2 printers work around the clock. We are working a project and if we get the work I will be purchasing a about 20 MK2 modified to meet our requirements for the printer farm.

Bottom line for less than a grand this is a super printer. You can't go wrong.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Damian and Ben,

Totally off topic but...
http://www.magiccandyfactory.com/

Oh My good god. 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛

Last minute.com for a last minute plane ticket to Berlin........ 😀

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Since we are talking about Prusa support, just wanna state that i have had NOTHING but the best support from you guys.

I have personally brought 4 printers (1 mk2 and 3 mk 1's ) and 1 upgrade kit, with 2 more upgrade kits coming soon. And every time i have had and issue its always been addressed promptly and quickly! I've dealt many times with Jakub, and he's probably tired of me 😀 But they have always been professional and courteous! The one time i needed some replacement parts for a defective bit, they shipped it too me immediately and it got here in 4 days (super impressive for coming from Czech to the US)

My only complaint, (as someone else mentioned above) is i never get candy! I think someone in the shop is hogging it all 😉 It even had a checkmark next to candy on my packing sheet, but there was none in the box! Darn thieving candy gnomes! 😀

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

I was having a think last night (scary) and you may find it is not Prusa not putting the candy in the box but more that customs takes it out of the box during shipping/delivery. Many places will not allow you to send food stuffs so that may explain why some have them and some do not.

Re: Lets talk business practises customer support Read this if you are considering one of these printers

Allright, thanks anyone for input.

Jeff can contact me at [email protected]

Thread is locked now.