Help us help you: Tips to engage our support team.

Funny story. We once, during our regular training, were taken through a communication drill. Our entire team trained to get key information from the message a client is trying to communicate. This enables us to resolve support issues in a timely manner. Back to the drill, the first person whispered ‘potato wedge’ and we were about twenty or so, so we had to pass the message across to the last person. Somewhere in the middle, it turned into ‘tomato weight’ and then ‘tomato paste’ …finally, we had the last person with ‘tatu weight’. I know there’s pronunciation and all that but the question becomes, is your message always received as intended?
These few tips will be helpful when communicating with our support agents.
1. Categorize your issue to ensure it’s picked up by the relevant team. Are you making an enquiry? Are you reporting a problem? Are you making a followup? Also, consider categorizing the issue in terms of the subject matter. Is the issue domain related, hosting related, website related, Billing related?
2. If you are reporting a problem, take note of any indications that there is a problem. This could include an error message you’re experiencing, a certain behaviour that doesn’t seem normal e.t.c. With websites and emails, they is likely an error message or if there is not, you could experience a blank page, missing content, missing emails, emails not delivered or received e.t.c. There is always an indicator that something is not right. If possible, take a screenshot of the error as it narrows down on the area the problem is being encountered.
3. Open a support ticket by emailing support@hostafrica.com. Most support issues are resolved after further check. Even when you have called the support team, if it is something that requires further checking, open a support ticket.

• It will enable you to follow up on the progress.
• It will also aid you in remembering the support agent you spoke to on the phone as you can attention them on the email.
• It ensures you give as much information about the issue you are experiencing and send screenshots of any errors you might be experiencing.
• It ensures that the support agent doesn’t forget to look into the issue you are experiencing.
• If you’re unable to open the ticket at that moment if the support agent says they are checking on it, request them to open a support ticket for you as you wait for a response.

4. Please refrain from opening too many support tickets. It’s likely that two agents can pick up the same issue and start working on it which can cause confusion and derail the resolution of the problem. We mainly merge tickets once you open multiple tickets in regards to the same issue.
5. Use a proper ticket subject line and a proper prioritization.
We understand you would like your issue resolved immediately. There are some issues that might take a little longer than others to be resolved. Kindly exercise patience. Always label the priority of the issue appropriately, if high, medium, low, urgent e.t.c Use proper ticket subjects to ensure that your issue is assigned to the most relevant team.
In conclusion
How you relay the issue to us determines how it is resolved. The most important points to take home is sending pictures of the errors you’re getting. It might seem as some text to you but it has a lot of meaning to us. Indicate as much information as possible. If you can include the time of the first occurrence that will also be very helpful. Information will reduce the back and forth conversation and allow quicker resolution. If you follow these tips, you will definitely see great improvement.