Category: Uncategorized

Categories
Uncategorized

Survey says… Many Online Retailers ignore as much as One-Third of Customer Emails

An interesting article on BusinessWire (Sept 25, 2007), Survey Reveals Top 100 U.S. Online Retailers’ Customer Service Shortfalls, highlights how top retailers don’t live up to customer’s demands when it comes to providing “an exceptional customer experience.”

Seems that most dropped the ball and found that success could be as simple as answering their email, providing better self-help tools and returning customer calls…

“Overall, the Talisma audit revealed that online retailers are failing in three key areas:

1. One-third of email queries were ignored – Email is generally accepted as one of the most efficient communication tools. This seems to have been overlooked by many online retailers as 34% didn’t reply to customer emails.

2. Lack of Self-Help Tools – 97% of online retailers had no knowledge base to help prospective buyers make an informed decision based on product features and suitability, known issues, or customer service accessibility and policies.

3. Accuracy of information provided – only 51% of emails and 72% of phone calls answered provided accurate information.”

Gives me greater incentive to ensure that I am getting to my email backlog in a more timely manner (with apologies)

A copy of the report (along with a list of the online retailers surveyed) is available at http://www.talisma.com/tal_emails/us/retail/ret_us_form.asp.

Categories
Uncategorized

Of interest: CNET News coverage of D-Day for ‘Halo 3’ launch

CNET News is providing full coverage on the launch of ‘Halo 3’ for the Xbox 360, on the minds of all of the kids at the bus stop today.

Categories
Uncategorized

Your questions: Is DST changing in Victoria, Australia?

A question from the Technical Deep-Dive LiveMeeting today on DST and Time Zones today…

“I believe Victoria, Australia will be extending daylight savings by a week (ending April 6, 2008 instead of end of March ’08) is this covered [in the latest Windows OS update, KB 933360]?”

No, not currently as this has not yet been passed into law. It was reported today that the daylight saving legislation will be introduced this week in Australia and propose that daylight saving be in sync across NSW, the ACT, Victoria and South Australia. More as it develops.

For our webcast, thanks today to Alon, Sophia, Beth, Joel, David, Bob, Gil, Jim and Steve, as well as our LM hostess, Tania.

As mentioned previously, later this year we expect to release the 2008 Cumulative Time Zone Update for Windows that will set the known, correct dates for 2008 (it should include changes for Brazil and any other country that changes the observance of DST entry/exit dates in 2008). Our goal is to move to a regular cadence, releasing cumulative time zone updates for Windows. We are checking on the ability to include Venezuela as well in this update.

For those in government considering changing the observance of DST or Summer Time in your country: figure on at least a year (perhaps even two) to ensure that not only vendors but those IT professionals impacted by the changes have enough time to make the appropriate decisions.

Tags: Microsoft, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings Time, DST, Time Zones, Australia. 649,768; 896,032; 1,750,000+

Categories
Uncategorized

Technical “Deep-Dive” LiveMeeting today on DST and Time Zones

In about an hour’s time, we’ll host a Technical “Deep-Dive” Webcast…

Monday, September 24, 2007 at 2:00pm Pacific

This LiveMeeting Webcast will be hosted by members of our Microsoft DST Team (Joel, Steve, me and a cast of many on the Question Manager), to provide a technical overview of resources available to help prepare Microsoft products for the change to Daylight Saving Time and time zones around the world. It will cover the core scenarios where the Outlook and Exchange update tools should be used, in addition to helpful links to patches and other information relative to other Microsoft products affected by the DST changes.

Click here just before 2PM PAC today: https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/lmevents/join?id=msft092407sa&role=attend&pw=ATN783

 

Available now: Webcast Live Meeting on-demand from September 14, 2007…

An overview of DST, Microsoft resources, impacted products, updates and tools. Click this link to view this web cast now.  Click here to watch this recorded LiveMeeting.

Tags: Microsoft, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings Time, DST, Time Zones, Venezuela. 629,596; 907,942; 1,750,000+

Categories
Uncategorized

Venezuela will move clocks in December, 2007… and you can test the change today in Windows

Navarrese Héctor, Minister of Science and Technology in Venezuela, announced that the “change to Venezuelan daylight saving time requires coordinations with diverse institutions and is what we are doing.” (See this link on Windows Live Translator for an article.)

Translation: institutions such as banks need a little more time to make the change. The minister said that Venezuelans will move the clock back a half an hour from 12:00 on the night of the day it goes into effect, which they now project will be December 31, 2007.

As noted, Microsoft is supporting this change today with a hotfix for Windows in KB 938977. This update for the Windows operating system is available to allow customers and partners to test and implement the new time zone for Caracas, Venezuela, prior to the official move to the new time zone in the region. This update makes a change to your Windows operating system by installing a new time zone for Caracas, Venezuela. The name of the new time zone is Venezuela Standard Time, and the display name for this time zone is (GMT -04:30) Caracas.

Microsoft recommends that customers downloading this update should maintain their current time zone settings and confirm the start date of the time zone change in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela before using the new time zone. End users may install this update and the resulting new time zone may remain on the time zone with a display name of (GMT-04:00) La Paz, also known as SA Western Standard Time, until manually making a transition to Venezuela Standard Time.

Installing and using this new time zone prior to the official time zone change will impact the date and time on your computer (see below).

For more information about how to manually change your time zone, please see the following:

The KB is now live and you can request the hotfix by going to http://support.microsoft.com/gp/CUHotFix_LandingPage_Request.