Did you know that 26% of the British public “get mad” at their gadgets and bits of technology they don’t understand instead of getting help with it?
To aid those in the UK who need help with technology, Virgin Group have launched their first new UK company in three years and have teamed up with AVG to launch Virgin Digital Help. A service that promises to “revolutionise the way British consumers solve problems with their digital stuff”, Virgin Digital Help plan to help the digitally confused British public by using “a combination of downloadable tools, online and phone support, and home visits.”
Sounds just a tad less patronizing than the Tech Guys doesn’t it?
As part of their launch, Virgin Digital Help have already reached out to 2,000 people in the UK and conducted research to understand how valuable technology is to consumers, how tech support is letting Brits down, and how stressful it can be for people when their gadgets just stop working. (The answer? VERY.)
What they found was pretty interesting. I won’t bore you will all of the numbers, but I found the following statistics of particular interest:
- 78% of Brits would consider spending two hours trying to fix a gadget themselves instead of spending 20 minutes on the phone with customer service. (Which says loads about the customer service in the UK.)
- Losing music and photo collections is more stressful than dumping someone. (Obviously people aren’t dating people they actually like...)
- Brits have spent an average of £155 each on gadgets they never use because they can’t get them to work.
- Half agree that if their internet connection went down, it would be like being lost in the middle of the desert.
While I personally think being stuck without a working internet connection is like being locked in a padded cell without food or water, the findings of Virgin Digital Help are certainly interesting, and primarily say a lot about the lack of quality tech support and customer service in the UK.
And thinking about it, I would also rather have a friend, my partner, or spend a lot of time trying to understand what cable goes into where and why than call up my broadband company and deal with their off-shore tech support call centre.
So, what exactly can Virgin Digital Help do for you?
If you have a tech-related problem (and who doesn’t these days?) simply go to www.virgindigitalhelp.co.uk to get started. (Or if your problem is you don’t have Internet connection, call 0800 1071 175.)
Virgin Digital Help will come to your house, speak to you over the phone, via the Internet whether it’s through their chat service, or their“Smart Access Technologies” which are used to remotely control computers and smartphones during service.
Or for £2.99 a month, you can turn on the full set of automated fixes and get access to 70,000 self-help solutions and over 1000 video tutorials.
Nice, eh?
I think it’s fantastic what Virgin Group and AVG are doing, as part of the problem with getting more people online and being tech savvy isn’t necessarily the rate at which we’re developing new technologies or technological advances, but how people understand, relate to and if they can actually use the technology we're so quickly producing.
What good is giving your grandparents a mobile phone if there’s no one around to help them use it? Just as it's all well and good giving your mom a Skype phone for Christmas, but if you live across the country and can’t show her how to set it up, and the customer service is crap, what are the chance she’s going to actually use it?
I’m very interested to see how Virgin Digital Help are going to revolutionize the way the British relate to and understand technology. Here’s hoping they accomplish all they’ve set out to do!