After almost a year of working on improving the way they handle player issues, gaming giant Valve still has a long way to go. The company is focusing on improving account security, the quality of problem resolutions, and in game transactions all by the end of the year.
Valve’s online gaming platform, Steam, is no stranger to customer support issues.
Valve was rated F by the BBB(Better Business Beureu) with over 800 complaints logged, most of which are still unresolved today. With issues of account hacking, multiple charges for a single game, and month-long waits for a response, players have taken to forums across the internet to vent their frustrations.
We’ve already seen some improvement but there’s still work to do.
Earlier this year Steam announced major updates to their refund policy in order to alleviate some of the headaches gamers were having. But making one policy change is a small step in Steam’s push for better support.
Valve’s Erik Johnson fielded some questions about the state of Steam’s support center and the way they handle player issues. Asked point blank about problems, he agreed there’s lots to work on.
“We hear those complaints, and that’s gonna be a big focus for us throughout the year. We have a lot of work to do there. We have to do better.”
The problem with third-party support.
Johnson went on to say that Valve is partnering with several third-party companies to pick up the support slack, but finding the right partnership can be tricky.
“We’ve hired a couple different companies [to help with support],” said Johnson. “The thing that’s interesting is, you go out to third-party support providers, and—at least in our experience—most of them wanted to sell you ways to reduce the number of people currently waiting in support, but they weren’t very good at selling you ways to solve customer support issues.”
Unimpressed with the quality of service, Valve has taken it upon themselves to begin properly training the third-party companies to handle issues in an effective and efficient manner. But that training takes time.
“It bugs us, but it is what it is. We think we’ll have the support wait time down to an acceptable point by Christmas time. That’s our goal. It’s a function of training up more and more people answer customer issues.”
If Erik’s time schedule follows through, gamers can expect to have a bit more help from Steam support by the end of the year, with more updates and features to come throughout 2016.
Valve has already added two-factor authentication for accounts to combat hacking problems, and they plan on tackling software issues for their own games like DOTA 2, TF2, and Counter-Strike soon as well.
What has your experience with Steam’s support been? Pleasant or awful? Join in the conversation and let us know!
