Help Center Blues?

I’m solely and entirely just curious, and want to know if I’m alone on this question…

Does anyone else find themselves going in circles and not being entirely productive using the Help Center?

If so, does anyone have suggestions to improve communication in any other way?

2 Likes

YES!!! The one big complaint I have about Viki is the communication, especially when there’s a problem that needs to be addressed immediately. The Help Center is now our only line of communication since community representatives will no longer take personal PMs anymore. There really needs to be improvement. It is very frustrating as a contributor.
I think that there should be two separate help centers. One for the questions as a viewer/member and another for those that our volunteering on a live project and having a problem that needs immediate attention. I’m not sure of the answer, but if there was a representative we could get a message to in an emergency and know that we would get immediate results, it would be very helpful. Sometimes there are issues with live licensed channel, for example, it doesn’t get cut into parts or the wave is missing or the link has another issue. These are things that should be addressed immediately. Part of what makes Viki so great is the great quality and speed of our volunteers in putting out the subs on the most recent dramas. The help center takes days or even weeks to get back to you. This is not good for the volunteers or for Viki.

4 Likes

that’s a good idea! It takes ages to get any response!!!

1 Like

A viki staff member told me there would be a special help request form for QC’s/volunteers so urgent matters still could be dealt with as fast as possible. A few weeks ago I was asked to give feedback on the matter so that’s how I know. She also said they get tons of requests so it would be a challenge.
I really have to get used to it as well, I’m so used to just PM someone and now with the small questions I’m like is it even huge enough to even make a help request for?!

1 Like

I totally agree with all of you guys. I mean, I understand that they get tons of messages, but I also feel like losing that communication directly will greatly diminish the efficiency of work, and I think over all just being less pleasant. I guess it’s a matter of gratification.

But! I was just thinking… what if they had volunteer community moderators? You know how they are called managers? And how on a channel, there are moderators? Since it’s the community members that are requesting to keep such people that are to-go persons for emergencies, I think community members that are actively part of teams can volunteer to be moderators. They don’t have to get paid, but they will go through a “selection process” of sorts, kind of like the volunteer programs from other organizations. You know, have orientations, minimal training, no pay, but still gets work done, etc.

I’m not sure if that’s the answer either, and who knows? Maybe some improvement in the organization of the help center can help streamline things, but I think if ultimately, the same small amount of individuals (namely the current community managers) are answering requests, the sheer amount of requests will always remain daunting.

I can’t phrase it right, but something in my mind tells me something can change to help improve the situation…

1 Like

Ohh nice, I thought let’s check if my pending requests are already assigned to someone and I noticed 2 are “solved” but actually they are not because my questions where not answered at all… Or I don’t see them.

Will PM that staffer if my questions are not answered in a few days… Viki staff if you want all questions to be directed to the help center please do answer them instead of closing without any answer, thank you!

2 Likes

I love how you’re trying to talk to the Viki staff through here… desperate situations call for desperate measures… It shouldn’t, and I hope it doesn’t stay that way!!

1 Like

Okay I totally was in the wrong topic before I seen this.
I going through the same frustration!I can’t find the place to submit my request.

And I seen what @Dudie wrote

I think that they need to have a help center where it’s for urgent matters and only channel managers can write to viki and they can reply fast, One for community members that are new to viki, and one for the QC’s that are having to deal with everything else in the community. And Viki needs to put a “submit a request” In all channels so if anything we don’t have to go through so much just to find a button.

Hahaha. Isn’t that what so many things are Viki are making us do? Dig everywhere to find one button… :slight_smile: They’ll figure something out! I have hope… maybe.

1 Like

I actually put in a ‘help ticket’ and about 2 weeks later got a message saying that they wre backed up and I should reply to that message and let them know if I’m still having the same problem. I replied that yes, I was still having the same problem and when I looked up the status in the help history area, they’d closed the case. Now it also seems that they only communicate through the help center and you have to check back to see if you’ve got an answer. However, if your problem is a log-in problem… How’re you supposed to log in to see the answer? Grrrr…

2 Likes

Exactly… Glad I’m not alone.

Normally you will recive an e-mail that notifies you about the status of your request at the help-center.

When they said they were going to switch over to exclusively using the help center for communication, I thought they were going to streamline it… But it doesn’t really look like that’s happened. Considering how important contributors are to this site, you’d think there would be an easy way to contact administrators or what not, if the need arose.

I have no clue what the size of Viki’s team is, but if the help center is backed up so much that I have to wait a month for an initial response that consists of asking ‘Are you still having this problem?’ I feel like they need to hire some more people. While I feel response times should be within like 2 days, I don’t really see that happening here. Maybe a week then?

I’m also curious how they prioritize requests - like technical or security issues seem like they’d be more important. I don’t think I submit that many support tickets so maybe this isn’t true, but the average response time I’ve been getting has consistently been just under a month.

I do have to say that I just had an issue completely resolved in about 16 hours, so I was quite impressed. Perhaps it’s because it had to do with a new channel and getting it up and running.