Survey Regarding Vendor Support

Richard Shoemaker (rshoe@wwitch.unl.edu)
Fri, 5 May 95 16:51:05 CDT

Dear AMMRL Members:

The Steering Committee has been discussing the way(s) some
vendors deal with certain service and parts issues, and there seems to be
enough interest to warrant addressing the issue in our forum.

We thought that if we had a free-for-all gripe session on the listserver,
there would be some disadvantages:

1) A "free-for-all" would likely "stuff" our already over-burdened
mailboxes with messages...especially if a particular issue were to become
heated.

2) It could possibly result in primarily defensive responses instead of
constructive action. Also, some very valid criticisms might not come out
because of fear of harming individual relationships between vendors and
customers.

3) It wouldn't address the issue of what the the various vendors are in fact
doing well at this time. It is to everyone's advantage to let the vendors
know what the users like, to encourage them to continue the good policies.

Many of you might have what you feel are pressing issues regarding policies,
procedures, or recent experiences regarding service/support issues with the
various vendors who serve the NMR community. What we would like to do is have
you communicate your complaints and compliments to:

"steer@bloch.cchem.berkeley.edu".

Specific issues (complaints and/or kudos) would be most helpful, with all
details surrounding the various incidents; therefore, we (the steering
committee) can group general areas of concern most accurately. We will then
compile them, render them anonymous, perhaps tone down some language, and ask
the vendors to respond (either by posting a summary directly to AMMRL, or by
direct letters from the steering committee to the respective vendors). The
vendors would then have the opportunity to respond to concerns which are
important to the NMR community that they serve.

One reason we feel that this is a good idea is that a _summary_ of issues,
ranked in order of seriousness as perceived by the users, might be a very
convenient way of gathering input for the vendors. Without spending a lot of
_their_ time putting together summaries of anecdotes, they would have a clear
indication of what they are doing _right_, as well as problem areas to be
looked into.

Again, please forward any responses to: steer@bloch.cchem.berkeley.edu.

For the Steering Committee,

Richard Shoemaker, Ph.D. Phone--(402) 472-6255
Instrumentation Director, Chemistry FAX---- -9402
Research Associate Professor, Chemistry
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
URL: http://wwitch.unl.edu/nmrlab.html