Are Beersmith Normally So Slow To Respond?

[thomer]

I have had the software for a few months now (paying dues).
Registered on the forum yesterday morning and my request is still awaiting admin approval.
Software is great, but you can always tell a companies ethos by their customer service.
Hopefully this is just a one off.

 

[Sammy86]

I have had the software for a few months now (paying dues).
Registered on the forum yesterday morning and my request is still awaiting admin approval.
Software is great, but you can always tell a companies ethos by their customer service.
Hopefully this is just a one off.

Well considering there are only two employees I would relax and cut them some slack...just my opinion.

 

[thomer]

Well considering there are only two employees I would relax and cut them some slack...just my opinion.

I did not know that, so yes I will. However I run a business with two people and we get back to people in a timely manner. It seems strange that when you sign up for the software you do not get forum access at the same time. Also the only information you have to give to get access is your email address. So not sure why they have a manual authorization system in place.

 

[Deadalus]

Do you run a forum? That's not the only information asked, there are two human verification questions. Someone has to check those, probably manually, depending on the question and answers expected, to weed out the spammer bots. The admin may also check IP addresses, with varying intensity of effort. Plus he may have a day job, but I don't know the guy that well. He probably only does approvals once a day if that. If you have a really pressing question, maybe ask it here.

 

[Wigglebutts Brewery]

Brad was probably at/recovering from HomebrewCon. I’ve sent him notes and the responses were good and quick.

 

[thomer]

Do you run a forum? That's not the only information asked, there are two human verification questions. Someone has to check those, probably manually, depending on the question and answers expected, to weed out the spammer bots. The admin may also check IP addresses, with varying intensity of effort. Plus he may have a day job, but I don't know the guy that well. He probably only does approvals once a day if that. If you have a really pressing question, maybe ask it here.

I don't want to start an argument here as brewing is supposed to be fun. The two verification questions are captures which don't (or shouldn't) require human approval. And yes I run several Facebook Group for the industry I am involved in, but that is not relevant. And there is no need for IP checking for a homebrewing software forum. Unfortunately I still do not have access to the forum. Maybe I am an undesirable after all . It seems strange that paying for the software is not linked to getting access to the forum.

 

[doogster]

Brad is really good about responding... Don't know if you tried the Beersmith "contact us" page, at Beersmith.com If you have not, I would recommend this approach. There is a form at the bottom of the page. Essentially sends him an email.

 

[day_trippr]

Cripes, it's summertime and Brad could be on a beach with his family for a week.
That's what I'm doing and I have no problem ignoring help requests right now...

Cheers!

 

[Deadalus]

I don't want to start an argument here as brewing is supposed to be fun. The two verification questions are captures which don't (or shouldn't) require human approval. And yes I run several Facebook Group for the industry I am involved in, but that is not relevant. And there is no need for IP checking for a homebrewing software forum. Unfortunately I still do not have access to the forum. Maybe I am an undesirable after all . It seems strange that paying for the software is not linked to getting access to the forum.View attachment 774588

FB Groups is an incredibly simplified version of what's available for forum software, so you're right not relevant. FB handles most of the backend work for you. Spammers and hackers target all kinds of forums. The question fields he uses can be open ended. Setting them up to be simple canned answers defeats their utility. It is just a homebrew software forum though, so you should relax and not be so demanding.

 

[mashpaddled]

Spammers and hackers target all kinds of forums.

If they are manually reviewing new accounts, they probably always have a queue of nonsense with a few legit accounts. A lot of forums get bombarded with dozens to hundreds of new accounts from spammers every day. (The automated software to evade captchas is surprisingly effective.) Some forums don't care and clean up any visible spam as it arises but that's not without its own problems. One of the easiest ways to create backlinks for websites these days is to create forum profiles because most let you include a link on the profile page.

 

[thomer]

If they are manually reviewing new accounts, they probably always have a queue of nonsense with a few legit accounts. A lot of forums get bombarded with dozens to hundreds of new accounts from spammers every day. (The automated software to evade captchas is surprisingly effective.) Some forums don't care and clean up any visible spam as it arises but that's not without its own problems. One of the easiest ways to create backlinks for websites these days is to create forum profiles because most let you include a link on the profile page.

That's why I am surprised they don't link the software account the forum. Would seem sensible. I also sent a contact form to them but didn't get a response, but I can appreciate people are very busy, so I will just wait it out.

It's a shame that some companies don't realise the damage it does to their reputation (not talking about Beersmith here but companies in general) by not responding in a timely manner. There are all sort of automated responses that can be used with forum enquires and contact forms that just says "sorry we cannot reply to you message as we are out at xxxxxxxx conference at the moment, we will get back to you as soon as we can".

I have been a little harsh on Beersmith here and I apologies to them, but it is a big bug bear of mine that a lot of US companies have lost sight of true customer service over the past 20 years. But that's a whole other story....

 

[BeerSmith]

I had some major issues with the old forum software (for which I apologize) including many users being blocked and a series of Denial of Service attacks that made filtering/moderating almost impossible.

It reached a boiling point in the last few weeks, so I completely replaced the BeerSmith forum software, updated everything, made it secure and (hopefully) brought it up to modern standards. In fact the BeerSmith forum is now running the same basic XenForo software that this forum is. There are still some denial of service attacks ongoing, but most are being shunted off within a minute or so of the attack.

So if you have a few minutes, check out the new BeerSmith forum, and drop me a note there.