Help support staff to help you

No matter what type of web hosting you use, at some point you will need to contact support staff. You may need assistance with a technical issue, you may need to know how to do something, or you may need to understand the source of connection problems. Some planning can help you get more out of your support contacts, and help them to assist you better.

First, be polite It shouldn’t be necessary to say that, but I see a lot of impolite and downright aggressive posts in help forums. Support staff did not deliberately target your server or account It’s almost certainly not their fault that you have issues. Treat them properly.

Learn the proper terminology. Often I see help requests, and I have absolutely no idea what the person is writing about. They are unable to accurately describe the issue or even what they’re seeing on screen, because they don’t know the terminology. If you’re asking for help with your web hosting account, you should know what FTP is, what your home directory contains,

If it’s an e-mail problem, do you access your mail via POP or IMAP, and with what software or web mail?

Did you change something just before the problem appeared? Clearly explain what you changed. If there’s an error message, quote it exactly. If the error message appears in the form of a web page, as many web server errors will, you can copy the message text and paste it into a text file. To show support staff exactly what you’re seeing, take a screen shot (a.k.a screen capture).

If you’re referring to a command that you tried then, as with error messages, quote it exactly. Document what steps you took that lead to the issue or error.

Be able to describe your Internet access setup. Is your computer behind a broadband modem alone, or do you use a router? Is it a separate router connected to the modem, or a single device that combines both modem and wireless router functions? If you don’t know, find out.

Are you running any firewall software on your personal computer? For example, Windows Firewall or ZoneAlarm? Have you recently added or updated this software?

Provide ping or traceroute results if asked. If you don’t know how to perform these simple connection tests, learn. Third-party web based tests are also useful, such as Alerta Spot Check and Down for everyone or just me?

Do you use any scripts on your web site, such as CGI or PHP? Did the issues occur right after adding or updating such a script? If the script is not supplied by the web host, explain what it is and where you got it. If you wrote it, explain the purpose and functions used.

There are other questions I could raise and tips I could provide, but I think you see my point. The more logical, clear and thorough you can be in explaining your issue to support staff, the more likely they’ll be able to guide you or their technical staff to a quick resolution. Plus, sometimes just by examining these points and researching the issue, you’ll find the solution yourself.