The release of MEX V14.0.3.0

Just as a note, something which has intrigued me for a long time and I just don’t get it.

Companies will do anything for a sale.  Absolutely anything, distributors, huge campaigns, door to door, give-aways, sponsorships.  They will do anything they possibly can to get the sale to happen.

But once they have sold to us, they then really want to ignore us as much as possible.   We try to contact them for help and support, and struggle to even find a phone number to call them on.  If we do have a problem it is not really their problem but ours.  

Many Companies put all their time and effort into making the sale and don’t care about after sales support.  As support and maintenance are just expenses on the balance sheet that is looked upon with scorn by the board members.  “hmmm, how do we get rid of this pesky thing”.  Then the board bundles it up and ships it off shore.

This has happened many times.  And I struggle to really see why!  I thought we as customers were important.
I liken it to getting the greatest minds in the world together to build a spaceship to take us to Mars and then when it is built employing the Joe the local barber to look after it.  

Yes, he is a lovely guy and he can tell a great story, but really spaceships are not his thing.  He can give the astronauts a quick hair cut before take-off but really won’t be able to help with technical issues.

So, ultimately the space ship fails, because of this.

Just like with companies. Customers reach a point where they can no longer stomach the bad service they receive and swap to a competitor, only to find out that they are just as bad as the one we left. 

What about instead Joe does not get the role, but instead these companies invest just as much money in support and service as they do in sales.

I think that the outcome would be different.  Customers would have problems solved and be happier with the service.  In turn, this will then make customers more loyal to the brand and company and will stick with them if it goes a bit squiffy.

Then we might have support and service departments of these big companies that actually enjoy their job and care about what goes on. 

And it is a snowball effect, where things just get better.  Instead of the plain same old rubbish that customers have to bear.

And now, to relate this back to me and my company, MEX.  I have always cared, or done my best to care for my customers, and I think and hope that everyone here has done the same.   Over the last few years we have gotten a bit carried away with making new products.  Made quite a few because we thought we should could, better etc.  Anyway, the outcome is that sometimes our focus is not always perfect. 

And early this year I realised this and have made many changes to what and how we do work here at MEX.  The aim, none too surprising, is that we have gone back to basics with MEX, FleetMEX etc and are working on providing the cleanest possible piece of software to our customers.   We want no bugs, we want things too work perfectly and we want it to do what our customers want it to do.

So, in saying this, this release of MEX Maintenance Software is not done by Joe the Barber, instead it has been done by us; all of us, trainers, designers, sales people, IT people.  Everyone has made sure that this version of our products is the best we have ever released.  Tested, then re tested, and then tested again.  Problems that pop up fixed straight away, if someone has an issue with something then it is re designed until all of us here can walk away with our head held high and happy with the result.

So, please enjoy this version of MEX.  I hope it is great and let me know what you think.

Steve Ninnes