Warning - Horrible Customer Service Experiences.

Before I get into this tirade I'll preface it with the fact that BitDefender itself is a good security product. I've been a paying customer for a couple years and own several licenses, and additionally have recommended / assisted several family members, friends, and clients with the purchase and install of BitDefender and I help manage at least 12 licenses now. BD is a solid security product that provides excellent protection. I'm a 45 year old man with a 20 year career as a web server administrator, which puts me in the position of frequently helping people with advice and assistance with their PC security needs. After many years of recommending / installing AVG for them, about two years ago I began recommending and and assisting with the install of BitDefender for certain friends / clients as a stronger alternative.

So now that you have some solid background and clarification as to my credibility and some positive words from me about the product; it's time to address the negative aspect of BD...

The BIG PROBLEM is with your customer service regarding purchases and license renewals, and the "tactics" implemented therein.

Here is just one recent example:

On July 20th I assisted my 76 year old mother with her free update from BD Antivirus Plus 2013 to Antivirus Plus 2014 and during the process the BD application offered a $29.95 one-year renewal offer via direct pop-up from the application, and we decided to take the offer. We clicked the renewal pop-up in BD Antivirus Plus and made the purchase, and received a new key instantly.

However, upon trying to active the new key BD Antivirus Plus displayed a message that the key was "not valid for this product". We were given a BD Total Security Key instead of the Antivirus Plus key. For some unknown reason, even though we made the purchase directly from the BD pop-up offer in her Antivirus Plus, BD's system assigned the renewal to be for Total Security instead of Antivirus Plus. (And to be clear - it was definitely a RENEWAL offer for her Antivirus Plus, NOT and "upgrade" or "change product" offer).

We immediately called the BD support phone number and from there it went downhill quickly.

When we explained the situation above to the BD support agent on the phone and requested a correct key for Antivirus Plus, he told us that he could not provide that and he would need to refer us to the "appropriate department". We asked to speak to the "appropriate department" immediately and he told us that is not possible, and that we are not allowed to speak to the "appropriate department" on the phone. He said he would need to create an internal ticket and that we would be contacted in a few days.

We told him that was not acceptable and demanded the corporate phone number. His response to that was; and I quote - "I can give you the corporate number but calling them would be useless".

At that point we demanded an immediate refund, but received the same response - that he could not provide a refund either (in addition to not being able to provide us a correct key to activate the renewal license), and that he would escalate a ticket with our refund request to the "appropriate department" and that we would hear back from them only in email in a couple days.

As you can imagine, that whole scenario created stress and anger on our part. However we agreed upon the refund and accepted the (ridiculous) fact that we would have to wait a couple days for an email confirming the refund.

That was on July 20th.

Finally 2 days later...

On July 22nd she received an email from an agent in the "appropriate department" stating this - "I have taken note of your refund request, and I would first like to offer our

assistance in regards to this matter" and that " it would not be a problem to change your current product with the inferior one, for no additional costs".

So basically instead of just honoring the refund that we demanded on July 20th, on July 22nd BD offered to provide us with the correct key and asked us to respond once again.

She (my mother) responded the same day, July 22nd, stating - "Send me the correct license key for a 1 year renewal of my Antivirus Plus application *today* " and "if you cannot do that then just do the requested refund".

Pretty simple, right?

Not so...

On July 23rd (today) she received a reply from the "appropriate department" stating (among other things) this:

"upon further checking your account, I noticed that you currently have an Antivirus Plus which is due to expire this October. My recommendation is the following: since you already paid for a renewal (29.95),

I could extend your current subscription with one year (corresponding to this renewal). Plus, I will also offer you the installation steps for the New Bitdefender (the 2014 version of Antivirus). "

Does anyone else here see the CIRCLE-JERK pattern forming here??

FIRST of all - She is already updated to Antivirus Plus 2014 (free update since she had current licenses), and all she did was click the Renewal pop-up directly from her BD Antivirus Plus application.

SECOND - We asked for the corrected license key over the phone on July 20th and when they would not provide it we demanded a refund on July 20th. The agent confirmed over the phone and via email that he escalated that request on July 20th!

THIRD - When she responded to them yesterday and made it clear that she wanted the renewal activation immediately and if they could not do that then honor the refund request, so WHY yet another email today still dragging this out and offering her "choices".

FOURTH - If "Sales" is responsible for handling these license issues, why is it that even after taking a customer's money the customer is not allowed to speak to sales?

Bottom line - although the BitDefender product itself is good, dealing with their customer service is an absolute nightmare and will drain the life out of you as you spend days going back in forth in redundant emails, not allowed to handle a simple situation over the phone with the "appropriate department".

My mother has responded to their email this morning letting them know that if this is not resolved today she will be filing a chargeback with her bank.

All of this could have been easily avoided and the really sad thing is that this is not the first time I've seen this happen first-hand, and just recently one of my clients whom I recommended BitDefender to went through a similar scenario and took a refund and switched to Microsoft Security Essentials just because of the sheer hassle. But don't just take my word for it - a simple search of these forums show plenty of other consumers going through the same kinds of hassles with BD customer service.

After almost 2 years of recommending BD to friends/clients/family, I am no longer recommending it. It's not worth the time and hassle of helping them deal with this sort of repeat scenario. This product is supposed to provide solutions and security for people - not force them to spend a ton of time just trying to get what they paid for and dealing with extremely bad customer care practices.

BitDefender - wake up and smell the sales you are losing due to poor customer care.

I am not sure why you were unhappy with the upgrade to BD Total Security for one year for just $29.95. The current one year license for BD Total Security for one computer is $79.95. BD Total Security is considered their top of the line product. As far as not seeing the word "upgrade" in the pop-up, lets just say you wouldn't be the first person who might have improperly read a UI, pop-up or otherwise.

In your defense I guess BD could have done a better job in complying with your request for a downgrade in product and probably for more money at that.

Well stated, Dave. You're dealing from real world scenarios with many clients, where I'm "sheltered" in a forum. I also appreciate that you started your post with commending the product, if someone was going to speak their mind, I think you did it in getting your point across thoughtfully and measured...with "just the facts, just the facts" (Hawaii Five-0) kudos, friend.

edit:sp

...... let alone these two examples of excellent service:

I am interested to know the % of such excellent services here on the forum.

@ AnotherDave:

I'm sorry you had to deal with this situation, I understand the frustration it can cause.

All the phone calls taken by the customer support representatives are registered, so please post back your ticket ID created upon the call. We want to listen to it and take immediate action.

Rest assured your request will be honored. Thank you so much for your valuable feedback, it is greatly appreciated!

On topic - Update - DAY 4 - just the facts:

Yesterday (July 23rd) we responded to the redundant emails from the "appropriate department" (which is actually thew "sales department" which you are not allowed to speak to on the phone as a paying customer) as noted in my previous post, requesting that they either provide the correct activation key or a refund, and as of today (July 24th) they have not responded.

Also yesterday (July 23rd) I called two specific customer support phone numbers as listed at http://www.bitdefender.com/support/consumer-phone.html with the following results:

- Upon calling (+1) 954 928 2780 we received the typical automated voice message and selected the proper option in the phone menu, only to then hear dead-silence as we waited on hold, and within 5 minutes the line went dead with a repeated fast "busy signal". (In other words, the call was abandoned to abyss and disconnected).

- After making my replies here in this thread and getting dead-ended at the (+1) 954 928 2780 number, I decided to try calling the "Enterprise" number at (+1) 954 928 2794 and IMMEDIATELY someone picked up.

I then explained our entire situation to the BD agent at (+1) 954 928 2794 and he repeatedly told me that he could not assist us because we have a "consumer" product and that we would need to call (+1) 954 928 2780 , while I repeatedly explained to him that we could not get anyone on the line / could not make any progress with them.

The agent at (+1) 954 928 2794 was polite and professional, but clearly could not help us and would only offer this, and I quote:

"This is the Enterprise support department and I can only transfer you to my colleagues at the consumer line at (+1) 954 928 2794 "

When I explained to him that we couldn't get anywhere with consumer support, he asked for and listened to the ENTIRE details of this situation and then told me that I would need to call the consumer support line at (+1) 954 928 2794 and then asked me to please hold so that he could transfer me to that department.

I explained to him that we had already been in correspondence with the "department" and that we already have a ticket open and already had email exchanges with the "sales" department in great detail, and that the email correspondence was just running us in a circle, and that I wanted to speak to sales directly.

He then said:

"You cannot speak to sales department directly because recently we have receive a lot of spam calls to them, and so you can only speak to my colleagues at consumer support department".

I then questioned his statement about "recently" and informed him that it's been 2 years of not being able to call the sales department directly.

He then back-peddled and changed his statement to "yes, just in the past year we have stopped calls to sales department".

At that point I knew we were at a stalemate, and I relented to allowing him to transfer us to the "consumer support" department.

After a long hold time the Enterprise support agent came back on the line and said:

"I'm sorry but cannot transfer your call to the right department because they are all busy."

I thanked him for his time and asked him for suggestions on how to best resolve this, and he stated:

"Try calling them maybe in a few minutes or hours, and give them a new ticket with all of the details about this".

I immediately blurted out to him that we had already explained everything to the consumer support department on the phone in great detail, and that we already have an open ticket number, and that we've been going in circles with the "sales" department in email for a few days, and that all of the entire details have already been provided.

But alas, he admitted that there was nothing he could do for us and that even calling the consumer support line would be useless, and that the only way to achieve resolution would be through emails (which we have been doing for 4 days now).

He wanted me to recount the details of the problem and I told him this:

"It's this simple - we have Antivirus Plus and we clicked the RENEWAL link and paid for it, and we were given a Total Security key instead and it will not work for our product. All we have wanted was either a refund or the proper activation of our Antivirus Plus renewal"

It doesn't get any more simple than that.

But still he said the only way we can receive help is to call the consumer support line and get help in email from sales. (though we have already done all of that)

So I relented and finished the call with him and immediately called the consumer support line AGAIN at (+1) 954 928 2794 and guess what happens?

You guessed it! We get the recorded message and then it tells to select the option (1 for registrations, example) and no matter which option we choose, it goes to dead-silence and nobody picks up, then within 5 minutes it gives a fast busy signal / disconnected call.

This cycle repeats over and over and over.

As I type this update, we have put together the proper documentation for filing the dispute / chargeback with our bank.

It's incredibly sad that one of the the very things we all expect this product to help protect us from (bogus charges for run-around online ######) is exactly what we are being put through.

I'm at the point where I will take free AVG or free MSE with less strength, rather than wasting my days playing games with BD "consumer support" and getting a perpetual run-around.

I'm actually sitting here shaking my head in disbelief right now. I cannot believe that I'm sitting here considering converting all of my systems and my customers systems to a less powerful free product, which in the end provides better stability and support than this paid product.

I'm sorry to come across as derogatory, but BitDefender at this point looks idiotic, untrustworthy, lazy, and borderline scam.

I am using the trial version of BitDefender Internet Security and happened across this forum topic. Curious whether or not the customer support will be what I would expect and worried regarding the circumstances described here I called the number mentioned above ( (+1) 954 928 2794). I first got a recording that did not ask me to choose a number but to simply hold on. After about half a minute I was speaking with a polite human. I explained I was just checking to see if I could get through etc. and we concluded the call. Don't know if I had a real problem that all would go swimmingly but at least got to talk with someone. I have already bought the license for the new BitDefender Internet Security 2014 at a real bargain ($24.95) for up to 3 PC's. So I guess I will go ahead and register and see how it goes for the next year. I am switching from Vipre due to cost and the latest high ratings given to BitDefender.