4 ms·

I've been a bit of a skeptic around that, but recently had an amazing experience with a small motorcycle rental company where we arranged everything over Whatsa

I've been a bit of a skeptic around that, but recently had an amazing experience with a small motorcycle rental company where we arranged everything over Whatsapp. They had a basic website that outlined their general terms and bikes on offer etc, but then actually arranging the booking dropped into WhatsApp which allowed me to outline my specific needs and get a useful steer. Throughout the trip I was able to continue messaging as things came up and it felt more like I was borrowing a bike from a mate than renting one from a business.

SoftTalker 1y ago
At that point I would prefer a phone call. And I don't like unnecessasry phone calls, but protracted discussions over chat is awful.
- collingreen 1y ago
  I see where you're coming from but a text record you can go back and review is very valuable to me in these situations as well.
- dmd 1y ago
  Counterpoint: If I had to talk on the phone with the company instead of using text, I would choose a different company.
  - lostlogin 1y ago
    You prefer the AI slop that pours out?
  - const_cast 1y ago
    Text accomplishes the same thing but spread out over many hours instead of, like, 5 minutes. Phone call + summary email is so much more efficient.
- mnahkies 1y ago
  Phone call was available, but I choose chat in this instance. It wasn't a particularly complex conversation - I outlined my experience, and my doubts from my research and he came back with availability and some direction. I was on holiday with family in a different part of the country whilst arranging it, a few weeks out so there was no real time pressure. Tbh I'm also somewhat adverse to phone calls for no good reason. At a higher level, this small business offered multiple channels and was able to meet me where I wanted to communicate. This is an advantage small business have because the volume is manageable. At larger scale it becomes more tricky to do economically and so you need to focus on self serve journeys (which may include chat bots, etc)
- drewcoo 1y ago
  A text record of what happened isn't just useful for new hires, not just useful for async comms, but for people like me who want to be sure we followed along. Spur-of-the-moment phone calls and meetings (especially camera-on ones with some uncaptured visual elements that the blind can't follow) tend to foul that up. And trigger the autistics who are likely hiding amongst the rest of you. We are legion. Treat us gently and we will likely do all manner of scutwork, refactoring old nasty untouchable code, and pager duty. i love debugging! [Edit to add: Never trust a manager who likes to give directions in impromptu, unrecorded/unrecordable sessions. That means for some reason they want to be off-record. Or don't understand management. Either one of those is trouble.]
  - ElevenLathe 1y ago
    > [Edit to add: Never trust a manager who likes to give directions in impromptu, unrecorded/unrecordable sessions. That means for some reason they want to be off-record. Or don't understand management. Either one of those is trouble.] I'll add "they're functionally illiterate" to the list of reasons managers and other awful-to-work-with people default to "a quick huddle". I have no data but I suspect this is a big reason and will be getting bigger as we start seeing more employees who went to school in the AI era. This is also the real reason managers are so enamored of AI: reading and writing are, to them, the biggest obstacles in a typical day at work. Any machine that can help with this is welcome, and they don't have any experience what precise communication is actually like to understand how poor a replacement it is.
csomar 1y ago
You'd be surprised but in SEA for 1-4 persons small businesses, that's how you do business. There is no website, offers are sent as pictures. Whatsapp is also used for everything else. I had one rental take a photo of the deposit and sending me the picture.
- aitchnyu 1y ago
  I'm Indian and see simple websites can get complicated quickly and nobody can edit a phone number without renewing the contract. So Whatsapp and pictures are the internet enabled stack of choice. Also there is so much lying and repudiation of lies that pics over Whatsapp are the "written statement". Traffic police take photos of haphazardly parked cars, makers share photos of in-progress works etc.

SoftTalker 1y ago

At that point I would prefer a phone call. And I don't like unnecessasry phone calls, but protracted discussions over chat is awful.

collingreen 1y ago
I see where you're coming from but a text record you can go back and review is very valuable to me in these situations as well.
dmd 1y ago
Counterpoint: If I had to talk on the phone with the company instead of using text, I would choose a different company.
- lostlogin 1y ago
  You prefer the AI slop that pours out?
- const_cast 1y ago
  Text accomplishes the same thing but spread out over many hours instead of, like, 5 minutes. Phone call + summary email is so much more efficient.
mnahkies 1y ago
Phone call was available, but I choose chat in this instance. It wasn't a particularly complex conversation - I outlined my experience, and my doubts from my research and he came back with availability and some direction. I was on holiday with family in a different part of the country whilst arranging it, a few weeks out so there was no real time pressure. Tbh I'm also somewhat adverse to phone calls for no good reason. At a higher level, this small business offered multiple channels and was able to meet me where I wanted to communicate. This is an advantage small business have because the volume is manageable. At larger scale it becomes more tricky to do economically and so you need to focus on self serve journeys (which may include chat bots, etc)
drewcoo 1y ago
A text record of what happened isn't just useful for new hires, not just useful for async comms, but for people like me who want to be sure we followed along. Spur-of-the-moment phone calls and meetings (especially camera-on ones with some uncaptured visual elements that the blind can't follow) tend to foul that up. And trigger the autistics who are likely hiding amongst the rest of you. We are legion. Treat us gently and we will likely do all manner of scutwork, refactoring old nasty untouchable code, and pager duty. i love debugging! [Edit to add: Never trust a manager who likes to give directions in impromptu, unrecorded/unrecordable sessions. That means for some reason they want to be off-record. Or don't understand management. Either one of those is trouble.]
- ElevenLathe 1y ago
  > [Edit to add: Never trust a manager who likes to give directions in impromptu, unrecorded/unrecordable sessions. That means for some reason they want to be off-record. Or don't understand management. Either one of those is trouble.] I'll add "they're functionally illiterate" to the list of reasons managers and other awful-to-work-with people default to "a quick huddle". I have no data but I suspect this is a big reason and will be getting bigger as we start seeing more employees who went to school in the AI era. This is also the real reason managers are so enamored of AI: reading and writing are, to them, the biggest obstacles in a typical day at work. Any machine that can help with this is welcome, and they don't have any experience what precise communication is actually like to understand how poor a replacement it is.

csomar 1y ago

You'd be surprised but in SEA for 1-4 persons small businesses, that's how you do business. There is no website, offers are sent as pictures. Whatsapp is also used for everything else. I had one rental take a photo of the deposit and sending me the picture.

aitchnyu 1y ago
I'm Indian and see simple websites can get complicated quickly and nobody can edit a phone number without renewing the contract. So Whatsapp and pictures are the internet enabled stack of choice. Also there is so much lying and repudiation of lies that pics over Whatsapp are the "written statement". Traffic police take photos of haphazardly parked cars, makers share photos of in-progress works etc.