At BoxAid we get hundreds of phone calls per day about virus removal help and usually our customers have taken the time to explore the BoxAid website before they give us a call. This means taking a look at our service rates page and seeing how much our fees are. When you give us a call we initially start with a few questions about your problem to make sure we can potentially resolve it. We ask you things like “can you connect to the Internet, are you getting popups?” etc. Sometimes our customers have a basic problem that only takes a few minutes to resolve. In this case we will often not charge our customers anything, leaving them extremely happy and of course referring our service to all their friends.
But sometimes it’s clearly a complex problem like a virus that usually requires at least 90 minutes of work, research and manual repair by one of our technicians. We of course make it clear to the customer that based on our analysis that there will be a cost involved. We always get someone who is shocked by this fact at least a few times per day. Inevidibly we get the response “What?! I thought this service was free?”
The reality, is that the Internet has changed the way we receive services. When we are on the internet we assume everything is free with the exception of tangible items, like an iPod, a purse, or a new laptop. These items always have a cost associated with them. But items like entertainment, searching, media, software and certain services have had their cost slowly removed since the Internet became popular. Often we download movies, music, software, games, and other data with no cost associated with them. Many times we are doing it illegally but we don’t think about it because it just doesn’t feel like stealing. When you use bittorrent or P2P software to download the Kanye West album, it feels like it’s routine, it doesn’t feel like stealing at all. There is no chance of the cops knocking on your door and arresting you. But if you went to Walmart and took the Kanye West CD without paying for it, I can assure you that the cops will be walking you away to that back room in WalMart outside the employee break room. So why is one OK but not the other? It’s how we have been trained over the years. Sure I don’t think Kanye West should be making 20 million a year for his mundane lyrics and recycled music hooks but if we walk away humming “she take my money when i’m in need, yea shes a triflin friend indeed, oh she’s a gold digger way over me” then we owe Kanye $13 (or at least $1.29 on iTunes).
But I digress, the point is, at BoxAid our service is not free when we work hard to remove a virus from your PC. You don’t take your car to the mechanic for an oil change and then he asks for $25 and you say “What?! I thought you did oil changes for free!?!” You would never do that for a service that is tangible where you have to meet the person who is doing the work. Yes there are ways to get your PC fixed for free on the Internet but they involve extensive work on your part of doing research, submitting logs, etc. You have to be fairly technical and there is nothing wrong with doing your own work. There’s great satisfaction in that and we will not take that away from you. If you would like to use our PC virus removal service then give us a call at 866.999.3578 where you can listen to Kanye while you are on hold 
Some our favorite Free PC support site are:
http://forums.majorgeeks.com
http://forums.techguy.org
http://www.computerhope.com/
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/
About George Dover
George Dover is one of the Microsoft Certified Technicians that works at BoxAid.com. He is the primary blog contributor and has helped thousands of customers calling into BoxAid on a daily basis. Connect with me on Google+
Mail | More Posts (27)
Great Read. Simple and straight to the point.