Ordinary Nothing

[Update: There has been some changes on this Yahoo! issue. I'll keep tracking it]

Among my various email addresses, I also have an account at Yahoo!. Overall quite good as far as webmail interfaces go, nice mailbox size, and certainly more than worth every penny I pay for it (which is 0 for the free account, but still).
And they have this unbelievable customer support service. Literally. Had several past interactions with them in the past, and I still can’t believe it.
The latest and newest experience has been so amazing, that I figured I just have to share.

To start with, I had a problem. I sent myself a message, from my own Yahoo account, through Yahoo!’s web interface, to the selfsame yahoo address. Just emailed myself a URL to look at later, so the body contained nothing but the URL, and the subject was short.
The message arrived at my Bulk mail folder, and not to my inbox. Personally I believe messages I send to myself should not be spam, but in any case they clearly state that messages sent from someone at the address book will never be tagged as spam. Well, my Yahoo! mail address is IN my address book. So certainly there’s a problem there. When I entered the message, it even offered a link to the AB entry.

There isn’t a direct "email our tech support" link on the site. What they have is this help system containing a hierarchy of subjects and questions, with prepared answers and info about the system. Makes sense, and does contain all the basic explanations. No complaints from me here up to this point. If you want something beyond that, each item has at the end a Was this information enough? sort of question at the bottom, with Yes and No buttons. Press "NO", and you go to a page where you can fill a form with your question, which will be directed to customer support. Just what I wanted.

Ahem. Problem one. All these "No" buttons under subjects relating to spam send you to a form used to complain about a spam message that got to your inbox. Not quite relevant. Actually, if you go to the question of What do I do if I receive solicited mail in my bulk mail folder?, and answer Is this enough information? with "No", you’ll get to a page letting you report a spam message. Highly relevant indeed.

So I decided to get smart, and went to the AB section, to a topic with a text telling me that messages from people in my AB will not be directed to the Bulk folder. Right.
Pressed the nice "No" button, and reported the following (email address posted here is not the real one I used):

I’ve recently sent an email message to myself (ment as a short note), that arrived to the bulk mail folder.

The message was sent through the yahoo web interface, from this yahoo account I’m using (me@yahoo.com), to the exact same account, and selected by the autocomplete feature.

The address was of course correct, since the message did arrive.

The address is in the address book, and once I moved the message from the Bulk folder to the Inbox folder, it showed the rolodex icon.

Yet despite the sender being:
A. Me, same address as the recipient.
B. In my (the recipient) address book.
C. Obviously not spoofed since the mesasge was sent through the Yahoo web interface.
it was still directed to the Bulk folder.

Please check your spam detection method, since B is officially stated as a way to make sure messages won’t be tagged as spam, and it makes a lot of sense for A+B to serve a similar purpose.

Should be clear enough, I think. Enough info to get the main points. At least IMHO.
Well… Not quite. Got a lovely email in return, which I won’t entirely quote due to size limitation. The email consisted of several texts copied nearly verbatim from the help system (The same one that didn’t help me). Best parts were:

If you believe a message that has been delivered to your Bulk Mail Folder is more appropriately delivered to your Inbox, please open the message, and click the "Not spam" button.
By sending examples of "spam" and messages you feel are "not spam" to Yahoo! for review, it will  increase the effectiveness of SpamGuard, Yahoo! Mail’s filtering system. Yahoo! will use the messages you send to constantly improve the SpamGuard technology.

If you demand even greater Spam prevention [...]

The rolodex icon appears next to messages that are from people in your Yahoo! Address Book. This feature allows you to quickly identify messages that you wish to receive. Messages from your contacts will always be delivered to your Inbox, unless you set up a filter to deliver it elsewhere. 

So I can send them my message for review, and let them or their system decide if they want to recognize myself, or a random link I send myself, as not spam.
And I got long explanation about how to get better spam protection, since let’s face it, my problam was exactly getting too much spam…. Or not.
And the best thing, I don’t really have this problem, since message from people in my AB will always be delivered to my inbox.

Seems that an automated process parsed my message, found words it liked, and sent the appropriate texts that I already said didn’t help me.
Cool. Can it get any better than that?
[Dramatic pause]
Sure it can. In the meantime, as a side note, message was signed by Clarence. Nice to know a person gave his name to this mild drivel.

Well, I’m not the one to be deterred by being ignored once. So on I go, pretending for the moment that maybe Clarence is actually a person, and can understand English, despite evidance to the contrary.

Thank you for automatically replying to me with standard stock texts without actually bothering to read what I asked about.

The text you quote here however is demonstratebly incorrect / false / erronous / etc…

A message from someone IN MY ADRESSESBOOK, next to which the rolodex icon DID SHOW, was delivered NOT to my inbox, but rather to the BULK folder.
This is in strict contrast to your statement that "Messages from your contacts will always be delivered
to your Inbox".
This is why I asked that you check the work of your filters.
It does not work as it should be.

I find the fact that the same contact (which is IN MY ADDRESSBOOK) is actually me, using the exact same Yahoo email address, to be more bothersome, but there’s nothing about that in your stock texts, so I won’t bother to comment on it again.

I do not need to send to your spam review messages sent by me, by someone in my addressbook. These should go to the inbox, regardless of content. Always.

Additionally, on a different matter, don’t quote these stock texts to people. The texts are already published on your help site. I read through the text before being able to get to the form used to sent this
message, and obviously it wasn’t relevant or helpful, so why give it back again?

Yes, yes, I’m a nice, kind and polite person. Always has been.
On my defence, as I already written, this is not exactly my first time trying to get something out of their customer support. The last times however were a "How can I…" and a "Can I…" questions, so I gave up once I got the answer is no.

Anyway, I got a reply right back.
Again, edited for highlights:

Filters automatically sort your incoming messages into the folders of your choice, according to rules that you set up. [... tons of info about setting up filters/rules, copied from the pages in help system, of course ...]

Yahoo! Mail automatically blocks unsolicited email (commonly known as "spam") from known bulk emailers. This service doesn’t guarantee that we can catch all unsolicited email, but we’ll sure try.

Are they trying to say the message got to my Bulk folder because I set a filter directing it there?
‘Cause I didn’t. I even double checked, just to be on the safe side (and avoid slander lawsuits).
Or are they saying I need to set a filter directing messages from myself to go to my Inbox, depsite myself being in the AB? Doesn’t make that much sense either.

And it’s really great at this point to know that maybe they believe the problem to be that my email address is a known bulk emailer. Yep, this must be it. What I should do is not complain that my message got to the Bulk folder, but that they let a bulk emailer use their services freely without terminating my account for breach of the terms of service… On second thought, this didn’t strike me as too sensible either.

So are we dealing with an automated system, or with outsourcing to persons that don’t speak English but can recognize key words and copy texts?
This new message, BTW, was signed by a different "person", called Lewis, so either they don’t believe in letting one person stay on an open issue, or I got higher up the hierarchy. Riiight.

Well, a close look at the message headers reveals at least two interesting things:

• Received: from seanymph.cc.kana.corp.yahoo.com (seanymph.cc.kana.corp.yahoo.com [207.126.228.30]) …
• X-Mailer: KANA Response 7.0.1.116

Aha!
Who or what is Kana, then? Well, a quick search found a Kana site, that seemed close enough to the spot to be it, and to stop looking for more. If there’s more than one Kana doing the same things, I think they should start suing each other for trademark infringement or something.

A long PR Flash animation on the homepage, letting you know how much they can save you by automating customer service and provide knowledge base management. Then there is the KANA email response management page. Which goes (bold is mine):

KANA email response management delivers the proven solution to the email crisis. An extensive array of tools automates the handling of high volume email, Web form and chat, helping contact centers significantly reduce manual handling and response times. Uniquely, KANA blends email management with customer self-service to simultaneously maximize contact center efficiency and deliver a consistent, integrated inquiry resolution experience that increases everyone’s satisfaction.

E-Mail Response Management Highlights

Automated E-mail Management — Productivity tools minimize costly manual handling, reduce agent workload and increase the consistency and accuracy of response.

    * Automatically route messages to work queues, priority queues and department queues.
    * Automatically respond to or acknowledge emails.
    * Set up email management by department to reflect each department’s specific processes.
    * Escalate complex inquires to contact center case status with the click of a button.
    * Run real-time reports and use service analytics to identify ways to improve contact center operations.

Self Service Integration — With links to solutions in the knowledgebase included in e-mail responses, customers can resolve inquiries on their own, increasing their satisfaction while reducing the need for costly agent assistance.

    * Include links to specific articles in auto-acknowledgements and auto-responses.
    * Automatically close and remove cases resolved through self-service.
    * Allow customers to escalate unresolved inquiries to agents with the click of a button.

Seems like what I was getting, alright. Except that I didn’t get the ability to escalate unresolved inquiries to agents with the click of a button anywhere. Darn. Nor did I feal much accuracy. Lot’s of automated responses and text from the knowledge base, though. Half-truths in advertising? Shocking. How could I completly and totally trust another PR text ever again?!

But there may be a way to progress. I just need to push in words that may trigger the system to realizing that the customer is not happy and the problem is not resolved. Assuming Yahoo! actually bought the get-this-to-a-real-person-eventually module. Not such an obvious assumption, I’ll grant you.
Time to get mean. I was too kind and polite so far. I have proof.

Dear automatic Kana bot,
Could you please, just so I’d know where I’m standing on this, either:
A. Pass this to a real live actual person who will actually read what my problem was and answer
relevantly about the subject.
B. Just tell me that no one will ever bother to actaully read my message so I should give up and stop trying to get an answer.

Simple, short, elegant, and contain words like Kana, Bot, real, live, person, relevantly, bother, tell me, no one. Something have to get a hit. Well, in a sense, something did…

We are concerned about this problem that you experienced. If you continue to have problems with this issue, we would like to investigate in further detail.

For us to look into the problem you have encountered, it will be necessary for Yahoo! staff to enter your account and conduct some tests.
Please reply to this message, giving Yahoo! permission to enter your Yahoo! Mail account and take those steps necessary to pinpoint the cause of this problem and explore possible solutions.

If the problem you’re reporting is with a specific message or messages, please let us know the exact name that appears in the "Sender" column, the exact "Subject" of the message, and the exact folder the message(s) is/are located in.

Signed by Herbert in case you were wondering.
Now, asking me to give them the exact sender name is pointless, since they got it on my first message from my account name and sender name on the emails I send them. Apart from that, maybe finally someone want to check the issue.
That’s good.

Them getting into my mailbox with my permission, not so good. Of course they are technically capable of doing this without asking me, but they shouldn’t. And the problem is general and not with my accout, so there’s no reason for them to do this.

What I can do in order to be nice, is to provide more details about what exactly causes the problem.
So I went testing.
Turns out that the problem happens whenever the body of an email message, sent from a Yahoo! mail account (yep, sending the same message to Yahoo from a Hotmail address, for example, gets the message to the Inbox.), in which the body consists of a URL to anything under GeoCities, will get the message to the bulk folder.
I go to compose a message from the web intefrace, put whatever I want on the subject line, then put on the body one line with "http://www.geocities.com/whatever/", in which whatever can be about anything, and there can be anything under it ("http://www.geocities.com/whatever/there/is/here.html"). And send it to myself, picking myself out of the AB.
Wham. Message goes to the Bulk folder.
Maybe Yahoo have something against GeoCities. It must be run by a competitor company that they really hate, and used exclusively to send spam messages. Right? Right?
Could have been a marvelous idea. Except for the minor fact that Yahoo! owns GeoCities, it’s a Yahoo! site. Has been for years.
Oh, heck, there are days when I hate myself. I suppose a web services company can hate itself as well. No laws against that, AFAIK.

So let’s just let them know. By now I must be flagged to get to a real person (Is Herbert for real?), but just in case let’s make sure that the automated system doesn’t tell them to go search in my account. Have to be carefull with something too automated to even be considered as bright as a dumb moron.

NO. The problem is general, and NOT just with my account, so there is NO justification for you to see any of my mail or enter my account.

To make it clear: You do not have my permission to enter my account.

I can however provide you with enough details to reproduce the problem on any other account you want:

1. Compose a new message from Yahoo web interface.
2. make sure the body contains only a link of the form http://www.geocities.com/whatever/
3. As far as I can see, you can replace "whatever" with anything, and add any subdirectories or html
pages after it inside the link.
4. Write anything you want on the "Subject" field.
5. Send the message to a Yahoo recipient.

That’s it. The message gets inside the bulk folder of the recipient, even if the sender is in the address book.

Why do you have anything that filters messages with a higher priority than checking the AB for approved
senders is beyond me.
Certainly I don’t know why the need to block anything pointing to a geocities site, considering the owner…

But that’s it.

In my case, I sent the message from myself to myself, using this account, so I suppose (after I wrote that a few times already) you can get the exact "Sender" name used, without asking me for it…

Can’t get any more obvious than that. Can’t. Crystal clear. They just HAVE to get it now. Right? Right? Please?

And I got a response. One I didn’t quite expect, though I suppose I should have.

You can move the message back to your Inbox by doing the following:
1. Log into your Yahoo! Mail Account
2. Go to your "Trash" folder by clicking on the "Trash" link
[...]
Also, when marking the message as spam you may have inadvertently chosen to block the sender’s address.  We recommend checking this option and removing the sender’s email address from the "Blocked Addresses" list to be able to receive email messages from that particular sender in future.
[...]
To remove ("unblock") an address or domain from the list, do the following:
[...]
We hope this information helps you complete your request. If not, please reply to this email and we will be happy to assist you further.

Signed by non other then Russell himself. Yep, another brand new name.
And here I was expecting someone may read my problem, or pay a bit of attention. It felt so close… So close…

They did ask to let them know if by some unforeseen way they did not manage to quite help me complete my request. Would only be polite to let them know.

Hello,
Not only did this did not help, but it completly ignores my actual problem and the information I sent to you about it.

There. Take that.
I’m getting tired of this. Broken and beaten. Very close to letting the matter lie in quiet and stop bothering the tech support staff computers.

I did get a reply, though.

We appreciate you following up with us and sincerely apologize for any inconvenience.

Please note that, our intent is to send solicited emails (those bulk messages you have requested) to your Inbox; however, we may occasionally send these messages to your Bulk Mail folder.

If this occurs, you can click on the "Not Spam" button, located in every message.  By sending examples of spam to Yahoo! for review, it will increase the effectiveness of Spamguard, Yahoo! Mail’s filtering system.
Yahoo! will use the messages you send to constantly improve the Spamguard technology.

Again, we apologize for any inconvenience caused to you and appreciate your patience and understanding.

This time sent by Tony. Welcome to the growing Yahoo! Customer Support team, Tony. I wonder if the name are chosen at random, or if they have a list and are purposefully trying to pick a new name every time.

Again they managed to miss the actual problem and events, though they did get the very general gist of a message going to the Bulk folder erronously.

They apologized however, and are sorry that they can’t help me. Would have warmed my heart if an actual person sent it or meant it (You know, at least it means someone tried).

I think that at least with that I can pretend that it’s not me giving up, but them. I beat them. They can’t help me, and have admitted it. Hurray for me!
Eh… wait… I still have a problem that wasn’t solved, and nobody knows about it…

Sigh.

October 2nd, 2004 at 18:22 EET | Categories: Web | Track comments. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.