Not liking this forum:
The old forum allowed for input from the entire community NACHI and non NACHI members. This forum has effectively shut out non members. Is it part of a plan to force all HG members to buy into NACHI?
I read most if not all posts to the HG community. The old forum was viewable from within HG desktop (a huge loss), allowing me to at least get a preview of the new discussions. This forum is buried, and unless you know where it is, it cannot be found thru a simple search.
Huh? Buried?
It is listed on the inspection forum page with the rest of them, and easily found.
Yes, HG shut sown their own support board (on their site), who knows why…
Russell has pulled the very helpful support system right out from it’s users.
Dom.
Ah, Dom and Glenford, my two largest voices on the HG message board. Both of you can say just as much here as you could there. The only difference is that I only have to answer once. Dom (from Florida) you helped make the decision for me because after you and me would argue out our positions to the end of conversation, you would come here and start it up again as new. I get tired of chasing the same gripe, or not even a gripe but a genuine support question in more than one location.
Many times an inspector in need would ask a support question on the HG message board and without me knowing would ask it here at INACHI as well. I would answer at the HG message board but was unaware it was asked here on INACHI. Then some INACHI trolls would try to say we didn’t care because we didn’t answer.
We have made a support site in it’s place https://support.homegauge.com/ that we are continually improving. New users many times have the same questions so this way we can perfect our answers to them. HG users can help too if they like and answer the question. If its good we will make it a permanent FAQ and answer.
So I disagree with you Dom. I have improved efficiency for the new user by providing pure support (our support center) and placed the gripes, chat and social here. Nothing is missing.
Our emails, phone support etc. still working too.
Any after hours and weekend help yet? The HG message board /forum was often the only place I could get help the rare instances I needed it on the weekends. I hate to see it go.
I just checked out the new support page. It looks good Russell.
Hi George. We are trying to monitor the “Ask a Question” side at our support center on weekends too. When you ask a question some of us here gets an email notifying us. If we are not climbing a mountain or out of reach we will answer over the weekend if its an after hours emergency. Also, HomeGauge on FaceBook. And of course here. Many HG users here are very helpful to others and go out of their way to help.
https://support.homegauge.com/index.php?action=ask&category_id=0
Thank you Frank.
We are trying to continually improve it and keywords or tags for when someone searches.
I tried the “ask a question” feature… I wouldn’t accept my name, kept returning an error.
Since my name hasn’t changed, and I can’t “ask a question” as to how to use the system, it didn’t work, and I didn’t ask HG the question.
The previous HG support board was a focused place for users to get help from other users.
Dom.
I just tried it with your name and it worked…? you can go see it in the open questions https://support.homegauge.com/index.php?action=open
not sure your error message (you didn’t say) but you can avoid the captcha thingy by going to support from your dashboard and not have to enter it.
I didn’t try it from your dashboard, I just went there and entered it in without logging in.
User to user can happen here as well. also at other associations boards too.
I used the “ask a question”. I got a response within 20 minutes
Russel. Ken Rentz hrere. Do you have to be a Nachi member to be able to view the Home gauge forum. If so that seems unfair. Maybe there should be a link on the software start up page to the Nachi Homegauge forum. In your July update you told us new things were coming. I did not see any information about the forums being removed. Would have been nice to know or did I miss something. Thought my software was broken. Also I need to email you to find out what happened. I do get your point about having to answer questions twice. Would be a pain.
We gave notice at least twice in our past news alerts: https://www.homegauge.com/inspector/shgi/newsalerts/newsalert-may15.html
It would be good to not require membership to INACHI to get to the HG Forums but this is not really a “replacement” of HG message board. It’s an added benefit from Nick and INACHI to host a forum for us. ASHI or other associations could add one for us too if they like. Or Inspectors from that association can post a question on their forum about HG anytime and users from that association can answer. InterNACHI has always been open to new and innovative ideas and trends. I think the trend is give social to the social sites like facebook and InterNACHI. HG software and HG Services will focus on pure support like our support center, direct calls, email.
I participate here myself because Nick and InterNACHI enables me too.
There used to be a totals on the dashboard. Is that still somewhere? I liked to keep track…
We have added the totals back into the dashboard. You will find them underneath “Search Reports”.
Russell, based on your answer, you would make a great politician. The plain and simple answer to Kenneth’s question would be “Yes, you must be an INACHI member to participate in this forum.”
You stated that this forum “is not a replacement of the HG Message Board”. However, it is not only a replacement, but the only replacement because the old HG Message Board no longer exists. Since INACHI membership is required to participate in this forum, it now leaves many users with 2 options: 1. pay $$$ to join INACHI for the “privilege” of participating in this forum. 2. contact HG directly with all questions/problems, which certainly increases your work load. I’m sure many users have gotten answers to their questions from the HG Message Board without having to bother anyone at HG. That certainly seems beneficial to everyone…
BTW, before you beat me down for implying that the only benefit to joining INACHI is participating in the HG forum, I’m NOT implying that. I am a member and do appreciate and benefit from all the things therein. I’m just saying that there are those that are not willing to pay the INACHI $$$ membership dues to read the HG forum.
Which brings up another question: Most of the INACHI forums are free to view without membership. Yet, the Vendor Forums are not. Seems odd to me… especially since HG seems to be the only vendor in the forum.
Gary my quote above I thought explained it well. ASHI hasn’t set anything up for us. That might make INACHI the only HG message board in town, but I haven’t been offered anything by ASHI. Does that make it unfair? Maybe to an ASHI member. But it certainly isn’t our fault. We sell software, HG Services and provide great support. Those are our goals. Not chasing down the same comment or question on more than one board. Or answering it on our board but failing to know it was asked at a different site like here. Here, I answer once. Now that is efficient. Chat, gripes and fraternity can happen here.
Support questions many times are the same only asked by a different person. Now it can happen here https://support.homegauge.com/ If someone asks a question at the support site, I get an email. Users can call in or email us directly. We can perfect the answers to the questions and spend less time answering the same ones over again.
Meant to add that I didn’t set up the HG Forum on InterNACHI. I didn’t argue for or against the HG Forum being on the member side. One thought for marketing could be that members only could drive more HG users to become InterNACHI members. The other side to that would be that by making it available without membership could get more traffic from inspectors who have not yet joined InterNACHI. Both have good points but I am not participating in that decision.
I am just grateful that Nick and InterNACHI see the trend that vendors should focus on their product and support and let the chat and social happen at the larger sites like FaceBook and InterNACHI.
I really miss the old message board. I could go there and often find answers to problems or questions that I had. It was grouped so that I could look at the section that my question or issue was related to, ie, companion or the desktop version. It also contained questions and responses from all HG users, not just those from NACHI.
I understand Russell’s point about having multiple boards but I think it was a mistake to get rid of it.