Please provide a Interspire review by giving it an overall rating of 1 thru 5 stars. Please take into consideration factors such as their good or bad customer service, price/value, the deals that could be had with discounts, coupons and promotions, and the quality/effectiveness of the product(s)/service(s) offered. In addition please feel free to submit a review using the form to the right and share with everyone about your experiences with Interspire (don't click on the star rating before you submit the review!) Are you an unhappy costumer? Do you think you have been been scammed by Interspire? You can even write a Interspire complaint or post a warning about Interspire here. Do you have an issue or comments regarding Interspire's service or product safety? Or are you a very satisfied client who wants to tell everyone about the great products & services offered? Please share your feedback- it's quick and easy!
User-Submitted Reviews of Interspire and Testimonials [No reviews or comments from the same IP address was found.]
Comment ID
The customer service is very bad. It has ruined what I thought could have been a great business. I changed from a system that I was paying for on a monthly basis to the Interspire system to have control over my own business. Because of their lack of support and timely replies (and my lack of research before buying this product) I'm up poo creek without a paddle. I even rang and left a message that I was interested in purchasing a product, just so i could talk to someone. Needless to say, they never rang me back.
Posted by Linqkster on Monday, January 25, 2010
1/5
52400
Interspire, Big Commerce, and whatever they want to call themselves! They take forever to give a answer to any question, up to 3 days. Then it's never the correct answer, then if you want to ask them about the answer, you need to put in a new ticket. So you can wait another 3 days to get an answer.
And that only if your still paying for it over the 3 month time frame. Once you've paid, NO MORE answers... for you.
And then they want to sell you an upgrade, when you only had the software for 3 months!!!!!!
Stay away form Interspire!!!!! Interspire will not help you!
Posted by No More! on Friday, January 22, 2010
52010
customer service is rubbish and they have become money grabbers. Going by past experience I made a purchase and it's like I am dealing with a different company. I waited 3 days for a response to service request, when I gave up through frustration and requested a refund, was told no, refer to terms, no matter what I said, the wall was there and that was the terms that I was meant to have read thoroughly.
It was suggested I should have taken a trial, however when you access bigcommerce via interspire you don't ge this option. I have spent a week trying to explain my case, all to no avail, this company is now officially rubbish.
I won't be dealing with them again, or recommending their products to any of my clients, buyer beware!
Posted by LyonKing on Monday, January 4, 2010
1/5
49700
Customer service at Interspire is terrible. You'll spend more money in wasting your time then the products are worth. Expect to have issues and if you're using Email Marketer (re-selling to your clients), expect to create mad clients after realizing you'll need Interspire customer support, which is extremely inconsistent and takes forever to get help.
Posted by Optimistic on Wednesday, November 18, 2009
1/5
44310
Web Publisher has been a nightmare and the customer service is as sorry as it gets. EdNews.org
Posted by JimmyKilpatrick@EdNews.org on Wednesday, November 4, 2009
42790
After many, many complaints, they now changed their upgrade and maintance policies. I suppose they finally realized that they could be without any customers very soon..
Posted by Dragan on Tuesday, September 22, 2009
38680
US support is/was no help at all as they always said that custom features and support are handled in Australia or fill out a support ticket as we do not have phone support. days would go by with no reply to emails and phone messages. Many others have mentioned that there is no sense of direction in where the software is going in the future and is hard to take their word for what they claim today to be true.
I should add that customer support IS ABSOLUTELY DISMAL, UNRELIABLE, AND HAVE TAKEN OFTEN A FULL WEEK TO GET BACK TO YOU REGARDING AN ISSUE THAT DIRECTLY AFFECTS THE FUNCTIONALITY OF YOUR WEB STORE MAKING YOU LOSE BUSINESS. UPDATE POLICY IS THEFT WHICH IS INLINE WITH THE REST OF THEIR BUSINESS PRACTICES. IF YOU CAN GO ELSEWHERE AND SAVE YOURSELF THE MONEY, TIME AND HEARTACHE, GO, RUN!!!
IT COULD HAVE BEEN GOOD BUT THE GREED BEHIND IT HAS DESTROYED ITS POTENTIAL
If you are masochistic and decide to deal with them then be sure to make copies of your specifics with policy and related issues like others have suggested as it will change and will dissapear if you try to refer back to them later. They will probably try to make you prove it too
Posted by thomas on Thursday, August 6, 2009
34790
The shopping cart has promise, but after nearly two years of waiting for them to add the initially touted "UPS integration", we've given up and are moving to Magento.
The claimed "UPS integration" does not mean you can print shipping labels as one would think (which was why we bought it pre-beta)...it just means you get an integrated price quote. You have to hand fill out any UPS label...which, if you have more than a few orders per day, is not feasible.
Further, even while using it in low volume for wholesale sales only, the system corrupted and we had to redo the whole thing (though not clear if this was Interspire or some MySQL issue).
Lastly, I was fairly appalled at their significant price increases just for a so-so upgrade - so far, one would be in for over $4+,000 and still wouldn't have a product that could automate shipping labels. StoneEdge order manager does it for far less.
I'm unclear why their pricing is for a larger business yet unable to support the obvious functions that a business with more order volume would need.
Summary is we've largely wasted time and money with their shopping cart and are moving to Magento...which by the way, is free albeit more technically complicated to get up and running.
If you want a product that will lock you in to very high upgrade fees while you wait and wait for features you really need (but never come) then Interspire cart might be right for you.
Otherwise, look elsewhere.
Posted by Patrick on Tuesday, August 4, 2009
34590
The software has the potential to become great, but for now it is loaded with bugs, has very poor support, and the upgrade policy is the poorest I have seen. You are forced to buy expensive upgrades because they contain the bug fixes from your prior upgrade. My first major bug left my checkout useless for 1.5 weeks without a response to the ticket, my latest major bug has left me immobilized for 2 weeks without a fix, and 12 days before I even got a response to the ticket that did not come close to fixing the bug. Please do your homework first- if you have an experienced interspire programmer and a big budget, this may work fine for you (because it does have great features), but otherwise, let's see if they change their policies and start taking care of their customers first before purchasing. Read through their forums, but do it daily, they delete the posts they do not want public. Not recommended for small businesses.
Posted by Angela on Thursday, July 9, 2009
32710
I have only use the Email Markter so cannot comment on how good the cart is. The following is my opinion:-
1) They are expensive. Buying a cart for £1200 is outrageous when there are perfectly very good other shopping cart systems for lower price (i.e. Zencart is free). Will they be desigining a site, adding prioducts and everything else for you? If yes then its a good price. If you only get the software and have to still do everythying else yourself its bad. You may need more technical help with other systems like Zencart, but it will do everything you need a shopping cart to do.
2) Their support is not good. I have raised a lot of tickets and have to wait ages for a reply. One instance 3 days, by which time I spent all weekend figuring out the issue anyway. I really, really needed support at this time but did not get it. I even spoke to someone on the phone who said they would get someone to reply but they did not. And most tickets they do no help anyway. It seems they really do not want to help customers. I suspect they concentrate on their larger clients advertised on the home page, so its not good for small business. I am even selling their product on but they are not interested in helping me out.
3) I do use their Email Marketer and I sell it to clients. In my opinion Interpsire Email Marketer is the best on the market. They know this hence the price. Last year it was half price at approx. £140. Now it's approx. £305. I use this system because there are no other systems as good as this, so unfortunately you do have to spend this money until a competitor comes along with a product that is equal. I do not use any other products because there ARE suitable alternatives. And with 1) and 2) above I dont see why you would use them unless you have to (like I do with email marketer).
So in summary, if you are a small business, with expensive products and bad support I would only use them if you need to (like email marketer).
Posted by Amityweb on Tuesday, July 7, 2009
32600
Put me down as another user that falls by the wayside. If you buy Interspire products you will be in the endless high upgrade cycle. I am putting my money and effort elsewhere.
Posted by Jeff on Tuesday, June 16, 2009
31090
I totally agree with Martin. What used to be a great company, now is just nothing more but money grabber.
If you ever complain about anything, on forum, or on their ideas lab, your post will be deleted. A guy posted idea that upgrade policies should be changed, and people voted for this so many times, that idea went in top 3 at Interspire official ideas lab. And what happened? They deleted it at once, without any notice and comment.
Maybe the worst thing is, if you do not pay for next year upgrades, when your current expires, and wait for a month, six months.. and than want to buy one year upgrades, you have to pay full price of product once again! So, with buying Interspire products, you have to pay them once a year for upgrades, but that's only for minor ones! If they release a big upgrade, you have to pay for it additionally, for every 0.5 or 1.0 upgrade, which cost half of the full price of product!
So, if you want to buy something from them, prepare very deep wallet, because they tie you for ever, and give you a choice - stick only with us and pay it several times a year, or leave us and loose money you gave for product. This is the policy they have, and this is a disgrase.
Also, worth of notice - beta testers are users who payed for product, without knowing it. They release a product with many, many, many bugs, and let you notify them about it, and than fix it. Why to pay for beta testers, when people who are using software regularly will tell you what's wrong?! And bugs go so high that using product is almost impossible in some cases. Joomla, which is Open Source, has hundred times less bugs, and they fix them more often.
Interspire will loose customers, and when they do, than they will realize what are they doing. But, than, it might be late.
Posted by Dragan on Thursday, June 4, 2009
30230
What used to be a great community led product with excellent support and a development team that listened has become a larger corporate monster that just doesn't give 2 pennies for its existing customer base.
Confusing, conflicting policies on upgrades/updates were rewritten retroactively to support a cash grab and the product support has resorted to Australian business hours only with the UK and USA offices providing next to nothing in terms of useful input.
Stock responses to tickets, slow turnaround and a complete inability to read problems is frustratingly accompanied by a product that COULD be excellent if the management behind the product could just listen to the comments from existing customers.
It COULD be an excellent product but if you are seriously considering this you need to be aware that:
- The initial price is not a good indicator of cost instead budget for 175% of initial price to ensure that you get maintenance, any major upgrades and "some" support. Trying to shoe string it is a waste of your time.
- Print off all the relevant information relating to support, upgrades, and SLA's when you purchase and be prepared to use legal action to enforce the terms you purchased under. You may need it.
- Have a plan B
- Only install an update or upgrade once it has been "in the wild" for more than a week as numerous additional issues usually crop up. The update communication has improved but getting a diff tool (like examdiff) is essential and think seriously about having a PHP developer on tap to help with any issues.
Bottom line... It's ok... but the communication and management approach to customers makes the company behind it a joke. They may learn but it's likely to require years of dropping sales for them to realise it.
