Darryl.net

Edge cases are typically deprioritized by product managers – there is usually little gain for the amount of work necessary to meticulously handle every case. After all, that’s what customer service is for: to hold the hand of the customer through those dark times when software is not responding. Right?

To add lemon juice to the cut, engineers typically thrive on thinking of and handling every edge case – that’s what makes good code. The opportunity cost is usually too high though, and writing a giant try { } catch statement usually allows you to move on to the next big thing that will acquire users / make more money / look flashy.

However, what if those edge cases cause make your customers want to leave?

Here’s two stories of where I was taken to wit’s end:

Citibank
Today, I wanted to open a savings account to be held under a trust (you should make one if you have kids!), so I walked into a branch since I figured it would be *somewhat* complicated. The agent said I would have to open a checking account first, then apply for the linked savings account online since the high interest savings accounts all required online registration. I asked “Are you sure I can open it online if the account is in a trust?” “You should be able to,” was the answer. Good enough – I opened the checking account at the branch.

I got home tonight, and tried to open the savings account online. No dice, I couldn’t seem to select the trust credentials as the primary account holder. I called customer service: “Sorry, you can’t open a trust account online, you’ll have to open it in the branch.” “But the branch ones have super-high minimums I can’t meet,” I said. “Sorry, nothing we can do from here.”

So, even though I’ve been a Citibank customer for 10 years, I started browsing Vanguard’s site.

Money Management
Not too long ago, I purchased Quicken for the Mac after ditching my PC. [Hmmm - another money example. Perhaps I feel the pain most when it involves money.] I then tried to download my transactions from Citibank only to find that they don’t support Mac. Turns out, Intuit charges banks more for the Mac connector – which most banks don’t buy. I don’t know who to mad at, Intuit or Citibank.

Well, off I went to Mint, an online money management site where I had been collecting transactions for a few months already. Perhaps now was the time to switch. Unfortunately, I found that I could not enter arbitrary categories. I also couldn’t exclude items from Mint. Both of these ‘exceptions’ ended up making the categorization and charts pretty useless. Frustrated, I switched back to Quicken after taking a whole month to sign up for Direct Connect with Citibank. [Kudos to Mint: turns out Mint added these two features later - perhaps after they received lots of feedback.]

What to do?
After you launch a product:

• Watch your customer feedback carefully to find any repeated edge cases
• Have customer care keep a pareto chart of issues
• Fix them quickly. Customers you lose b/c of them will likely never come back.