FAQ
Frequent questions
General information
Yes, it was developed by Higher Functions, Lda, promoter of two projects financed by European funds together with 7 international institutions
Higher Functions, also known as pcmedic or pcm, is an international company, in the market since 2001, dedicated to technological support for residential and business end users. Throughout it’s existence, pcm has solved more than 10 million problems for more than 4 million customers.
We solve 86% of problems in the first contact, following up on advanced level services whenever this first interaction proves to be insufficient. In addition to telephone and chat support channels, we have stores open to the public, specialized laboratories and home services throughout the country.
With all these levels of service, we always find solutions for the needs of our customers, whether residential or business, even if we need to use a company from our network of more than 30 specialized partners.
With full dedication to each situation and multiple means of response – telephone support, chat, proprietary resolution tools, in-store services, specialized laboratory repairs, home service and integration with a network of more than 30 certified partners in each area – it becomes very difficult not to find a solution for every need.
That said, in the impossibility of not solving the problem, we credit the amount paid and look forward to showing our capabilities at the next opportunity!
We perform remote access to the equipment whenever 3 conditions are met: 1- Be necessary to solve the problem; 2- The customer expressly approves this intervention and 3- The client is present during the same.
It’s actually hybrid, depending weather or not you want to. The BOT helps the customer and technician based on a huge base of acquired knowledge; however, customers with subscription access or one-off service always have direct access to support provided by a real dedicated technician.
Customers without subscription and without specific services purchased have access to BOT support, indefinitely and free of charge, after the first resolution doneby a human expert.
Yes, we already have a few thousand companies with our App actively monitoring systems and with our preventive maintenance service safeguarding the health and safety of equipment.
More information at www.pcm.pt or by e-mail to Empresas@pcm.pt.
Subscription
No. You can subscribe whenever you want, use as many times as you need, and discontinue whenever you want if you don’t want to continue the service.
Unlike the free support and the one-off support, the subscription service reserves a technician dedicated to the management of your technological experience, closely accompanying you with all his knowledge and expertise. The name and contact of this technician will be made available after the subscription.
In addition to the dedicated technician, this service includes proactive maintenance, which means that we act to prevent problems, rather than just solving them.
If you agree, permanent management of the insured equipment will be carried out, monitoring the main technical indicators, thus managing to guarantee the stability and security of all your devices.
In short, you will have a dedicated person to accompany you, concerned about your well-being with technology, contacting you whenever we detect a problem.
If you are a subscribed customer and wish to activate the monitoring service, we will periodically collect some technical information from your operating system, without any connection to personal information.
This data is linked to CPU, hard disk and RAM usage rates, search for dangerous processes (malware, viruses) and updates linked to security software.
This information allows us to check the health of your equipment remotely, contacting you whenever necessary to solve problems even before they show symptoms.
No. The subscription service includes unlimited diagnostic efforts and remote resolution attempts; in the event that face-to-face service or collection and delivery is required, the respective conditions will be presented, and may or may not accept its realization.
In the 86% of cases we resolve on the first contact, the repair time is a few minutes.
In cases where a study by the team and subsequent contacts are necessary, the deadline can be extended up to 24 hours.
In cases of in-person services or with collection, laboratory repair and delivery, the period normally varies between 24 hours and 72 hours.
When it is necessary to order parts, we cannot guarantee deadlines, as we depend on external manufacturers and suppliers, but you can check the repair status throughout the entire process in the App.
Information about the App
askWhizz’s technological architecture was developed based on the most demanding security, rigor and integrity measures in communication and data storage.
It pays to guarantee privacy and confidentiality, all data is encrypted, respecting GDPR policies, all services and platforms work in HTTPS and all communications are carried out with WebSockets via SSL/TLS.
Remote monitoring services are directly controlled and managed by the user, with any technical information collected only with the knowledge and approval of the customer.
No. You may have a problem with your computer or appliance and access our support via your cell phone. But you can have the App installed on multiple devices at the same time.
Yes. The information will be synchronized between all devices.
The monitoring agent allows the collection of technical system data to help prevent and resolve problems. It is a feature that only applies to customers with a subscription who have it explicitly activated.
The agent collects non-personal data, such as the utilization rates of system resources – CPU, disk and RAM, as well as looking for malicious programs that may be present, reporting alerts that deserve intervention.
The action to be taken in the event of any event generated by the monitoring agent will always be carried out with the client.
The askWhizz App adds a wide range of features, including chat with a technician, sending dedicated resolution tools, monitoring technical indicators with event management and automatic actions, remote access, querying the status of ongoing processes, collecting technical information from the system, generation of verbal calls, various resolution tools, among many others. The availability of these tools and their application may depend on the operating system (Windows, MacOS, iOS and Android) and on the specific settings of each environment.
There are actually no comparable solutions on the market; askWhizz is a service supported by an App developed specifically for this area of activity, with a base of acquired knowledge supported by millions of services provided and proprietary tools that aim to maximize remote resolution in the first contact.
There are many Apps with one or another of the features present in the range of askWhizz tools, as is the example of remote access, but none that add such a vast set of features integrated with each other, nor that have complemented these mechanisms with the essential support of a technician that guarantees its proper use in the face of every need.