10 Reasons Immigration Attorneys Should Avoid INS Zoom

INS Zoom, whose U.S. operations are based in San Ramon, California, offers software and website development services to immigration attorneys. Here are 10 reasons why immigration attorneys should avoid INS Zoom.

1. Abysmal customer service. INS Zoom claims to offer 24-hour customer support. However, it's all but impossible to get anyone knowledgeable on the telephone during business hours, let alone after hours. Calls are rerouted to India, where the company is headquartered, and answered by individuals who have extreme difficulty communicating in English. For technical issues, you will be told to hang up and email "Support." These emails go unanswered for days.

2. An inept technical division. For a company that specializes in software and website development, technicians are startlingly incompetent. They have difficulty with the simplest tasks, such as changing a domain host. Technical issues are set aside for months while your immigration law firm's website sits in Internet Limbo.

3. Exorbitant prices. INS Zoom does not publish its price list online or in their initial brochure -- for good reason. The prices are ridiculous. Your immigration law firm will spend nearly $3,000 just to set up the so-called "Premium Package." The end result is a simple web template similar to those found for free on some sites. With their software, immigration law firms pay up to an additional $600 a month, plus a $100 fee for every additional license.

4. INS Zoom's software is obsolete. The forms they offer are provided for free by the U.S. Government through their U.S. CIS website. The questionnaires INS Zoom offers are merely extensions of the forms, which can be drafted by a first year law student using a word processor. Why pay $1,200 a month for tools that are offered for free?

5. Management is unaccountable. Try to get a manager or supervisor on the phone. You will have an easier time contacting the President of the United States. The slick executives at INS Zoom take no accountability for the services they offer, leaving a sales force and technical division to fend for themselves.

6. SEO/SEM. INS Zoom offers immigration attorneys basic and enhanced search engine optimization services for a premium price. But INS Zoom does not deliver. Salesmen try to woo prospective clients with success stories about law firms that jumped to page 5 on Google. Don't believe it. Months after signing the contract you will receive reports of their "efforts" and excuses as to why they are failing.

7. INS Zoom is unprofessional. From management to technical support to customer service, INS Zoom has the most unprofessional staff an immigration attorney will likely deal with in his thirty or forty year career. Emails are bounced from one department to another like pinballs, each member blaming another for the problems. The breaking point comes when you are told to send your complaints to "escalations" at inszoom.com. That's right -- furious clients have their own email address to send complaints to...because there are plenty of them.

8. INS Zoom's word is as good as its service. Promises will be made by salesmen but will never be delivered upon. It isn't necessarily their fault; they, too, are dealing with an utterly inept technical division and wholly unprofessional management hierarchy. Still, no one at INS Zoom should be taken at their word.

9. Treatment of their own employees. The salesman and head of sales who worked with my firm both expressed terrible disdain for their own company. They admitted client complaints are entirely valid, but were helpless to issue refunds, even after they promised them. The technical division is completely untrained, and also expressed their exasperation at their working conditions in India.

10. Immigration attorneys have enough headaches. You don't need another. And that's what a relationship with INS Zoom amounts -- one giant headache. Immigration attorneys should avoid INS Zoom like the plague. Both for their sake, and for the sake of their clients.