Chariot has maintained the price of our products for over 10 years.  Especially now, in these difficult economic times, we want to avoid a price increase.  One way we can do that is to change our technical support policies.  Since only a small percentage of our customers ever use Technical Support, but significantly increase our expenses by doing so, we feel that it is unfair to levy a price increase on everyone just to sustain Technical Support for the few. 

Effective immediately, Technical Support for desktop programs (MicroGrade and MicroTest) will only be available for installation and program usage problems for ninety days from the date of original purchase or upgrade.  Registration problems that occur after the first ninety days will still receive support as time permits, but there may be some delays depending on the circumstances of the problem you have encountered and the type of support you require.  If we cannot resolve your problem during the ninety days after purchase or upgrade, we will be happy to refund your purchase/upgrade price. 

Technical Support for Chariot's subscription services (Exit Exam Prep, Corporate Testing, WebGrade, and MicroGrade Online) runs for the entire period of the subscription.

In addition, we cannot warrant that our software will work with new operating systems developed by Microsoft or Apple.  We will attempt to make our products compatible with new operating systems as soon as possible, but we cannot guarantee that compatibility in advance of the release of the new operating system.  For example, the new Apple Snow Leopard operating system has numerous problems with MicroGrade and is not yet supported by Chariot.  There may also be issues with Windows 7 that are as yet unknown to us.

• Your name
    
• The email address under which you have registered or intend to register the program
    
• Your five-digit serial number.  We only need the five-digit number in the middle of your full serial number; your full serial number should look something like this: XHSWX-61035-Q91K.  We only need the middle number ( 61035 )

When emailing for program usage support, please include the above information in your email message.

Support is only provided to the registered user.  If you are assisting someone who is a registered user, that registered user must contact us via email (using the same email address used to register the product) and authorize us to speak to you on their behalf.

We do not provide Operating System support.  We sell you the car; we don't teach you to drive.  If you don't know how to use your operating system (Windows or Macintosh) to start programs, locate files, and so forth, you must obtain that type of support elsewhere.

There are several types of files that are used by MicroGrade and MicroTest.  Please familiarize yourself with these file types and what functions they perform so you will know which types of files do what.

MicroGrade:

• yourfilename.CLS -- these are the files that contain all your class gradebook information (students, assignments, grades).
     
• yourfilename.WEB -- these are the files that contain the information that will be uploaded to WebGrade (if you subscribe to WebGrade).
     
• yourfilename.TXT -- these are the files that contain template information or class export data; they are simple text files.

MicroTest:

• yourfilename.1 and yourfilename.i  -- these are your questionbank files, the database of questions and answers.  Both files are required to comprise the questionbank.
     
• yourfilename.TST -- these are your exam files; they are an index of the questions and answers (the data for which is actually located in the yourfilename.1 and yourfilename.i files) that will appear in your exam.  The yourfilename.TST file is useless without the associated yourfilename.1 and yourfilename.i files.

Please note that Windows is often configured to hide the file extensions from you, so that if you looked for these files in Windows Explorer, you might not see the .CLS, .WEB, .TXT, .1, .i, and .TST.  So, if you had a Math101.cls and a Math101.web, they would both appear to be named, simply, Math101 in Windows Explorer.  The responsibility for understanding how to change your system to reveal the hidden file extensions is yours.

When contacting us by email to request assistance on a program usage problem, please provide specific details about the problem you have encountered:

1. Be precise.  Details are important.  Specific details.  Approach the problem as though you were giving us directions to drive from our house to your house.  Don't start in the middle.  Don't make assumptions about what we know.  Begin at the beginning. 
     
   Start with a synopsis of what you intended to do: "I wanted to change the student ID of student Mary Jones from 123 to 456."  Or, "How do I export all the students' grades from MicroGrade into Excel?"  Sometimes a very simple statement like that is all you need.
   
   But, sometimes, when you are attempting to do something, things go awry along the way.  Maybe you did something incorrectly or maybe the program malfunctioned.  So a step-by-step approach is probably necessary: 
     
   1. First you started the program;
        
   2. then you opened your class file (MicroGrade) or your question bank (MicroTest);
        
   3. then you selected xyz from menu 123;
       
   4. then ... you don't know what to do next ... or, then the program crashed ... or, then ... ???

   It is always a good idea to refer to specific parts of the program by name.  If you are referring to a problem in a desktop program like MicroGrade or MicroTest, the menu bar at the top of the program has several different menus composed of actions or items from which to choose.  The name of each menu is the word that appears in the menu bar.  There is the File menu and the Help menu, and so forth.  Each menu is comprised of a list of actions or items to be acted upon.  The File menu has the actions Save and Deactivate and the Students menu has the item Student Records (to be acted upon).  Each screen (major window) and each dialog (small window) has a name.  Examples of major windows are Class Roster, Student Summary, and Class Scores.  Examples of dialogs are Edit Student Records and General Export.  Use the appropriate names when referring to your problem. However, if you are referring to a problem in an online (Internet) program like WebGrade, provide the sequence of actions you followed up until the point at which you encountered the problem. 
   
   Sometimes your problem may involve more than one program.  For example, a WEBgrade problem may have it's roots in MICROgrade (MicroGrade "feeds" information to WebGrade; MicroGrade runs on your computer and WebGrade runs on the Internet).  Be very careful to refer to the proper program.  It could mean the difference between solving your problem or not.
   
   We must have your license serial number.  All we need are the five NUMBERS (we don't need the alphabetic component).  The serial number can be found by selecting "About MicroGrade" or "About MicroTest" from the Help menu.  If you don't provide the serial number, we will not be able to assist you.  Maybe we should add, if your name is not registered as a licensed user under that serial number, we will also not be able to assist you.
   
   

2. Be concise.  We don't need information that is not related to your problem.  However, if you are unsure, it always a good policy to provide too much information rather than not enough.
      
   
3. Clarity:  be coherent.  It is much easier to be coherent when writing than when speaking because writing allows you to collect and organize your thoughts and the issues related to your problem.  That is why (almost) all of the technical support you receive will be written only.  Being coherent means laying out your problem (and any actions you took prior to the problem) in a orderly manner.  Don't skip around.  Don't just dash off something cryptic.  If it appears to us that you don't care enough to express yourself coherently, then we might not care very much about your problem either.