As I was looking through a list of tech support cases that I had opened within a particular web application, I noticed something strange. Most of the cases had the status of “expired”. What exactly does that mean? Maybe these cases were:

– Abandoned by the customer
– Ignored by the vendor’s tech support team
– Related to a time-sensitive issue where the window of opportunity has passed

Actually, none of these descriptions was correct. It turns out the vendor uses the term “expired” to refer to cases that have been closed for more than 15 days. Apparently, they won’t accept any follow up on the case after that. You can’t reopen it, and if more questions arise, you have to create a separate case. That’s all fine and good, but it makes me wonder: Wouldn’t the word “closed” be a lot simpler and more intuitive?