Opinions wanted on Cisco TAC and package help response times

Just curious to see how long it is taking some of you to get a response back
from Cisco when sending them an e-mail detailing a problem. The reason I ask
is that at work we have had a few problems registering equipment bought
through our supplier, who had decided to register them theirselves and made a
hash of it. I send an e-mail off asking for assistance and in most cases it
takes two weeks to get a useful reply!! To my mind this is totally
unacceptable. Are we just unlucky or is this the norm? We are based in the UK
by the way.

 

:Just curious to see how long it is taking some of you to get a response back
:from Cisco when sending them an e-mail detailing a problem. The reason I ask
:is that at work we have had a few problems registering equipment bought
:through our supplier, who had decided to register them theirselves and made a
:hash of it. I send an e-mail off asking for assistance and in most cases it
:takes two weeks to get a useful reply!!

In our experience, the reply has come back within 2 days.

The suppliers are -supposed- to register equipment these days. I've
had a couple of mis-registrations that I wrote to Cisco about, and they
were fixed next day.

 

Good to see someone is getting good support. That is definitely not what we
are receiving here. I even received a couple of e-mails from the support
person regarding two completely different calls, one in the USA and one in
Germany. Perhaps they just have a bad batch of people at the moment.

Again, we had to wait for over a week minimum to get any response from them at
all. Very poor and hopefully we will get better support. We have already
launched a complaint to our account manager and hopefully that will lead
somewhere.

 

Is this a SUPPORT issue????

I cannot resist commenting here even though I am not current with TAC.

My experience has been that Cisco support is the best that I
have ever known.

The customer (3 years ago anyway) chooses the case priority
from 1-4.

A priority 1 case (as selected by the CUSTOMER) will be worked on
by a cisco TAC person 24 hours a day 7 days a week until the
issue is resolved to the CUSTOMERS satisfaction.

However a priority 1 case is tested against a _network_ _down_
_cannot_ _do_ _business_ situation. Also YOU THE CUSTOMER MUST match
Cisco's comittment and provide 24x7 resources to work the problem
through. TAC will ask you "what exactly is broken". If you say,
my product registration is broken and I cannot do business
then I guess TAC might not take you too seriously.

GET REAL.

Quite frankly, moaning that you are having to wait some days
to register a product does not seem that significant. This is a
low priority case (level 4). IIRC TAC work on level 4 cases as time
permits and do not promise any time to resolution AT ALL. If
your business truely does depend on a network, for example a
bank that MUST provide certain information system functionality
in order to meet regulatory requirements and do business - then
I suggest that the system implementer should have organised
product registration in good time. Otherwise, who cares?

The Gold Partner that I used to work for in the UK would NEVER
turn a customer with a problem away. If they had bought the stuff
from us (and had purchased support?) we would fix it. If we needed
to beat Cisco up to get it fixed we beat them up. The attitude
was simply, MAKE THE CUSTOMER'S NETWORK WORK.

I guess that if one was to choose to buy from support free
channels then that is your business. Caveat emptor. If they
are working on negligible margins then clearly your reseller
can not help out very much. If you bought from the Gold Partner
that I worked for, we comitted absolutely to making it all go.


Finally:-

The escalation path for a P1 case used to quite swiftly end at the
CEO. I cannot recall the details now but I think that it might
have been as little as 24 hours. The sting in the tail however
is that if TAC call you and you do not answer your phone then
clearly the case is not P1 to you and therefore not to Cisco
either. Instant downgrade to "normal business hours" working.
If you REALLY NEED it fixed and it really is broken then the
resources are (were?) there.

PS

To assist in your enlightenment I have located the TAC priority
definitions for you.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products...ng_started_guide09186a00800b0176.html#1002452

Says:

TAC Case Priority Definitions
To ensure that all cases are reported in a standard format, Cisco has
established case priority definitions.

Priority 1 (P1)—Your network is "down" or there is a critical impact
to your business operations. You and Cisco will commit all necessary
resources around the clock to resolve the situation.

Priority 2 (P2)—Operation of an existing network is severely degraded,
or significant aspects of your business operation are negatively
affected by inadequate performance of Cisco products. You and Cisco
will commit full-time resources during normal business hours to
resolve the situation.

Priority 3 (P3)—Operational performance of your network is impaired,
but most business operations remain functional. You and Cisco will
commit resources during normal business hours to restore service to
satisfactory levels.

Priority 4 (P4)—You require information or assistance with Cisco
product capabilities, installation, or configuration. There is little
or no effect on your business operations.


Don't get me wrong it is far from perfect, but I think that they are
trying to, and compared to anyone else, do actually provide, an
excellent
service.

 

:Quite frankly, moaning that you are having to wait some days
:to register a product does not seem that significant. This is a
:low priority case (level 4). IIRC TAC work on level 4 cases as time
ermits and do not promise any time to resolution AT ALL. If
:your business truely does depend on a network, for example a
:bank that MUST provide certain information system functionality
:in order to meet regulatory requirements and do business - then
:I suggest that the system implementer should have organised
roduct registration in good time. Otherwise, who cares?

You presume that the systems implementer had a choice in the matter.

Things are run differently at different places. At my work, the
biggest Cisco device that I can purchase (complete with 1 year minimal
support) under my authorized limits, is a "PIX 501 3DES Bundle".
Anything beyond that has to go to a vote of my management. And if the
item is bigger than a PIX 501 with 50 user license, then I have one
opportunity per year to plead for a share of the budget fund that
has to be used, and at the time of that plea, I have to fully justify
the request and have it fully costed (even if the device won't be
needed for another 10 months and the pricing hasn't even been set up
by the manufacturer.)

One can only do a certain amount of planning ahead. If the requirements
change during the year -- well, I'm suppose to anticipate that
requirements may change and find out from the users ahead of time
what -could- happen and budget for that... and yet still be able to
justify every funding request as being -definitely- needed.
"We have no evidence that there are any problems, but Hey! You Never
Know" is not considered sufficient justification for allocating funds.

Net result: equipment sometimes has to be purchased and put in place
ASAP after the money can be scraped together for it and management
can do their approval magic and our suppliers can deliver it. The
systems implimenter is sometimes structurally constrained against being
-able- to organize product registration "in good time". Don't confuse
"implimenter" with "authorized spender".

 

Hi,

I was a bit OTT with the message, sorry everyone.
It was 2am and I had had a few beers

I agree that there is no good reason for not being able to complete
registration in pretty short order.

It is not a Technical Support matter but it is a Support
matter. At the time I failed to make the distinction.

 

Cisco TAC is well known for its timely and effective support. For all P1 and P2's you normally get response almost immediately. For P3 and P4 you can expect a response in an hour ideally.

Whenever you open a TAC case , make sure that you specify the current network impact so that the Engineers can classify the urgency correctly.