That's their problem - once a customer becomes disenchanted and moves to a competitive product, and it works for them, and they get good support, it's hard to get them back. CA's underinvestment in support staff (and probably SW development) cost them a huge fraction of market share. I think it would have cost them a lot less to have invested in these areas before the customers left. Oh well, maybe they really get it now - it sounds like they are investing and trying to do it right. We'll see ...
- Bob -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2001 8:23 PM To: MS-Exchange Admin Issues Subject: RE: CA becoming more responsive The fact that someone called you is impressive. It's a big maybe, though, that we will go back to them. But I think not. Because of their ARCServe product, our disaster recovery became a running joke. Being a Financial Banking firm where down time can cost us as much as $1 million bucks an hour, I for one am not willing to wear my career on my sleeve or the viability of a good Arcserve backup/recovery. Signed, burned once.. Dot Harris -----Original Message----- From: Bob Peitzke [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2001 7:16 PM To: MS-Exchange Admin Issues Subject: CA becoming more responsive Hi, all, Thought I'd share with you my notes on this (surprising) new contact i just had with the Computer Associates VP of Technical Support. Though I had been a vocal critic of CA's tech support in the past, even back when I was an SE, I thought I was a lightweight when it came to CA-bashing on this list. So I was surprised when I got a call from their VP/TS, especially since he was calling from the east coast. Anyway, let me just hit the high points for you ... I told him my main complaints with CA products (ARCserve & Inoculan) were lack of real-time tech support, and the nightmare of RegIT. He agreed. Here are a few of the things he told me: - CA has relaxed their registration code, so that now it does not disable the service. - They have beefed up their support staff, with an office in India with 100 techies, and now 80%+ of their calls actually get answered by a real tech support person. Wow! I used to get the "take a number, we'll call you back someday" runaround. - Their knowledge base has been beefed up. I recall it used to be pretty thin. I haven't checked it out yet. Well, I was impressed that a high-level guy from CA is actually reaching out to customers and people in the industry, and trying to respond to criticisms. Maybe they have turned over a new leaf. I won't have the opportunity to really evaluate them as we are a Backup Exec / Sophos / Antigen shop, and being happy with these I'm not changing horses ... but maybe some of you out there will revisit CA products and give them a fresh chance. FWIW Bob Peitzke Information Systems Manager Sander A. Kessler & Associates Santa Monica, CA, USA List Charter and FAQ at: http://www.sunbelt-software.com/exchange_list_charter.htm List Charter and FAQ at: http://www.sunbelt-software.com/exchange_list_charter.htm List Charter and FAQ at: http://www.sunbelt-software.com/exchange_list_charter.htm
