Carina, I understand your experiences. (and I have been there too.)
However, let me, for a moment point out that being a customer is a type of relationship. If we truly give up on them, then they will also not learn/improve because of what we know. All, Let me pick on Carina's sample ticket for a second. I know it takes more time and effort, but if you found something that was "wrong" or "unclear" in the docs that caused you some delay/problem then you should FIGHT with support to get the docs fixed. I understand it does nothing but consume your time, especially when you already know the right answer. However, if you can get them to improve (their docs, their processes, etc.) then the next poor sole that stumbles into that same problem might be helped faster or better too. And eventually, I hope, BMC will see the value that we (the customer) adds to their business and help us to help them in better and more efficient ways. So please, let me underscore that while it does NOTHING for you individually I think it is important for the WHOLE ARS community that we continue to highlight, underscore and if necessary get out the trusty "bat signal" to try to get our position understood by BMC. The little details do matter. The only way it (BMC Technical Support ) will improve is if we help them to improve. In my book that means opening tickets, when appropriate, to: document there poor documentation (BUGS) document their poor installers (BUGS) document their poor support (BUGS... in the pants. :) document suggestions/ideas for how things can be better. (RFE's) And to try to bring the thread back to the original topic... I think they got a handle on whatever was their network/performance issues sometime yesterday. (Well it worked better for me yesterday.) I really wish they would tell us that they had a "slammer" (or other virus, or router config goof, or whatever the root issue was) problem and just come clean about it. I am sure we have all been there and done that stuff too. :) There is even a place on the "Support Overview" page for announcements like that. (What's New in Support) Which is exactly where SYSTEM WIDE announcements should show up. ( Like we "are having"/"had" problems.. they were bla... but they are now "being worked on"/"fixed".) -- Carey Matthew Black Remedy Skilled Professional (RSP) ARS = Action Request System(Remedy) Love, then teach Solution = People + Process + Tools Fast, Accurate, Cheap.... Pick two. On 1/24/07, Carina Burns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Trust me, website probably isn't as helpful as phone support (save downloads). We got sold/told that the basic support was the way to go by our sales rep since we had limited funds and we wanted the longest contract we could purchase. Citizens have to vote a bond when we want money! With basic, we can't even make a phone call. All support happens via the web interface or by email. BTW, the definition of basic support means you will basically get ignored. I opened an issue recently and the responses to my updates generally took between 48-96 hours. I finally muddled things out on my own and with the help of the ARSlist archives (which seems to always be the case). I posted in the ticket that I was able to upgrade to 6.3. Then support asks "is there anything more we need to do on this ticket?" The short description of the ticket was "Upgrading to 7.0." I gave up on getting support and told them just to close it. I'm thinking the only reason to pay any sort of maintenance contract is to have the upgrades. You'll just be disillusioned if you think you'll actually purchasing support.
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