Solved: Why do the TAC engineers refuse to support CCA and why isn't Cisco fixing this

dcomdan · ‎09-24-2009

I am completely fed up with having to deal with the lack of support on the SBCS products. I don't have the time or patience for a bulletin board. Any time I have ever called the TAC for support the engineers refuse to use CCA and then consequently, make changes that make the software incapable of editing any features. Furthermore, am I missing something? Small business customers are supposed to navigate this?!?! Seriously?!? Partners are supposed to "invest" our time with smaller customers. Who can make money if all of our time is spent goofing around with Cisco's SBCS experiment.

Is there a number I can call to actually get a live body capable of supporting the UC520 products?!? I am tired of emails and bulletin board posts. I don't want a blog....I just want and engineer to talk to to fix this crap so I can move on to something else!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dan

Chief Operating Officer

Genesis Integrators

Marcos Hernandez · ‎09-25-2009

"Just so you know what a big deal this is, our telecommuter is offline until this is fixed."

This is unacceptable.

Please get in touch with me at your earliest convenience. I have already escalated this and we will be taking specific actions to help you out. I will wait for your contact information and the case numbers.

Thanks a lot for the patience.

Marcos

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Marcos Hernandez · ‎09-24-2009

Hi Dan,

My name is Marcos Hernandez and I am part of the UC 500 Product Team. The problem that you describe is one of the reasons why we have decided to dedicate a new support organization to the Pro family (UC 540 included) as well as to the Cisco Configuration Assistant, CCA.The new organization is called Small Business Support Center, or SBSC.

UC 520 is still supported by our "classic" TAC though, and they also support CCA. Unfortunately not every engineer follows the out of band rules that will keep extra CLI from breaking the compatibility. While this practice does lead to inconsistencies and affects customer satisfaction, one can understand how in the heat of the moment and in order to offer an expedited answer, some engineers will choose to provide the solution that resolves your problem, not really understanding the ramifications of such a decision. We actively work with TAC to identify ways to mitigate the aforementioned problem, but inevitably this type of situations are bound to keep occurring, unless we completely evolve the support paradigm, which as said earlier, it's exactly what we are doing.

I know the above explanation does NOTHING to help you. I just wanted to give you some visibility into our plans moving forward.

Back to your original complaint, this is what we can do:

1) Email me the TAC case (or cases), open or closed, that you have been working on. My address is marchern@cisco.com

2) I will review the cases and ask our escalation engineer to personally work on the outstanding issues with you.

3) I will forward your complain to my management and they will certainly be contacting you to discuss further.

I apologize for the inconvenience and look forward to hearing from you shortly.

Thanks,

Marcos Hernandez
Technical Marketing Engineer
Cisco Systems, Inc.

dcomdan · ‎09-25-2009

Hi Marcos,

While I understand the "heat of the moment" issue, I have over the past year done around 10-12 TAC calls for assistance on the UC520. No one I had ever spoken with at TAC said they had training on it and, in the case of the VPN engineer, he said he would be unable to help unless we used CLI. I found the support number which this should be handled under which is the 866-606-1866, however they said that the TAC is handling the UC520s but all the UC540s and related products, including our SR520 at home were supported inside the group. I have meetings with Cisco and another partner this morning. Later this afternoon when I have a chance, I will forward the information on to you. Just so you know what a big deal this is, our telecommuter is offline until this is fixed. Cisco is lucky this happend only to a partner. If it had been an end user, they wouldn't be so understanding.

Despite the problems, thank you for following up on this.

Dan

Marcos Hernandez · ‎09-25-2009

"Just so you know what a big deal this is, our telecommuter is offline until this is fixed."

This is unacceptable.

Please get in touch with me at your earliest convenience. I have already escalated this and we will be taking specific actions to help you out. I will wait for your contact information and the case numbers.

Thanks a lot for the patience.

Marcos

greenturtlesteak · ‎09-25-2009

Hi Marcos,

This shift in technical support does concern me a little bit. I have several questions about regarding this new service.

Will TAC support be available with the new line of products as well during this transition period?

Will this new group be versed in the CLI for the SBCS products?

Will CCA be required in order to troubleshoot problems?

Is there advanced hardware replacement for defective equipment with a 4 hour turn around time?

Is there any documentation about this new service? I am having a hard time finding info on the partner site.

Cole

Marcos Hernandez · ‎09-25-2009

The September 9th "One Cisco" Webcast has information about all these, and many other questions:

https://www.myciscocommunity.com/docs/DOC-9998

Let me know if this helps.

Marcos