• Who’s problem is it?
• Terminal Server problems
• European support issues
• Support via the web

Getting technical support these days is becoming harder and harder. Much of this is because the vendors and resellers have been arguing about responsibility for a considerable amount of time and it’s the customer, of course, who suffers. A perfect example of this is with Windows 95/98 where Microsoft will tell you to talk to your dealer and often, the dealer will tell you that it is a Microsoft problem.

Who’s problem is it?

When Microsoft took control of the Canon Bubblejet Printer Drivers in Windows 95 this problem reached its peak. Inside the BIOS today, you can set the parallel printer port so that it can be used as an ECP (Enhanced Communications Port) an ESP (Enhanced Serial Port) or a normal parallel port. Set the BIOS to either ECP or ESP and you will find that printing via Windows 95 doesn’t work. Shell out to DOS and redirect the document direct to the printer port and it does work. The result is that the dealer will tell you it is an Operating System problem and you must speak to Microsoft to get new drivers, and Microsoft will tell you that the Dealer, under the terms of their OEM agreement, must mix it. If you are lucky, the Microsoft person will agree to fax you a sheet describing the problem and the fix. Just before Christmas I had to deal with a re-occurrence of this problem on a customers’ premises due to someone messing around with the BIOS and then denying it.

The solution was available via Technet and the Microsoft web site but you had to know what to type in order to get to it. Unfortunately, these options were not available to the vast number of people who suffered from this problem, as they were small businesses. Even large customers suffered and they did have access to the information, but not necessarily the time to distil it from the rest of the possible solutions.

Terminal Server problems

With Windows NT, Microsoft has attempted to put its support service on a more professional footing with charges for support and extensive internal training for those on the support desks. The dealers and resellers are also expected to ensure that they have a certain number of trained experienced staff who can identify and resolve Windows NT problems. Even here, however, there are conflicts between Microsoft and its channel. This has been highlighted recently by the problems facing Terminal Server.

There appears to be a problem when Terminal Server reaches the 25-user limit with the server suddenly going into a blue screen of death and users losing all their work. Now this is a critical problem for the product yet the information chain between dealers and customers is failing to address the problem. Microsoft does have information available about this problem but of the seven dealerships I spoke to, only one knew the state of play from Microsoft and four, all of whom were involved in Terminal Server installations, had no knowledge whatsoever about the problem and needed to be told where to look on the Microsoft Web site. Now these problems are nothing new and Microsoft is not the only vendor to be suffering this channel problem. Yet in defence of Microsoft, it has been making considerable efforts to make information easily available. Every support department should make sure that it has access to Technet, which is updated monthly with all new problems and fixes. The cost is minimal and just two problems solved via this route will be cheaper than two calls made to Microsoft technical support.

For those sites working in multiple languages or who have complex set-ups, Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) should be seriously considered. It supplies you with copies of all the key products from development, through Office and includes Backoffice and operating systems. Under the terms of the license you can at least recreate the problem and then try out potential solutions before applying them to your live systems.

European support issues

Since 1^st January, Europe has been operating with a single currency across most of its countries and this is opening a new chapter in technical support. Prior to January, it was the general case that most vendors were very careful about how they offered support. If you bought a product in Germany then it was expected that you would contact Germany for any technical support. If you bulk purchased in Germany, because it was the cheapest price point, then any support had to be either routed through your German office or you would have to call Germany direct.

The prime reason for this was that each country had its own sales targets and competed with the other European country offices of the company. This also goes back to the costs of localisation of materials and packaging whereby the company would want to see the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and be able to distinguish the profit of any particular unit. Despite the arrival of the euro, few companies have actually removed the competition between their country units but they have recognised that customers are now likely to carry out comparisons and purchase at the cheapest European price point. After all, it is such comparison purchasing that the EU has been putting at the forefront of its campaign for euro acceptance.

As a result, we are seeing markedly differing strategies between the product vendors. Some have established a single, Europe-wide support organisation and have even co-located all the support personnel in the same building to maximise their language skills. Typical of this is IBM who has based its support in Greenock, Scotland for several years now.

This means that a customer dials a local or low-cost number for their country and is routed to the Greenock support desk, reaching a support person who speaks their language. Provided your product has been registered and your support contract paid up, there is no problem in getting support on the software. Other companies have adopted a European and even a worldwide sales position whereby you can purchase your product in any country you choose. When you install the product onto or into your computer, you simply contact the local country office of the vendor and take out a support policy from that office (although many of these vendors also offer a single, worldwide support agreement). This is slightly more restrictive but allows the vendor to manage its costings and ensure that the national division is not being overwhelmed by cheap imports.

Support via the web

Yet there are ways around this problem of support. Every vendor now has its own Web site and most are becoming increasingly sophisticated about the way that they offer support through this medium. Email, direct into the support desk, is a very common feature and I have often received calls from the US office of a company because the problem was critical and the time zone meant that they were the only available office. There is a danger here that people will abuse the callback mechanism and leave the vendor with an expensive call for a relatively minor fault. The boy who cried wolf syndrome: and there have been times when we have all been guilty of claiming our fault was more serious than it was just to ensure that we get technical support. As IP Telephony starts to become more widespread, the possibility of being called back via the Web with the associated cost reductions becomes more realistic.

Access to patches, upgrades and on-line support databases is growing dramatically and this single mechanism, more than any other, has probably been responsible for helping vendors keep support under control. This is particularly effective where the product being sold is a general consumer product rather than a corporate network product, yet the impact on response and potential solution is recognised more at the corporate end. This mechanism is so effective that more and more industries and manufacturers are actually adopting this approach and are seeing a distinct benefit. Support has always been the poor relative of the sales cycle and despite the claims of investment in support from vendors, large and small, it is sometimes difficult to believe that any effort has been put into this area. Europeans are finally starting to get support on a continental basis but don’t hold your breath just yet. One company recently said to me that until the UK does decide on its European position it is extremely easy for vendors to agree to a common policy but then exclude the UK.