Re: [cobalt-users] <rant> Cobalt Support - May we help you? </rant>

[Kris Dahl <krislists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

on 5/2/00 6:17 AM, M Fryer at mfryer@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> Does anyone have a clue why it would take them 5 weeks to answer an E-mail?
> It is certanly not because they are busy answering questions in this forum.
> The list is a real blessing. I really appreciate you sharing your knowledge
> of the Cobalt products, as I am sure many others do also.

My former customers (I no longer work as an SE for a Cobalt Resller) never
had to wait longer than their support contract specified for help.  I never
had a single client that was not 100% satisfied with Cobalt and their
support.  Perhaps that is because they never had to deal with it.  That is
the job of the Value Added Reseller--if you weren't able to get high caliber
support from your VAR, you should be shopping for a new one.  It doesn't
save money to buy from people who aren't going to be there to help you when
you have problems.

<rant>
Typically when I hear complaints about Cobalts support, its from people who
buy from CDW, etc.c trying to save a couple of bucks.  I don't tend to have
much sympathy for them when something goes wrong and they don't have a
fall-back plan.  Its an honest mistake, and its hard to ingore the bottom
line when making a purchase decision.  But the purchase price of a piece of
equipment rarely amounts to more than 25-35% of the TCO (Total Cost of
Ownership) of that piece of equipment.  If you can't afford to be down, you
need to make an real investment in your infrastructure *as well as* your
support, engineering, and development areas.
</rant>