back to article HPE: Wanna revive that support deal for your software? Ha ha ha, har

Organizations running software from Hewlett Packard Enterprise would be wise to read up on their support contracts – there's a new policy in town. Under revised terms effective today, HPE software support contracts that expired more than a year ago can no longer be renewed, meaning customers who wish to revive their old …

  1. Mage Silver badge
    Pirate

    Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

    "but they will have to pay the support costs from the entire time their deal has been lapsed as well as a 50 per cent "reactivation" charge."

    How much do you pay if you are a new customer?

    So to get a renewal you have to pay the fee for a period when there was no deal? Sounds like the Motor tax office or a protection racket!

    1. Nate Amsden

      Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

      Seems pretty normal to me. Having renewed lapsed support contracts from several vendors they generally backdate them to when the support lapsed(which in my case typically hasn't been more than a couple months). Though am not used to paying a "re activation" fee. Though vmware recently reached out to me and said there is a 20% fee for reactivating stuff from them.

      With HP for me what is more frustrating is at least with hardware, care packs vs support contracts, especially in Europe. I renewed support for a pair of fibre channel switches last year through an EU vendor (because U.S. based vendors are not allowed to buy such contracts, I have tried). I got a registration ID, I go to the HP website and register the care packs, and I get an entitlement certificate(s). Then normally I would go to the support website and link that care pack to my account so I can open a case online. Only to find the support site says the entitlement does not exist.

      I spent hours on the phone and email trying to track down the source of this problem, and for U.S. support contracts I found the cause, some care packs for some reason automatically transfer to be support contracts and in the process invalidate the care pack IDs. So to register you have to have the SAR and SAID codes, of which HP does not give to you when this process happens (why this process happens at all is just beyond me). With U.S. HP I was able to address a similar issue(they gave me the new codes), but for E.U. HP for the past 15 months I have been unable to find someone to help me on this. I have had my EU vendor for the past 6 weeks trying to figure it out again (year 2 of this issue). In the meantime I cannot open support cases online, and if I really need support I am forced to call long distance to europe because HP (again so stupid) doesn't have any ability to reach their EU call centers from a U.S. phone number for paying customers like myself. (maybe they have not heard of VoIP)

      If someone happens to know of a contact at HP in Europe that knows about this stuff it would be good to know. For U.S. based care packs it is (844-317-1454), I was told last year that for EU it was +31 504-0666 though last time I tried that it did not work. HP U.S. specifically said they have no insight into how the EU stuff works and I was even more surprised that they could not get me in direct contact with their EU counterparts (other than some random phone number which I could not get working).

      Fortunately on these pieces of equipment they have gone 5 years so far without needing support.

      I really like HP stuff otherwise this is one of the few things that really annoys me.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

        but for E.U. HP for the past 15 months I have been unable to find someone to help me on this. I have had my EU vendor for the past 6 weeks trying to figure it out again (year 2 of this issue)

        If you have paid money for this I would change the approach. The fact that you are unable to receive the service associated with the payment basically amounts to fraud. The next step is thus not to try and solve HP's problem for them, it is to make HP liable for fraud and the business consequences that will stem from your inability to obtain support post payment.

        Do this together with legal council, but if you've been fighting this for over a year I would start with not just formally demanding a refund for that period but also adding a fat company invoice for your time.

        My personal timeout period for switching from unhappy but willing to find a mutual solution to being prepared to call down hell and brimstone on their rear ends lies around the 3 months, and I am *very* creative.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

          >My personal timeout period for switching from unhappy but willing to find a mutual solution to being prepared to call down hell and brimstone on their rear ends lies around the 3 months, and I am *very* creative.

          My personal timeout period for switching from unhappy but willing to find a mutual solution to being prepared to call down hell and brimstone on their rear ends lies around the 3 weeks, and I am *very* impatient.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

            I am *very* impatient

            Oh, I am too, but I'm also quite experienced in these things. Especially with long term contracts you need to demonstrate an effort to resolve the matter before you can get the legal system to work for you. If you go straight to court without a final warning and a demonstrable attempt to mediate, the judge will tell you to do your homework first.

            I am FAR more evil than that: I only push very gently, and especially banks make massive mistakes when you get them to think you're ignorant, thus providing their own rope. Once you have enough of that, you knot a nice noose and calmly hang it around their neck in court. It's quite fun to see it dawn on the other party that they've basically hung themselves and that there's really no way out.

            Trust me, it's well worth the wait..

      2. Hans 1
        Linux

        Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

        @Nate

        Why do you put up with this crap ? WHY ?

        What I say: I pay, I get service as per contract, OR YOU REFUND ME NOW and I f* off to the competition!

        HP: Yes, sir, but I cannot ....

        What I say: Oh, not really my problem, is it ... I paid for service, I get service or YOU PAY ME BACK NOW and I go off to competition, second, AND .... LAST reminder on my part.

        HP: Mmh, sir ....

        What I say: Now, introduce me to your manager if you will, this is your company's last chance to retain me as a customer.

        Remember, you pay THEM for a service they MUST provide, or you go elsewhere.

        Of course, if you rely on proprietary BS software, you cannot do that and have to bend over ... next time, go open source freet@rd software ... you get none of that, coz, well, you can switch from RedHat to Suse to Oracle (for the LOL's), to Canonical, or to whatever ... with hardly any incidence ... Ok, a little more when switching to Canoncial coz some tools are slightly different ...

    2. TheVogon

      Re: Renegotiation is the issue, this is:

      "will have no choice but to negotiate and purchase new support contracts."

      Nope - doesn't say that! Says that you will no longer be able to reinstate them. Implication is that you will have to buy new product / licences to be supported...

  2. tfewster

    There is some rationale to this...

    ... if your kit has been maintained by a third party (or not maintained), the vendor doesn't know what state it's in and it's likely to be more costly to support. Plus you're "buying" all the patches with your backdated support payment.

    And Informix used to give massive discounts on new software release to anyone with a support contract; IIRC, it was cheaper to backdate 3 years of support payments for Informix v4 and upgrade than buy v5 without the discount

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Unhappy

      Re: There is some rationale to this...

      Its tough, but support customers who pop up again after a long absence often do so because they have hit a wall and need inordinate amounts of hand-holding, plus they "need to pay for the last XX months of updates they have missed".

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Under what circumstance would a firm whose support contract had lapsed without much action suddenly want to renew it?

    I think the obvious answer explains vendor policy here. There's a very high risk they're walking into an epic shitstorm.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      > "Under what circumstance would a firm whose support contract had lapsed without much action suddenly want to renew it?"

      A firm whose IT department was run by a bunch of utter, fucking muppets who never documented anything, who later quit and left a complete clusterfuck for the sorry-arsed sods who were lied to about the extent of the mess, and discovered too late how bad it truly was.

      < Anon, as I'm one of those sorry-arsed individuals.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "Under what circumstance would a firm whose support contract had lapsed without much action suddenly want to renew it?"

      Given that the vendor is HP, because they have been fighting for yonks to get a salesperson who knows their way around the ordering system well enough to sign them up for a renewal.

  4. Whitter
    Mushroom

    "Dear Valued Customer"

    Don't you just hate that shit?

    Does anyone read it without thinking "f*** *ff" quietly in the heads?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "Dear Valued Customer"

      "Dear customer that has $ we value" would be a bit more intellectually honest.

  5. nijam Silver badge

    "Dear Valued Customer" means "Dear Valuable source of cash flow". Just business jargon, pay no heed.

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