Sage 100

With the fairly recent introduction of Sage's new Silver and Gold plans for Sage 100 which now come with X support cases, have any of you been taking the somewhat logical position of using those cases when needing to call Sage on that particular client's behalf assuming they do in fact have a Silver or Gold plan? I say ""logical"" because if the client is calling the Business Partner for support/assistance, chances are they won't have the need to use the cases on their own.

I'm curious to know what everyone thinks now of this, too. Originally that seemed to be the consensus, but then when I, at least, have started touting the 5 cases as a benefit of the silver plan, it seems maybe it's not a good idea to then use them up for the client.

I would call in on the customers cases -- wasn't that what Sage was touting with this whole smoke and mirrors fee increase? Most customers are probably not calling so unless there's a huge problem I would think 5 would suffice for the year. Now if you exceed their 5 cases -- that's the real question. Do you charge them extra (I probably would NOT though I'd want to know what caused that many calls and if it was some risky thing or they insisted on calling all the time I'd probably go up on their fee about 2x what I thought I'd consume in Sage costs for support cases over-runs).

My understanding from Support is that the client needs to set you up as an authorized contact before Support will let you use one of their cases.

One of our people called in to support for a client and the tech said he wasn't going to use a case on it. So our person said, ""Are you actually 'using' cases now?"" and Sage said something along the lines of, ""If the customer has a gold or silver plan, you can call all you want and neither you nor the the customer will be charged a case."" Now, I don't know if my guy misunderstood or what but that is NOT what my understanding was. Others experiences??

What do you need Sage Tech support when 90Minds is more responsive, accurate and easier to work with?

I'm pretty sure if the customer has a gold plan, the call isn't supposed to count against your case count.

I am never sure who gets charged - this policy seems to change based on some internal metric as Sage that's not shared with us. Even when I ask Sage if the call is charged I am not completely sure.

I had to call Sage Tech Supp the other day, so I tried to open a case under the client, but the Rep wouldn't let me since I'm not a Contact on their Sage Account. So it appears @LeonardSmith hit it - although I still think it may depend on which Rep you get and how good you are at talking the talk. I'll have to try again next time.

Wasn't one of Sage't terribly misleading reasons for enacting added costs that partners were providing support to customers ""not on plan"". In this case - not on plan = not on a SAGE PHONE support plan (but they WERE on Bronze). I had thought one of Sage's twisted concepts was these cases would capture the customer support inquiries. Maybe I was not paying attention (and the whole announcement of enacting forced phone support will likely go down as the single biggest partner relationship wrecker for Sage)

@BrettZimmerman is right. We called on behalf of a customer who has Gold plan and the rep insisted on getting our partner id. Crazy.

Just found out from someone in our office that if you can have the client on the phone with you when you talk to the Sage Tech Supp Rep, the client can give verbal approval in order to use one of the client's Support Cases. And I can't imagine the client would have to stay on the phone, but who knows. Or of course you also have the (ethical?) option to use one of the valid Contact names on the client's Sage account. Just be sure to give a gender-appropriate name. :) unless you're good at doing voices.

The deal was supposed to be if the customer is on Gold you were allowed to used their cases.

How cheesy is it that you need to get a customer on the phone. In my opinion Sage should either verify you are a certified partner -- and leave you alone. Or if you're Freddy Freelancer managing the IT you get the customer on the phone. What's so hard about that?

Cheesy is rather polite ... ridiculous is more to the mark.