topic Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support? in Network Access Control

Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

adamscottmaster2013 — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 15:08:26 GMT

TAC support has gotten really bad for the past few years. I've many cases opened and it just drags on for months without any resolutions. The TAC engineers are not very responsive. For example, I opened a TAC case on 06/24 for an issue. I got a response back on the same day, provided the engineer everything he requested. I haven't heard from him since. The SE support the account is any better, completely clueless.

Anyone experiencing the same issue?

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

derek.andrew — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 15:26:00 GMT

I have seen Cisco TAC support be less that what it was in the past (mostly due to hiring of contractors), but a quick call for support to another vendor in Redmond Washington quickly shows me that Cisco TAC is still gold and just needs a bit of polishing.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Aref Alsouqi — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 17:03:16 GMT

I think the main "issue" that would cause TAC to delay with their responses and to provide "unsure" responses sometimes is the amount of new technologies they are dealing with. Many times it happened that TAC asked to give them some time to lab things up to trying to replicate the exact environment to reproduce the issues. Personally, I do still think TAC is still good, but they defo seem to be much much busier than before, and sometimes struggle to give answers due to many software bugs that we are seeing on a few products. If you feel the tickets are taking longer than expected, you would try to escalate the case to engineer leader, nothing wrong with that, it just sometimes would be the only way to move things faster.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Marvin Rhoads — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 17:39:31 GMT

I've been seeing the same across multiple product lines and with multiple geographic TAC locations. I have brought it up via multiple Cisco venues and not seen any positive outcomes to date.

From what I can tell, Cisco has decided that the "old" TAC model was too good and is now pushing customers to buy higher cost support packages to get what used to be included with regular Smartnet.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

ahollifield — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 18:49:08 GMT

agree with @Marvin Rhoads here.... But Cisco TAC is still great compared to the competition.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Leo Laohoo — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 06:13:25 GMT

@adamscottmaster2013 wrote:

The TAC engineers are not very responsive. For example, I opened a TAC case on 06/24 for an issue. I got a response back on the same day, provided the engineer everything he requested. I haven't heard from him since.

The initial email where the TAC agent introduces themselves always contain the email address of their supervisor. I would recommend either doing the following:

Email the TAC agent and CC the supervisor and request for an update.
Contact Cisco TAC over the phone and request for the case to be re-queued to another engineer.

NOTE: There are three TAC "regions": North America/LATAM, Europe (ME & Africa), Asia (Asia, Australia/NZ).

WARNING: Have the TAC Cases are assigned to NAM/LATAM, and Europe (ME&A) regions only (and nowhere else).

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Marcelo Morais — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 00:09:51 GMT

Hi @adamscottmaster2013 ,

I would like to add just one thing from what @Leo Laohoo said:

For options 1. and 2.: request a change in Case Severity from P4 to P3, P3 to P2 or P2 to P1 !!!

Note: remember that you can always count on us at Cisco Community : )

Hope this helps !!!

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Damien Miller — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 00:44:18 GMT

I deal with customers who have the High Touch TAC offering, I haven't noticed any degradation of support. I do however always open the case with a webex space and ask for an update when I need/want, I feel it's more conversational, informal, and maybe less pressure on the engineer to spend extra time formatting an email. It suits my preferred communication style and they are easier to track than emails.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Arne Bier — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 06:28:42 GMT

I might give that a try - although I am based in Australia I wouldn't mind seeing what it's like dealing with a TAC engineer in the Americas/EMEAR. I don't think Sydney has a TAC anymore. At least, not for ISE.

I remember the days when you could call TAC and have an engineer who could read the IOS C source code - and tell you why OSPF was not converging. 😄

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

adamscottmaster2013 — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 12:41:14 GMT

I replied to the email and CC's their supervisor(s) on it. Nothing. Re-queued to another engineer? Same result. I am glad I don't use Cisco Firewall anymore in the environment.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Marcelo Morais — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 13:22:15 GMT

Hi @adamscottmaster2013 ,

in this case, the ONLY solution is to talk to the TAC Duty Manager (please take a look at How to Engage with Cisco TAC).

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Leo Laohoo — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 22:44:22 GMT

@adamscottmaster2013 wrote:

I replied to the email and CC's their supervisor(s) on it. Nothing. Re-queued to another engineer?

Get it re-queued to another engineer. Make sure the cases stays on NAM/LATAM or Europe desk only.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Leo Laohoo — Mon, 18 Jul 2022 23:19:30 GMT

@Arne Bier

Have your ISE cases queued to NAM/LATAM and/or EMEA desks only and never get it queued anywhere else.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Leo Laohoo — Sat, 06 Aug 2022 10:46:11 GMT

@Leo Laohoo wrote:
Have your ISE cases queued to NAM/LATAM and/or EMEA desks only and never get it queued anywhere else.

All SEA/Australia/NZ ISE cases go to Eastern Europe (for now).

Anyone in SEA/Australia/NZ creating cases for:

LAN/WAN (excludes Nexus, thank G0d)
Wireless (includes PI and MSE/CMX)
UC
RMA

Make sure to route TAC Cases to NAM/LATAM and/or EMEA desks and nowhere else. If in doubt, look at the email signature of the TAC agent and it will specify the time zone they operate on. If they are not in the areas I have specified, get it re-queued to the correct area.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Sheraz.Salim — Sun, 07 Aug 2022 20:05:16 GMT

I have had a similar suitation. I also find the TAC support is not up-to-date as it was few years ago. For example, in my case major P1 case opened and myself working with a TAC first line support engineer. where I have to push him to bring in his team leader to fast track the problem/fix the issue.

on other time the TAC engineer was not very helpful. as some one mentioned as the new technology are eveloving so TAC need time to replicate the issue. In my experience, some time TAC can not repliacte the issue if you have a physical appliances issue. or software is complex where its heavily used (configuration wise). I recently came across an physical issue with FMC/FTD where we were using the physical appliances and TAC engineer mentioned he need to get a permission into to replicate this issue. according to him the virutal appliance no issue at your. TAC can get their hand on it any time but when it come to physical appliances they need permission.

In other case the TAC engineer is too slow to respond even all the infomration was provided. I even CC Manager,team leader etc but they never bother to email back.

I also come to suitation where engineer agreed to meet up (day before we agreed on time) but at the webex meeting engineer never showed up.

I had these issue with having the smartnet contract and also with PSS contract same outcome. we could not afforad the HTTS services so no idea what it is like. but what i have heard is HTTS is the elite TAC eningeers how maste the technology on different platform.

on the other side. I also came across some very bright TAC Engineer. with so much experience and having a good command on the software. where you just say to yourself WOW.... This TAC Engineer is Dam good.

To summaries,

TAC India is good. Poland good too. Jordon is okay this is where they need imporvement. it also depends which technology area you having issue with. The security technology TAC teams are in Poland, Jordan, and India.

if you not happy with TAC or how they dealing with your case/s. you can always feedback to the email once tac close the case an email always come to your inbox from Cisco Customer Experience the subject is 2 Minutes -Your TAC Experience.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Leo Laohoo — Sun, 07 Aug 2022 23:39:49 GMT

@Sheraz.Salim wrote:
I had these issue with having the smartnet contract and also with PSS contract same outcome. we could not afforad the HTTS services so no idea what it is like. but what i have heard is HTTS is the elite TAC eningeers how maste the technology on different platform.

The success of this forum is really telling -- Murmurs are getting louder about HTTS. (Read between the lines.)

@Sheraz.Salim wrote:
TAC India is good.

Depends on the "technology" the case is in. I have several TAC Cases with them and we are about to "push the button" and move every one of those cases to NAM. Every. One. Of. Them.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Philip D'Ath — Mon, 08 Aug 2022 00:18:03 GMT

I'm with @Leo Laohoo , have the case re-queued to another engineer.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

travisss — Thu, 13 Oct 2022 18:02:54 GMT

I have had some bad experiences with anything that has to do with cucm call manager. I do not know why that is. But anything else I haven't had issues with.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

travisss — Thu, 13 Oct 2022 18:04:40 GMT

True that.

Re: Anyone happy with Cisco TAC support?

Rwhinsley — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 16:15:33 GMT

Every ticket is an absolute nightmare anymore. You get better service at McDonalds